Comparison

Italic Type vs BookPine

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

Head to head
About

Italic Type

Organize your reading life with this book tracker. Import data, manage your reading queue, and take private notes on books, quotes, and new words. Share recommendations and create virtual book clubs.

Highlights
  • Import Goodreads data
  • Manage reading queue
  • Add context labels
  • Private book board for notes
  • Track quotes and new words
  • Recommend books to friends
  • Create virtual book clubs
Features
Read full description

Italic Type is the simple, beautifully-designed book tracker loved by avid readers and authors. Easily import your Goodreads data. Email us to help with a custom spread sheet. Add books you want to read to your queue. Add a context label to remember why you want to read it or who recommended it. Keep track of your reading and take notes in your own private book board. Keep track of quotes you love, new words you find, or add links for the things you look up. Recommend books to friends and start pop up virtual book clubs. Review books with keywords and expressions to capture what you thought. https://www.italictype.com/privacy/ https://www.italictype.com/terms/

About

BookPine

Track your reading journey with detailed stats, custom lists, and reading goals. Easily import your library from other platforms and discover ambient sounds for focused reading. Share your progress and connect with a community of book lovers.

Highlights
  • Detailed reading stats and insights
  • Custom lists and shelves for organization
  • Personalized reading goals and challenges
  • Import from Goodreads, StoryGraph, LibraryThing
  • Ambient sounds for focused reading
  • Social features to follow friends and share reviews
  • Transaction log for borrowed, lent, or purchased books
Read full description

BookPine is a free book tracker for readers who like to keep a record of what they read. Log your books, set goals that fit your life, and see real stats about your reading habits. If you're coming from Goodreads, you can bring your whole library with you and pick up right where you left off. There's no subscription and nothing is locked behind a paywall. READING CIRCLES Read a book together with friends or other readers. Start a circle from any book, make it public or private, and choose how long it runs. Members write posts, comment, vote in polls and log their progress as they go. You can hide a post until readers reach a certain point in the book, or until they finish it, so nobody gets spoiled. SERIES TRACKING BookPine builds your series list from the books on your shelves. Each series shows its books in order, how many you've read, and which one comes next. Reading a series in another language? Set the language for that series and your progress only counts the books published in it. You can also mark a series as paused or abandoned. CUSTOM COVERS Don't like the cover on your edition? Change it. Pick one from another edition, upload your own image, or grab one from any web page. Only you see your custom cover, and it shows up everywhere you see that book in the app. HOME SCREEN WIDGETS Keep your books on your home screen. Pick a grid of covers, a shelf of spines lined up like a real bookshelf, or the book you are reading now with your progress on it. Choose which shelf each widget shows, how it is sorted and which colors it uses. From the Currently Reading widget you can start the reading timer or update your progress. CUSTOM GENRES AND TAGS Sort your library with your own genres and tags: comfort read, slow burn, signed copy, book club, five-star prediction, whatever fits how you read. They are private to you, and you can filter your whole library by them, so any book is easy to find again. READING STATS AND INSIGHTS Track pages, finished books and reading time, with charts for your streak, monthly progress and yearly trends. It's an easy way to see how much you read and what you actually finish. BOOK TRACKER, LISTS AND SHELVES Shelve books as Currently Reading, Want to Read, Read or Did Not Finish. Rate with half stars, write reviews, and make your own shelves and lists. Add a book in seconds by scanning its barcode or searching by title, author or ISBN. READING GOALS AND CHALLENGES Set yearly, monthly or custom goals by books, pages, minutes or authors. Streaks and milestones help you keep the habit going. IMPORT FROM GOODREADS, STORYGRAPH AND LIBRARYTHING Import your books, ratings, reviews and shelves in one go, so your reading history comes with you. TRY IT AS A GUEST Open the app and start tracking without an email address. Create an account later if you want to keep going. AMBIENT SOUNDS Play rain, a crackling fireplace, cafe noise and more while you read. SOCIAL Follow friends, share reviews and see what other people are reading, along with their goals, shelves and wishlists. SHAREABLE BOOK CARDS Turn your current read, a favorite quote, a review or a reading milestone into an image you can post or send to friends. TRANSACTION LOG Keep track of the books you borrow, lend, buy or give away. PRIVATE BOOKS Some reads are just for you. Private books never appear on your public profile. ALSO INCLUDED • Dark mode, plus dark gray, high contrast, true black and sepia themes • Available in 16 languages • Half-star ratings and tags for more detailed reviews Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

Screenshots

Italic Type4 screens
BookPine4 screens

Verdict

The call

Italic Type and BookPine both sit at 4.8 stars, but that hides the real split: 86% of Italic Type's written reviews are positive against 29% of BookPine's. Italic Type also leads on in-app purchases (none vs 2) and iOS requirement (13.0 vs 16.4). BookPine's advantage is update cadence (weekly vs every 3 months). On price, rating, ratings volume and ads 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. BookPine sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $4.99 per month. Italic Type asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.8 for Italic Type against 4.8 for BookPine. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 31 and 73 respectively. Written reviews are what separate them: 86% of Italic Type's written reviews are positive against 29% of BookPine's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Italic Type ships an update every 3 months, BookPine weekly. The most recent releases landed on October 23, 2026 and October 25, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 5 level
Italic Type versus BookPine: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterItalic TypeBookPine
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.8 (31 ratings)4.8 (73 ratings) — better
Positive reviews86.4% of reviews — better28.6% of reviews
Number of ratings3173 — better
Update frequencyEvery 3 monthsWeekly — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationFree — betterAd-supported
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod — betteriPhone, iPad
Requires iOS13.0 — better16.4
Further details — not scored
Size12 MB101 MB
Age rating12++12
DeveloperItalic Type LLCDevpri SRL

Customer experience

Italic Type

All ratings30 ratings
Positive90.0%
Neutral10.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews22 reviews
Positive86.4%
Neutral13.6%
Negative0.0%

BookPine

All ratings73 ratings
Positive97.3%
Neutral2.7%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews7 reviews
Positive28.6%
Neutral14.3%
Negative57.1%

In-app purchases

None

Italic Type

No in-app purchases

2 purchases

BookPine

Subscriptions2
  • BookPine Pro7 Days trial$4.991 Month
  • BookPine Pro7 Days trial$49.991 Year

Questions

Is Italic Type free?
Italic Type is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is BookPine free?
BookPine is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Italic Type or BookPine?
BookPine is rated higher. Italic Type averages 4.8 out of 5 from 31 ratings, while BookPine averages 4.8 from 73 ratings.
Do Italic Type or BookPine have ads?
Neither Italic Type nor BookPine shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Italic Type or BookPine?
Italic Type ships an update every 3 months, and BookPine weekly. Most recently, Italic Type was updated on October 23, 2026 and BookPine on October 25, 2026.

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