Can I Export Kindle Bookmarks For Other Reading Apps?

After I read this thread I tested it with my Kindle Voyage. As already described, you press the top corner of the screen to bring up the black ribbon. Interestingly enough, when you have set your Kindle to ‘every page’ (instead of ‘less often’), the black screen even flashes for a brief moment when setting a bookmark. However, if you have set your Kindle to ‘less often’, the black ribbon just appears – no full screen refresh involved. This seems to be a very minor detail but it could be important for people who are sensitive to screen flicker.Bookmarking a PDF now feels even more seamless when I have set my Kindle to ‘less often’ for page refreshes.

The data in the export is a snapshot in time. Any books that you purchase after you run the export for a given date will not be included in that export until you run the export again. For periodic reviews of past purchases, this is okay. But for tracking current reading in real time, this data is essentially useless. I do a data dump of my Kindle books every 6 months or so, then reconcile the numbers. This is like balancing a checkbook. In the interim, I live in the moment of my Kindle-reading life, buying and reading books on a whim. I don’t use my spreadsheets for current information; that would drive me crazy.

Your archived items are also archived on your old device (even if you deleted them from your downloaded books list to make room). Now that you have a device with more storage, you might want to re-download some of these archived books. Make sure you’re viewing your library as ‘All’ or ‘Cloud’ and not just ‘Downloaded’. I discovered that I have a complete history of all my purchases over the last years, and can even re-download books I’ve purchased on sale years ago (I found three such books from 2017 that I had purchased but never read). Transferring to a new device became a fun library excavation.

Not sure what the answer to this one is… I just got my first iPad and I am trying to move all of my Kindle stuff to it. Hmm, I guess that won’t work from reading all of the previous comments. Too bad.

As an avid reader who juggles multiple e-readers, I’ve explored the compatibility between Kindle and Kobo extensively. Unfortunately, Kobo devices don’t natively support the Kindle app due to the differing ecosystems. Amazon’s Kindle books are designed to work within their ecosystem, which includes Kindle e-readers, the Kindle app for mobile devices, and Kindle Cloud Reader for web browsers. Kobo, on the other hand, operates on its own platform, with books primarily purchased through the Kobo store or loaded via EPUB files. The lack of a dedicated Kindle app for Kobo devices means you can’t directly access your Kindle library on a Kobo e-reader. However, there are workarounds if you’re determined to read Kindle books on a Kobo device. One method involves removing DRM protection from your Kindle books and converting them to EPUB format, which Kobo supports. Tools like Calibre, a free and open-source e-book management software, can assist with this process. It’s important to note that DRM removal is a legal gray area and may violate Amazon’s terms of service, so proceed with caution. Once converted, you can sideload the EPUB files onto your Kobo device via USB or use Kobo’s Dropbox integration for wireless transfers. This method requires some technical know-how but is a viable solution for tech-savvy readers. Another approach is to use Amazon’s Kindle Cloud Reader in the experimental browser on your Kobo device. While Kobo’s browser isn’t optimized for this purpose, it can sometimes load the web version of Kindle, allowing you to read your books online. This method is far from ideal, as the experience may be sluggish and lack features like offline reading or seamless page turns. For a smoother experience, consider using a tablet or smartphone with the Kindle app alongside your Kobo e-reader. This way, you can enjoy the best of both worlds without compromising on functionality. Ultimately, while there’s no straightforward app to read Kindle books on Kobo devices, the workarounds available can bridge the gap for determined readers. The decision to explore these methods depends on your comfort level with technology and your willingness to navigate the limitations. If you’re deeply invested in the Kindle ecosystem but love your Kobo device’s hardware, it might be worth the effort. Otherwise, sticking to Kobo’s native offerings or using a secondary device for Kindle books might be the more practical choice.

What is the emotional core of wanting sync? For me it has always been a fear of not being able to find my place again, a fear of discontinuity. But I came to realize that this anxiety could be alleviated not by improved technology, but by a change in habit. I now always try to finish reading a section at a chapter break. If that isn’t possible, I just make a quick note of some unique phrase or other near where I shall pick up again, and then off I go. Our brains are amazing pattern-matching machines. I have trained mine to remember where I left off, and if that doesn’t work, then I simply skim-read until I pick up where I had got to. Ditching the need to have all digital reading perfectly synched has, for me, turned reading into something that is purely reading once again.

I forgot to check whether the book I requested from the library was a PDF. Most PDFs don’t read very well on the Kindle – the text is typically too small and doesn’t reflow to fit the screen. You can “Send to Kindle” a PDF and choose whether to have it automatically converted by Amazon, or not. I’ve had the converted version be almost as bad as just reading the PDF on a tablet, but sometimes it works okay. The book is converted by Calibre to MOBI or AZW3 as well, but that is essentially random and depends on the quality of the PDF that was created. I would recommend just trying to read the PDF on your tablet. If you really want to read it on your Kindle, you could try sending it with “Convert” in the subject line of the email, and hopefully it will work out okay for you. A lot of library eBooks are PDFs of scanned book pages, so don’t read very well on any eReader.

I can confidently say that the Kindle app for Kindle Fire supports a vast majority of novels, but there are some exceptions. The Kindle Store offers millions of titles, including bestsellers, classics, and indie books, all readable on the Fire. However, certain publishers or authors might restrict their books to specific platforms due to licensing agreements. For example, some Japanese light novels or niche indie works might not be available. Additionally, you can sideload books not purchased from Amazon by converting files to compatible formats like MOBI or AZW3 using tools like Calibre. The Kindle Fire also supports PDFs, though the reading experience varies. It's worth noting that subscription services like Kindle Unlimited expand your options significantly, but not every novel is included. Always check the book's details page on Amazon to confirm compatibility.

Shared reading experiences for a fandom. I am part of a book club and we read books on our Kindles and use a private Goodreads group for our shared reading experience. We can add notes and highlights to our eBooks and if enabled, other club members can see the most popular parts of the book as well as their friends’ highlights. All highlights are synced to the members’ devices whether they added them on their e-reader or laptop. Thus, my highlighted quotes are synced and I can access them when I write my discussion post for the book club. Shared reading becomes a little less solitary thanks to this technology.

I celebrate the export of my annual list of reads as if it were a digital holiday. After each year, I haul out my laptop, brew a cup of coffee and go through all the steps to get my data out. There’s a moment of切り替え or ‘-switching’ as I click the button to ‘export to CSV’ that feels like sending off a letter into the void. It takes a few days or even weeks to arrive in the form of an email which I then download as a .CSV file. Unpacking the CSV in Excel and/or constructing charts and/or making long lists to review my year of reading is more fun than Goodreads could ever provide for me in the way of reviewing the year that has passed. The few steps involved in manually exporting my reading data adds to the ‘occasion’-like feeling of going through them. Reclaiming one’s data, even in this rather basic form, is no mean feat.