Bookshare Reader User Reviews

Name: Bookshare Reader
Rating: 3.3 (67 reviews)

Bookshare Reader

Benetech

📚 Education

📚 Books

Customer Experience

Positive experience34.5% of reviews

Neutral21.8% of reviews

Negative experience43.6% of reviews

~ Based on 55 written reviews from the US App Store.

Is Bookshare Reader Safe?

Bookshare Reader has mixed safety signals based on user ratings. AppsHunter Safety Score for Bookshare Reader is 67/100.

This assessment is based on 67 user ratings, with an App Store average of 3.3/5.

Safety Analysis

52.2% of ratings point to a safe experience

13.4% of ratings suggest some concerns

34.3% of ratings point to a risky experience

~ Based on 67 App Store ratings for Bookshare Reader.

Is Bookshare Reader Legit?

Bookshare Reader appears legitimate, with a few gaps. AppsHunter Legitimacy Score for Bookshare Reader is 78/100.

Based on 78 of 100 points across 7 verification signals from App Store and developer data.

Top reviews

Most Recent Highest Rated Lowest Rated

Amazing for dyslexic people

The interface is great and this app helped me read all of my college textbooks. I’m so happy about the new voices for text to speech- they sound super realistic which is something that was lacking before. Also it’s nice to be able to download free books and read them offline too

Jaydenhayyy

a month ago

Response from developer

We're thrilled the app has helped you read your college textbooks and glad the new voices are landing well; a lot of work went into making them sound more natural and we're continuing to improve them. Enjoy the offline reading, and thanks for taking the time to share this!

Recent update added problems

Use previous versions of Bookshare reader. Recent update added prolonged pause at the end of each sentence. Even if the words are sped up, there’s a one second pause between paragraphs, sentences, and any page breaks. Attempted to navigate fixing it, and it is not fixable at this point. I will only be using website until next update. Hopefully it improves.

Jen-chan

2 months ago

Response from developer

Thank you for flagging this. The pausing issue should be fixed now (available in our latest update). We'd love for you to give the mobile app another try and let us know if read-aloud is working better for you now. If you run into any more issues, our team at mobilereader@benetech.org actively reviews and responds to all incoming feedback. Reach out any time.

Amazing app but it has a bit of a bug that makes it difficult to use

I have been a user of bookshare since I was in 7th grade on the old read to go app and now as an adult on an individual membership. It’s the best thing to happen for blind people so that we can access books and information. However, there appears to be a new emerging bug. My library is not syncing across my devices. When I download a book on my ipad to read, it doesn’t download on my phone which is logged into the same account, I have to go manually go download it on my phone too. Reading lists also don’t sync. If I start reading a book on one device, I can’t pick up on another later, it also doesn’t save progress. I don’t know if I’m being unreasonable, but I feel like books should sync across devices and your most recent position in them should sync across devices. I had managed to keep syncing the read to go app to all my new devices until a couple of months ago via the icloud transfer, yes it survived until 2026, but it finally quit and I have to use the new bookshare version now. Book syncing across devices was never an issue on the old read to go app, even when I was on IOS 18 using an app intended for IOS 9. Lol. If you can get this syncing issue fixed on the bookshare reader app I will switch my review to five stars. Thanks.

Ifupfpjcpydos

2 months ago

Response from developer

Thank you for taking the time to write this out in detail and for being with Bookshare from the start! Good news on two of the three areas you've mentioned: your reading lists and your reading position do sync across devices today. Reading lists: if a list isn't showing up on a second device, the screen is likely showing cached data. With VoiceOver on, a three-finger swipe down on the screen will refresh it and pull in the latest version of your reading lists. Reading position: this is saved to your account, not the device. If you read to page 50 on your iPad, download that same book on your iPhone and select "Read Now", and it will open at page 50. Downloading a book on each device is expected behavior today and enables you to read whether or not you have a stable internet connection. That said, we absolutely hear you, and we've heard the same request from other readers. So no you're not being unreasonable at all! We're actively exploring offering both (download-to-read-offline and streaming) so you can pick whichever works best for you. Thank you for all of these questions and feedback. Please don't hesitate to reach out to us at mobilereader@bookshare.org if there are more areas you'd like to discuss. We aim to earn those additional stars from you, so please keep in touch!

Help

I like this app and use it a lot but after the most recent update it won’t work I opened a manga (I thing I spelled that wrong) and I can not go to the next page it is stuck on the copy right please fix

Boookcatt

2 months ago

Bookshare has made significant improvements

In 2025 I would have described the Bookshare app as below expectations for an eReader app. In 2026 we’ve seen lots of improvements such as synced reading lists and so many other quality of life improvements that make the app easier to use. Creating accessible tech is hard and the Bookshare team is doing a good job addressing community concerns. As a blind person my mobile devices are my go-to in part because the screen reader and controls are easier to use, so the mobile version of platforms like Bookshare working as expected is expected. Already looking forward to half two of this year and what will come next.

Thehonkinggoose

2 months ago

Response from developer

Thank you for your support and stay tuned for new features and updates coming soon.

