Comparison

Ex Libris vs Ex

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

Head to head
About

Ex Libris

Organize your reading life with this app. Easily add books by scanning barcodes or covers, track your reading progress, and save memorable passages. Connect with friends to see what they're reading and share your own literary discoveries.

Highlights
  • Add books via barcode scan or cover photo
  • Track reading progress and pace
  • Save and share favorite passages
  • Create custom bookplates
  • Connect with friends to see their reading
  • Discuss books with other readers
Features
Read full description

Ex Libris is a quiet & cozy home for your reading life. Scan a book's barcode or snap its cover and it lands on your shelf with the details already filled in. Nudge your progress as you read, keep the passages worth keeping, and share the whole thing with your friends. ADD A BOOK IN SECONDS Point your camera at the barcode on the back, or photograph the cover and let your iPhone read the title. Search by title or author, or add rare finds and borrowed copies by hand. FOLLOW YOUR PROGRESS Ex Libris keeps the sessions quietly in the background, works out your pace, and tells you roughly how many days are left in the book. When you finish, rate it, write a line to remember it by, and pass it on. KEEP THE GOOD LINES Scan a page and pull the text straight off it. Highlight the passages that stopped you, add a personal note, and share it with friends. MARK IT AS YOURS Design your own bookplate — a frame, a typeface for your initials, a color. It follows you everywhere you turn up: your profile, your comments, your friends' pages. READ WITH FRIENDS Add friends by handle and see what they're reading. Browse their shelf, read the quotes they've kept, talk about a book with everyone else reading the same edition, and recommend the ones you think they'd enjoy reading too. No ads, or tracking, or a feed to scroll. Just your books, and the people you want to share them with. Ex Libris...from the library of you.

About

Ex

Catalog your personal book collection, track where each book is, and manage loans to friends. Organize your library with custom shelves and discover what your community is reading.

Highlights
  • Scan and catalog books
  • Organize books on custom shelves
  • AI-powered shelf arrangement suggestions
  • Search personal and community libraries
  • Manage book lending and borrowing
  • Create custom book lists
  • Connect with friends and share collections
Features
Read full description

Your books, and the ones going around. Ex-libris is the app for your own library: what you own, where it sits, and whose hands it is in. Not a reading list — an inventory of the books actually on your shelves. BUILD YOUR LIBRARY, ONE SHELF AT A TIME Open the scanner and walk along your shelves: the camera stays up, each barcode brings the book onto the screen, one tap files it, and the next one is already waiting. A book you have scanned before says so, so a second pass never creates duplicates. You can also search for a title and add it by hand. SHELVE THEM THE WAY THEY SIT AT HOME Create shelves and drag your books onto them, on a screen built for it: your shelves on one side, the books still to file on the other, and nothing written until you confirm. If you do not know where to start, "Suggest an arrangement" uses the AI built into your iPhone to propose shelves sized to your collection. You keep the last word: the proposal touches nothing before you accept it, and never disturbs what you arranged by hand. ONE SEARCH One field, three answers: your books, your friends' books, and the inventaire.io catalogue. Your own results first, your recent searches at hand, and the option to search by title or by author. LISTS FOR EVERYTHING ELSE To read, to give away, summer crime novels, the pile by the bed: create as many lists as you like, from a book or from the Lists tab. LEND, GIVE, SELL Mark a book as available to lend, to give away or to sell, and follow each transaction with the person concerned, messages included. You finally know who has your copy — and since when. THE COMMUNITY Find your friends, browse their shelves, see what they are willing to lend, and ask them for a book instead of buying it. BUILT ON INVENTAIRE.IO Ex-libris runs on inventaire.io, the open, non-profit book database: your account and your books are hosted there, author, work and edition pages come from its open data, and what you add benefits everyone. No ads, no data resale. Happy reading — and happy lending.

Screenshots

Ex Libris4 screens
Ex3 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is update cadence: Ex at every 4 days against Ex Libris's every 10 days. Ex Libris's advantage is iOS requirement (17.0 vs 26.0). 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. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 5.0 for Ex Libris against 5.0 for Ex. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 1 and 1 respectively.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Ex Libris ships an update every 10 days, Ex every 4 days. The most recent releases landed on October 9, 2026 and October 11, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard2 real differences · 8 level
Ex Libris versus Ex: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterEx LibrisEx
PriceFreeFree
Rating5.0 (1 ratings)5.0 (1 ratings)
Positive reviews—100.0% of reviews
Number of ratings11
Update frequencyEvery 10 daysEvery 4 days — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFreeFree
DevicesiPhoneiPhone
Requires iOS17.0 — better26.0
Further details — not scored
Size10 MB17 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperAtreides LLCLunabee Studio

Customer experience

Ex Libris

All ratings1 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Ex

All ratings1 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews1 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

In-app purchases

None

Ex Libris

No in-app purchases

None

Ex

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Ex Libris free?
Ex Libris is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Ex free?
Ex is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Ex Libris or Ex?
Ex Libris and Ex are both rated 5.0 out of 5 on the App Store, from 1 and 1 ratings respectively.
Do Ex Libris or Ex have ads?
Neither Ex Libris nor Ex shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Ex Libris or Ex?
Ex Libris ships an update every 10 days, and Ex every 4 days. Most recently, Ex Libris was updated on October 9, 2026 and Ex on October 11, 2026.

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