Comparison

StoryGraph vs TBR

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

StoryGraph

Track your reading habits with insightful stats and personalized book recommendations powered by AI. Discover new books based on mood, pace, and genre, and connect with friends for shared reading experiences.

Highlights
  • Import Goodreads data
  • Personalized book recommendations
  • Track reading habits with stats
  • Discover books by mood and pace
  • Read with friends (buddy reads)
  • Custom reading challenges
  • Content warnings for books
Features
Read full description

Import your Goodreads data: We will import all of your currently-reading, read, to-read, and did-not-finish shelves. Any custom shelves will be mapped to a custom tag on The StoryGraph. Simple tracking and insightful stats: Easily track and learn about your reading habits with our wide range of charts and graphs. See how your reading develops over time and use that to help you pick better books. Get smart personalized recommendations: Our machine learning AI is like your trusted go-to friend for book recommendations. It'll understand your reading preferences and find the best books for you. Discover books by mood: In the mood for something adventurous, funny, and fast-paced? What about a darker, slower, more emotional read? Mix and match our comprehensive set of filters to choose your next perfect book. Read with friends: Add live reactions to specific parts of the book without fear of spoilers. Comments are locked for other participants until they reach that point in their reading. Don't have people to read with? We’ve got machine learning-powered suggestions for great reading buddies. Reading Challenges: Want to read one book from every country in the world? Or how about read a book per week across a range of genres? Our reading challenges feature help you set up personal goals or join in with others. Custom Tags: Enhance your book tracking and discovery by making use of our custom tags feature. You can search and filter books by your tags and share curated lists with friends. Content Warnings: When you review a book, you can let us know if there's any content within it that might be triggering for others. Then, when searching for your next read, all of this information is at your disposal. Features: • Import your Goodreads account • Sync with Kobo • Reading charts and graphs • Streaks • Favorites • Buddy reads • Readalongs • Book Clubs • Personalized machine learning recommendations • Follow your friends to see what they're reading • Annual reading, page, and listening goals • Search/browse books by mood, pace, and more • Custom tags • Lists to share with your friends or the public • Create your own reading challenge or join in with others • Dark Mode • Barcode Scanner • Giveaways • Browse similar books • Find similar users • Half and quarter star ratings • Built-in DNF (Did Not Finish) functionality (including tracking pages read) • Progress updates with built-in reading journal • Author-approved and user-submitted content warnings Want to support an independent, Goodreads alternative? Consider upgrading to Plus! • Keep the platform ad-free: You'll help The StoryGraph stay independent! • Custom Charts: Create your own pie and bar charts. • Extra Stats Filters: Filter down your stats to a custom time period, or view stats for your fiction or nonfiction reads, your custom tags, any particular mood or genre, and more. • Custom Wrap-Up Graphics: Pick any custom date range and instantly generate shareable graphics for your reading. • Compare Stats: Compare any two stats segments of your StoryGraph library, whether that's a particular year against a custom time period, your To-Read Pile against your owned books, or a combination of several other options. You can also compare any stats segment with any segment from any other user — mix and match however you like. • Exclusive Charts: When comparing your reading across two different years, see exclusive year-on-year charts on the number of books read and their genres. • Shape the roadmap: You get to vote and comment on upcoming features as well as submit official requests for new ones • Priority Support: Your support tickets and requests for book information updates will be handled first Privacy Policy: https://app.thestorygraph.com/privacy Terms of Service:https://app.thestorygraph.com/terms-of-service

About

TBR

Easily track your reading progress, organize your book lists, and discover new titles through curated book news. Scan books with a barcode, add them manually, and sort them by various criteria. Get personalized recommendations and export your library.

Highlights
  • Track books to read, reading, and read
  • Organize books into custom lists
  • Barcode scanner for quick book entry
  • Discover new books via curated news feeds
  • Get 'More Like This' book recommendations
  • Import from Goodreads
  • Export to spreadsheet formats
Features
Read full description

