Read Scripture vs SWAN Libraries +
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Read Scripture
This app guides users through a year-long Bible reading plan, enhanced by explanatory videos. It aims to help individuals discover the truth and beauty of God's Word through a curated experience.
- Year-long Bible reading plan
- Creative explanatory videos
- Book of the Bible explanations
- Gospel theological themes
- Tips for Bible reading
- Community or solo experience
Read full descriptionHide full description
The goal of Read Scripture is that everyone would read the Bible for themselves and discover the truth and beauty of God’s Word. To this end, we are curating a year-long Bible reading plan and supplementing the reading with amazingly creative videos (produced by our friends at the Bible Project) that explain every book of the Bible, major theological themes of the gospel, and tips on how to read the Bible. We house all of this content in a beautifully designed app that is available to download in the App Store. We encourage you to experience Read Scripture in community but it is set up so that you can go through it on your own. Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
SWAN Libraries +
Access your library account, search a vast catalog, and manage holds and renewals. Download ebooks and audiobooks directly to your device. This app connects you to a consortium of public, academic, school, and special libraries in the Chicagoland area.
- Manage library account
- Search library catalog
- Renew items
- Place holds
- Download ebooks
- Download audiobooks
Read full descriptionHide full description
SWAN is a library consortium of public, academic, school, and special libraries in the Chicagoland area. Manage your account, search the catalog, renew and place holds on books, download ebooks and audiobooks, and more. Visit your library including: • Acorn (Oak Forest) • Addison • Alsip-Merrionette Park • Batavia • Bedford Park • Beecher • Bellwood • Bensenville • Berkeley • Berwyn • Bloomingdale • Blue Island • Bridgeview • Broadview • Brookfield • Calumet City • Calumet Park • Carol Stream • Chicago Heights • Chicago Ridge • Cicero • Clarendon Hills • Crestwood • Crete • Dolton • Downers Grove • Eisenhower (Harwood Heights and Norridge) • Elmwood Park • Evergreen Park • Flossmoor • Forest Park • Frankfort • Franklin Park • Geneva • Glen Ellyn • Glenside • Glenwood-Lynwood • Grande Prairie (Country Club Hills and Hazel Crest) • Green Hills (Palos Hills) • Harvey • Hillside • Hinsdale • Hodgkins • Homewood • Indian Prairie (Darien, Willowbrook, and Burr Ridge) • Itasca • Justice • Kaneville • La Grange • La Grange Park • Lansing • Lyons • Markham • McCook • Matteson • Maywood • Melrose Park • Messenger (North Aurora) • Midlothian • Nancy McConathy (Sauk Village) • North Riverside • Oak Brook • Oak Lawn • Oak Park • Palos Heights • Palos Park • Park Forest • Prairie Trails (Burbank and Nottingham Park) • Richton Park • River Forest • River Grove • Riverdale • Roselle • Schiller Park • South Holland • St. Charles • Steger • Stickney-Forest View • Sugar Grove • Summit • Thomas Ford • Thornton • Tinley Park • Town and Country (Elburn) • University Park • Westchester • Villa Park (Villa Park and Oakbrook Terrace) • Warrenville • West Chicago • Westmont • William Leonard (Robbins) • Wood Dale • Woodridge • Worth • National University of Health Sciences • Theosophical Society • Morton Arboretum
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is review sentiment: Read Scripture at 87% against SWAN Libraries +'s 13%. Read Scripture also leads on rating (4.8 vs 1.8) and ratings volume (1.8K vs 73). On price, update cadence, ads and in-app purchases there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
Read Scripture holds the better App Store score, 4.8 against 1.8. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Read Scripture has 1.8K ratings behind it against 73, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 87% of Read Scripture's written reviews are positive against 13% of SWAN Libraries +'s.