Amazing opportunity for print disabilities, horrible app 🤣

I love what Benetech is doing here. It’s an awesome opportunity for people like myself with documented disabilities! This rating has nothing to do with that. The app itself is so bad. The website is awesome, with many different formats and accessible audio readers, like AvaMultilingual on Edge. However, this app has so many issues. Whenever I try reading, a glitch will happen which will cause the pages to disappear. So I have to exit the book to read again. And this happens quite frequently, every time I use the reading app, multiple times a session. I also occasionally have trouble downloading books that I already have access to. Besides that, I love Bookshare, and it’s just a great movement for disability rights and access!

AsianTism

3 months ago

SUGGESTIONS FOR CREATORS

PLEASE make highlighting available for textbooks!!! When it comes time to find something for a paper or quiz, I need access to highlights.

Also, PLEASE make it easier to navigate the Contents menu! I have to scroll all the way down every single time. Where I am in the text should be highlighted in the contents and the menu should automatically be scrolled to my location.

Also some of my textbooks in Bookshare are missing essential video content.

Thanks!

Storm Trooper W

3 months ago

Response from developer

Thanks for bringing this to our attention! The current location scroll and indicator in the table of contents have been fixed — please download the latest version from the App Store to get the update. Highlighting is on our roadmap. Thanks again!

Book-share Reader

I still can’t read a book from the app even newly downloaded books and I’m using the exact same password from the password I use on my Chromebook at school and I need to know if that’s what might be causing it not to work.

Noah Vowell

6 months ago

Book-share Reader

I keep trying to reed a book from the app on my phone and it won’t load, it’s been like this for three days

Noah Vowell

7 months ago

Bugs

I love it but constant bugs and crashes. Only way I get accessible books but it is so so buggy

Doggg swaggg

8 months ago

Background Play Works

Background play works great now. Way easier to listen to my books. Thank you for making this update.

eva11!

a year ago

Response from developer

Thank you so much for the review!

Bookshare Error

I use this app and it has been shutting down when I try to type anything at all on my macbook. this means I cannot sign in nor search for the books I need. Please fix this

lilly undertale

a year ago

Response from developer

Thank you for bringing this up, we're currently looking to improve the Mac experience. Please reach out to mobilereader@benetech.org for more details or feature requests. Thank you!

Good morning Bookshare team I really love the Bookshare reader application. Keep up the great work.

Good morning Bookshare reader developer my name is Ulises Gomez, I really enjoy this application a lot I would like to see the background play future on a future update. Keep them coming. I love Bookshare Reader.

Ulises waffles

a year ago

Response from developer

Thank you for your valuable feedback! We appreciate your input and are excited to share that we are currently working on adding the background text-to-speech functionality. Stay tuned for updates—we hope to launch this feature in the coming months!

Minor improvements for voiceover users

2025-02-23: The latest update fixes the ability to adjust speaking speed, however, you can only adjust the speed by 20% at a time. A way to enter a specific speed would be much more useful. There is still no access to any reading lists you've created so you'll have to search for those titles all over again or switch to using EasyReader which is what they recommended to me.

Original Review: The latest version does fix the ability to get to the audio sub page in settings, however, it is not possible to adjust the speaking rate at all. The whole point of getting to the audio sub page is to adjust settings so you would think the developer would test Basic features of this app with voiceover before pushing out an update. Hopefully more effort goes into future releases.

WhiplashZamboniMan

2 years ago

It’s finally fixed

For the past few months, I’ve had difficulty with this app crashing. Even though I updated the app and my phone it was problematic at first. Suddenly after the final iOS update and a few other app updates for this… Everything came out fine. Whenever I don’t want to use my braille display for a book… I turned to this app. I’m glad I can alternate between both my braille display and my Bookshare app. I hope it stays perfectly fine this time.

305cas

2 years ago

Response from developer

Sorry to hear about that, please try updating to the latest version. We believe this should be fixed, let us know if issues persist. Thank you for your patience!

Good morning Bookshare team I really love the Bookshare reader application. Keep up the great work.

Ulises waffles

2 years ago

Response from developer

App consistency

I love the app and use it for school. I would like it if the app was the same on every platform. Specifically if I was it on my windows desktop there is an icon to tap and it tells me the percentage of the section I have completed reading. On Apple or mobile devices their icon is not available. It’s useful to tell how much I have left without scrolling to the end. Please top this feature on mobile devices.

donald7777777

2 years ago

Response from developer

Thank you for your feedback! We appreciate your suggestion and will take it into account for future updates.

The app crashes

The app has been crashing for the past week and a half. Unsure why that is. My firmware is up to the latest update so far. I have updated the actual Bookshare Reader app and that’s when all the nightmares started.

305cas

2 years ago

Response from developer

Sorry to hear about that, please try updating to the latest version. We believe this should be fixed, let us know if issues persist. Thank you for your patience!

Keeps crashing

Love this app but would appreciate a fix….every time I click a new book or the profile button my app crashes.

jacobwjfjfla

2 years ago

Response from developer

Sorry to hear about that, please try updating to the latest version. We believe this should be fixed, let us know if issues persist. Thank you for your patience!

App is crashing repeatedly

I love this resource. It was working beautifully until recently. Now it is crashing and some of the books I had added for a research paper have disappeared.

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