My Book List vs Shelfie
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
My Book List
Effortlessly catalog your personal book collection with this library organizer. Easily add books by scanning barcodes or searching online, and view your library with customizable sorting and filters. Keep track of reading status, ratings, and notes for each title.
- ISBN barcode scanning
- Online book search
- Customizable library views
- Read status and ratings
- Multi-device syncing
- Import/export library data
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Catalog your entire home library in an afternoon. Snap a photo of any shelf and the AI adds every title. No typing, no spreadsheets, no scattered notes. Trusted by 600+ readers and rated 4.1 stars on the App Store since 2011. • Catalog a 200-book shelf in five minutes. Point your camera. AI reads the spines and adds the books. • Add a single book in seconds by scanning the barcode on the back cover. • Bring your Kindle library across in one tap. No CSV juggling. • Find anything in plain English. "That biography about the architect" works. • AI sorts your shelves by genre, mood, and theme so you stop tagging by hand. • Read on iPhone, edit on iPad, look something up offline at the bookstore. Sync handles the rest. How it works: 1. Point your camera at a shelf and let AI populate your library. 2. Sort, tag, and mark books as Read, Reading, or To Read. 3. Pick up on any device. Share with friends, join a club, ask for a recommendation when you want one. Coming from another app or a spreadsheet? Import CSV, TSV, JSON, XLSX, BibTeX, or RIS files. Field mapping is built in. Real review: "I had a bunch of books I needed to inventory and the barcode scanner made it incredibly easy. Great app." BuckeyeCityCates, App Store review, 2024 Free to start with twenty books and three barcode scans. Open the app and add your first shelf. Payment will be charged to your Apple ID at confirmation of purchase. Subscription automatically renews unless auto-renew is turned off at least 24 hours before the end of the current period. Your account will be charged for renewal within 24 hours prior to the end of the current period. You can manage and cancel your subscriptions in your Account Settings on the App Store after purchase. Any unused portion of a free trial is forfeited when purchasing a subscription. Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/ Privacy Policy: https://BigBalli.com/privacy
Shelfie
Effortlessly manage your reading notes by scanning book barcodes or using your camera with advanced OCR. Organize your collection, track progress, and share insights with elegant templates. Syncs across all your devices.
- Scan books by barcode or search
- Capture notes with OCR technology
- Organize books by shelves
- Track reading progress
- Share notes with templates
- Full-text search of notes
- Export notes as PDF/HTML
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Collect your books reading notes in one place by simply pointing your camera at the paperbacks. Managing your reading notes has never been so effortless! KEY FEATURES * Find books and add to your collection by scanning bar code, searching keyword, or entering book info manually. * Take a photo of the printed text and save your reading notes in a flash, empowered by revolutionary Optimal Character Recognition (OCR) technology. * Recognize texts in 45+ languages: English, Chinese, France, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, German, Italian, and many more. * Record your reading data. * Save images directly as your notes. * Organize your books by shelves. * Create a table of contents for your books and navigate your notes by chapters. * Set short title for your notes. * Share your notes and thoughts with multiple elegantly designed templates. * Search full-text and find your notes. * Track your reading progress. * Export your notes as PDFs or HTMLs. * Support various iOS features such as Handoff, Multitasking, and Search. * Website: https://shelfie.app HIGHLIGHTS * Access your notes anywhere: Everything is synced automatically and instantly across any computer, phone, or tablet. Once you create your account, your date stays in sync so that you always have the up-to-date version of your favorite quotes and inspirations (yeah we do not rely on iCloud). * Advanced OCR technology based on Google: Fast and precise. * Auto recognition of tables of contents: Take a photo of a book’s table of contents and we automatically turn it into chapters matched with pages. * Simple, but powerful. SUBSCRIPTION We offer monthly and yearly Premium subscriptions. App Store will renews the subscription during 24 hours before it expires. You can stop the auto renewal in the system settings of iPhone. When start auto renewal in trial period, the trial will stop automatically. If you encounter any problems, please try to restart Shelfie, or tap the restore button below. Privacy: https://yanwai.net/privacy/en Terms: https://yanwai.net/terms/en SUPPORT We love hearing back from you and we are constantly improving our app based on your suggestions! E-mail: hi@yanwai.app
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is monetization model: My Book List at free with in-app purchases against Shelfie's subscription. My Book List also leads on update cadence (every 4 days vs fortnightly) and ratings volume (641 vs 201). Shelfie's advantage is rating (4.5 vs 4.1) and review sentiment (76% vs 49%). On price, ads, in-app purchases and device support 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. My Book List sells 8 in-app purchases, starting at $4.99 per month and Shelfie sells 5 in-app purchases, starting at $2.99 per month. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
Shelfie holds the better App Store score, 4.5 against 4.1. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 641 and 201 respectively. Written reviews point the same way: 49% of My Book List's written reviews are positive against 76% of Shelfie's.
My Book List ships an update every 4 days, Shelfie fortnightly. The most recent releases landed on October 30, 2026 and October 29, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | My Book List | Shelfie |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.1 (641 ratings) | 4.5 (201 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 48.5% of reviews | 76.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 641 — better | 201 |
| Update frequency | Every 4 days — better | Fortnightly |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases — better | Subscription |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, Mac | iPhone, iPad, iPod, Mac — better |
| Requires iOS | 17.0 | 15.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 41 MB | 85 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | BigBalli Consulting llc | 志鹏 刘 |
Customer experience
My Book List
Shelfie
Bugs and requests
My Book List
Reported bugs
4 issues- Books disappearing from user libraries
- Scanning and importing issues
- Crashes and freezes when using certain features
- Inconsistent behavior across iOS versions
Requested features
5 requests- Ability to sort books by series or genre
- Option to manually add book details
- Offline access to book lists
- Improved search and filtering capabilities
- Sync across multiple devices
Shelfie
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
My Book List
- Full unlock$4.991 Month
- Premium Yearly Offer$14.991 Year
- Full unlock$24.991 Year
- 500 Tokens$4.99
- 1000 Tokens$9.99
- 10000 Tokens$49.99
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- Lifetime Full Unlock$49.99
- 20000 Tokens$79.99
Shelfie
- Premium Monthly Subscription$2.991 Month
- Premium Annually Subscription$12.991 Year
- Shelfie Lifetime (for yearly)$6.99
- Shelfie Lifetime (for monthly)$14.99
- Sheifle Premium Lifetime$19.99
Questions
Is My Book List free?
Is Shelfie free?
Which has better reviews, My Book List or Shelfie?
Do My Book List or Shelfie have ads?
Which is updated more often, My Book List or Shelfie?
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