Read Scripture ships an update every 5 weeks, SWAN Libraries + monthly. The most recent releases landed on September 17, 2026 and September 6, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Read Scripture | SWAN Libraries + |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.8 (1.8K ratings) — better | 1.8 (73 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 87.3% of reviews — better | 13.2% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 1.8K — better | 73 |
| Update frequency | Every 5 weeks | Monthly — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free | Free |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod | iPhone, iPad, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 15.1 | 15.1 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 103 MB | 37 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Crazy Love Ministries | System Wide Automated Network |
Customer experience
Read Scripture
SWAN Libraries +
User reviews
Read Scripture
From 1.8K App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 💡 Helpful videos provide context and overview of each book
- 👍 Organized reading plan with Psalms
- 🚀 Streamlined and intuitive interface
- 👍 Visually appealing design and animations
- 💡 Ability to set your own start date
Room to improve
- 🐛 Progress and reading position sometimes gets reset after updates
- 🔋 Videos can't be downloaded for offline viewing
- 🔍 Lack of verse numbers makes it harder to reference specific passages
- 🔍 Limited translation options (only ESV)
SWAN Libraries +
From 73 App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 👍 Easy to look up books
- 👍 Can place holds easily
- 👍 Can see checked out books
- 👍 Get notified for pick up
- 👍 Digital library card available
Room to improve
- 🐛 App crashes frequently
- 🐛 Constantly logs out users
- 🐛 Slow loading times
- 🐛 Filters do not work
- 🐛 Discover section is blank
Bugs and requests
Read Scripture
Reported bugs
3 issues- Videos sometimes fail to load or play
- App crashes or freezes on certain devices
- Reading position not always saved correctly
Requested features
6 requests- Add ability to highlight, take notes, and bookmark passages
- Incorporate audio narration of the Bible text
- Provide a dark mode option for easier reading
- Allow syncing of reading progress across devices
- Integrate more Bible Project theme videos
Show 1 moreShow fewer
- Add option to select different Bible translations
SWAN Libraries +
Reported bugs
63 issues- Category toggles are tricky and don't reflect changes immediately
- Pick up location changes don't seem to stick
- App logs users out constantly
- Discover section is blank, new content doesn't appear
- Filters to search for items no longer work
Show 58 moreShow fewer
- App works less than 50% of the time
- App is logged out every session, requires re-entry of library card number
- Cannot sign back in after being signed out
- Keyboard and Number pad do not work on login screen
- App takes forever to load
- App is impossible to customize
- App is clunky and has very little options
- App kicks users out for no reason
- App is generally unreliable
- App is not smart or intuitive
- App is buggy and unreliable
- App is consistently closing out and logs users out at random
- Filters for searches frequently don't work
- Buggy mediocre app
- Search requires retyping the entire field
- Filters by media format show results of filtered-out formats
- Filtering by library only shows home library and eVideo
- App crashes constantly
- App is slow
- App is signed out for no reason on a weekly basis
- App locks up iPhone before login
- App asks for Library Card # and return from keypad does NOT work
- App crashes on startup
- App is bricked after latest update
- Categories on discover page aren't linked or showing selected ones
- Tapping account icon and menus has a delay, leading to double taps
- Search filtering doesn't work
- Offline ecard access doesn't work
- Cannot select library location to get past initial screen
- Error when requesting certain holds
- App won't open
- App immediately crashes
- App crashes when it starts
- App won't open anymore, just crashes immediately
- Tapping holds crashes app
- App startup is cumbersome, requires selecting library each time and reading trivia screens
- Tapping my holds list keeps crashing the app
- Notifications are enabled but app says they are not
- App doesn’t support automatic iOS light/dark mode
- Correct login info returned as incorrect on first input
- Forgot PIN link returns a blank window
- Progress bar is choppy and not indicative of loading time
- Brightness doesn't return to original setting after using ecard
- Double/back to back loading icons at the start of future app launches
- App keeps crashing and/or losing account info during a session
- Old app was working fine, new app is a mess
- Filters are ignored
- App is extremely limited in functionality
- Categories like New DVDS do not open/populate
- App asks to allow notifications EVERY TIME
- For every book ordered, user has to input their library
- App is slow to start up
- App provides no convenient access to the library
- Facial recognition to open app should be available
- In notifications, enable all switch is confusing with individual alerts
- App is slow to load
- Have to force quit and go back in to see account info
- App is buggy
Requested features
38 requests- Fix the issue of being logged out every session
- Improve category toggles and make changes stick
- Fix discover section to show new content
- Make filters work correctly
- Add app support to website
Show 33 moreShow fewer
- Improve loading times
- Allow customization
- Add more options
- Fix the issue of being kicked out of the app
- Improve reliability
- Make the app smarter and more intuitive
- Fix glitching and bugs
- Improve loading screen experience
- Ensure changes to pick up locations stick
- Allow retyping search fields instead of full retype
- Fix filter results to match selected media formats
- Allow filtering by any library, not just home library
- Add self checkout option
- Add facial recognition to open app
- Improve notification enabling process
- Add variety to loading screen facts
- Add a report feedback option
- Improve backward compatibility for older iOS versions
- Add a spinner or hourglass for loading
- Make categories on discover page linked
- Allow users to select library every time or remember it
- Add a submit or go button after entering library card number
- Add a percentage to the progress bar
- Add more fun facts with variety
- Ensure brightness returns to original setting after using ecard
- Remove double loading icons
- Fix 'Forgot PIN' link to work
- Add option to create a new account
- Include all libraries in the pick-up location list
- Add a search guidance for users
- Make the app less annoying with notification prompts
- Add a dark mode option
- Improve the discover page functionality
In-app purchases
Read Scripture
No in-app purchases
SWAN Libraries +
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is Read Scripture free?
Is SWAN Libraries + free?
Which has better reviews, Read Scripture or SWAN Libraries +?
Do Read Scripture or SWAN Libraries + have ads?
Which is updated more often, Read Scripture or SWAN Libraries +?
Other comparisons