TBR is a fast, elegant and modern place to track your reading. The books you want to read (your TBR, To Be Read), the books you are reading, and the books you've read. You can also organize your books into custom lists of your own choosing. Get inspiration by reading Book News from our 1000+ curated book news sources. TBR contains a Book News browser, essentially a curated collection of RSS feeds, with links back to the original sources. Bookship will identify books in each story and easily let you save them, remembering where you found the book. TRACK BOOKS Add a book by name by searching our database, or use the easy Barcode Scanner to scan books quickly into TBR. It's great when you're in a bookstore and want to remember a book for later. Using Multi-scan lets you quickly add your entire library right into TBR. Reorder your TBR list by drag-n-drop, so you can change what's coming next. Sort and filter by author, genre, title, publication date and more. Mark books as Reading, or Read, and the books are automatically added to those lists as well, and dates are automatically tracked. Keep Notes about the books you are reading. Use our Share Extension to share pages you are reading on the web to TBR. TBR extracts the books being mentioned so you can easily browse or save them. READING IDEAS TBR’s More Like This tells you related or similar books to a book you're reading. Or get reading ideas by browsing our always-timely Book News, featuring the latest in books from around the web. BOOK NEWS We've curated over a thousand high quality book news sites, and assembled their RSS feeds into a timely, beautiful view into the world of books, with links back to the original sites. You can find news about books by genre, about the books you are reading, or just what's popular right now. Browse our feeds to see news from each source individually, or browse by Channel to see book news about a particular topic. DARK MODE We support dark mode, for a particularly striking view on the world of books. IMPORT, EXPORT, SYNC Import your books from Goodreads. Export your books to a spreadsheet (Excel, CSV). All sync'd with the cloud and with Bookship, our Social Reading app, so you can plan your reading for your reading group or Book Club.

Screenshots

StoryGraph4 screens
TBR4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: StoryGraph at Free against TBR's $4.99. StoryGraph also leads on ads (none vs shown) and ratings volume (3.6K vs 6). TBR's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 2) and review sentiment (100% vs 70%). On rating, device support and iOS requirement 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

StoryGraph is free to download; TBR costs $4.99 up front. StoryGraph sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $4.99 per month. TBR asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.5 for StoryGraph against 4.3 for TBR. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: StoryGraph has 3.6K ratings behind it against 6, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews are what separate them: 70% of StoryGraph's written reviews are positive against 100% of TBR's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

StoryGraph ships an update monthly, TBR every 3 months. The most recent releases landed on November 10, 2026 and November 3, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard8 real differences · 3 level
StoryGraph versus TBR: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterStoryGraphTBR
PriceFree — better$4.99
Rating4.5 (3.6K ratings) — better4.3 (6 ratings)
Positive reviews70.3% of reviews100.0% of reviews — better
Number of ratings3.6K — better6
Update frequencyMonthly — betterEvery 3 months
AdsNo — betterYes
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFreemium — betterPaid
Best chart rank#30 — better—
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod — betteriPhone, iPad
Requires iOS15.0 — better16.0
Further details — not scored
Size3 MB56 MB
Age rating12+12+
DeveloperThe StoryGraphThe Hawaii Project, LLC

Customer experience

StoryGraph

All ratings3,594 ratings
Positive85.6%
Neutral5.0%
Negative9.4%
Written reviews1,039 reviews
Positive70.3%
Neutral12.4%
Negative17.3%

TBR

All ratings6 ratings
Positive83.3%
Neutral0.0%
Negative16.7%
Written reviews2 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Bugs and requests

StoryGraph

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • App crashes or freezes when trying to update reading progress
  • Incorrect book details and page counts
  • Login issues where users get logged out frequently

Requested features

5 requests
  • Ability to track re-reads and multiple editions of books
  • More robust social features like following friends, liking reviews
  • Barcode scanning to easily add books
  • Customizable reading challenges and goal tracking
  • Dark mode option

TBR

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

2 purchases

StoryGraph

Subscriptions2
  • The StoryGraph Plus Monthly$4.991 Month
  • The StoryGraph Plus Annual$49.991 Year
None

TBR

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is StoryGraph free?
StoryGraph is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is TBR free?
TBR costs $4.99, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, StoryGraph or TBR?
StoryGraph is rated higher. StoryGraph averages 4.5 out of 5 from 3.6K ratings, while TBR averages 4.3 from 6 ratings.
Do StoryGraph or TBR have ads?
TBR shows ads; StoryGraph does not.
Which is updated more often, StoryGraph or TBR?
StoryGraph ships an update monthly, and TBR every 3 months. Most recently, StoryGraph was updated on November 10, 2026 and TBR on November 3, 2026.

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