Comparison

My Book List vs Bookspine

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

Head to head
About

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.

Highlights
  • ISBN barcode scanning
  • Online book search
  • Customizable library views
  • Read status and ratings
  • Multi-device syncing
  • Import/export library data
Features
Read full description

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

About

Bookspine

Features
Read full description

The book you're reading, on your Home Screen. Bookspine is a reading widget with no subscription and no ads: add a book, and your current read — with a progress ring — sits on the Home Screen. Tap the widget to add pages without opening the app. Most reading apps keep the widget behind a subscription. Here the widget is the point, so the Small one is free, and the number of books is never limited. ■ Free ・Small widget: the book you're reading, its cover or spine, and how far you are ・Add pages right on the widget (iOS 17 interactive widgets) ・Unlimited books — no five-book cap ・Finished books stay on your shelf, free, forever ・Search by title or author, or scan the ISBN barcode ・Works without a connection: you can always add a book by hand ・Set a reading goal for this year and see how close you are ■ Bookspine Pro (one-time purchase, not a subscription) ・Medium widget: cover, progress bar, pages left, books this year ・Large widget: this year's shelf — every book you've finished, lined up ・Lock Screen widgets: your progress without unlocking ・See your shelf by spines or by covers ・Reading goal widget: how far to this year's goal, on the Home and Lock Screens ・Year in review: books per month, pages read, your thickest book and the year's shelf — past years too ・iCloud sync: books, progress and your goal, the same on all your devices — even after a new iPhone ・To-read shelf widget: your to-read pile as spines, in Medium and Large ・Import from Goodreads: bring in what you've read, are reading and want to read from your export file, in one go ・Spine colors: pick the color of any book's spine ■ The shelf Books you finish line up on a shelf, oldest to newest. Books without a cover are drawn as a spine — a colour and the title — so the shelf never has grey holes in it. ■ Privacy Your books stay on your device. Only if you turn on iCloud sync (Pro), they sync through your own iCloud between devices signed in to your Apple Account — the developer never sees them. No account, no ads, no tracking. Only anonymous usage (which screens and widget sizes are used, whether Pro was purchased) is sent to improve the app — never your books, names or any Apple identifier. You can turn it off in Settings. Turn on “Also find covers on Apple Books” in Settings to fill in covers Open Library doesn't have (off by default). Book data comes from Open Library.

Screenshots

My Book List4 screens
Bookspine3 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is device support: My Book List at 3 against Bookspine's 1. 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. My Book List sells 14 in-app purchases, starting at $4.99 per month and Bookspine sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

My Book List ships an update every 4 days, Bookspine every 3 days. The most recent releases landed on October 21, 2026 and October 13, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard1 real difference · 9 level
My Book List versus Bookspine: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterMy Book ListBookspine
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.1 (641 ratings) — better—
Positive reviews48.7% of reviews—
Number of ratings641 — better—
Update frequencyEvery 4 daysEvery 3 days — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchases—
DevicesiPhone, iPad, Mac — betteriPhone
Requires iOS17.017.0
Further details — not scored
Size41 MB3 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperBigBalli Consulting llcMinari Taniguchi

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

Bookspine

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

14 purchases

My Book List

Subscriptions3
  • Full unlock$4.991 Month
  • Premium Yearly Offer$14.991 Year
  • Full unlock$24.991 Year
One-time11
  • extra details for all books$0.99
  • Barcode scanner$0.99
  • remote database & device sync$1.99
Show 8 more
  • CSV Import$3.99
  • Amazon Kindle eBook import$3.99
  • BibTeX and Zotero export$4.99
  • 500 Tokens$4.99
  • 1000 Tokens$9.99
  • 10000 Tokens$49.99
  • Lifetime Full Unlock$49.99
  • 20000 Tokens$79.99
1 purchases

Bookspine

One-time1
  • Bookspine Pro$4.99

Questions

Is My Book List free?
My Book List is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Bookspine free?
Bookspine is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Do My Book List or Bookspine have ads?
Neither My Book List nor Bookspine shows ads.
Which is updated more often, My Book List or Bookspine?
My Book List ships an update every 4 days, and Bookspine every 3 days. Most recently, My Book List was updated on October 21, 2026 and Bookspine on October 13, 2026.

Other comparisons