22 Amazing Apps That Will Revitalize Your Love Of Reading

*Disappears with phone for months*

1. Goodreads

itunes.apple.com

What it costs: Free (iOS & Android)

What it offers: A community of 40 million readers to interact with; a database of 1.1 billion books to track and review; a social feed to see what your friends are reading and loving; and a fun, streamlined way of organizing and celebrating your literary life. If you aren't on Goodreads, what are you even doing? (For Windows Phone users, Epiphany and Social Reads are unofficial apps that use the Goodreads API.)

2. Comixology

itunes.apple.com

itunes.apple.com

What it costs: Free, plus in-app purchases (iOS, Android, and Kindle Fire)

What it offers: A library of over 75,000 cheap (or free) comic books, graphic novels, and manga; exclusive digital-first titles; a "cinematic, immersive" reading experience that lets you easily flip through pages and zoom in on panels.

3. We Read Too

itunes.apple.com

What it costs: Free (iOS only)

What it offers: A regularly updated database of children's and YA books by writers of color, featuring characters of color. You can't read the books on the app, but it does link out of app, and allows you to share titles with friends and suggest titles you think should be added.

4. Shelfie

play.google.com

play.google.com

What it costs: Free (iOS and Android)

What it offers: A chance to upload and autotag photos of your bookshelf, download digital versions of eligible physical copies for free or on discount, scope out new reads by browsing other users' shelves, and rate the books you're reading.

5. Scribd

play.google.com

play.google.com

What it costs: $8.99 monthly subscription fee (iOS and Android)

What it offers: Unlimited access to over one million books (including audiobooks and comics) and over 60 million documents (academic papers, court filings, presentations, etc.), personalized recommendations, selected offline titles to read any time, and automatic syncing across devices.

6. Poetry

itunes.apple.com

itunes.apple.com

What it costs: Free (iOS and Android)

What it offers: A database of thousands of classic and contemporary poems organized by theme and mood, searchable by memorable lines, and the ability to save and share favorites.

7. Overdrive

play.google.com

play.google.com

What it costs: Free (iOS, Android, Kindle, Nook)

What it offers: Access to over 30,000 public libraries worldwide — search for your local library here — and the ability to borrow ebooks, audiobooks, and video from their catalog.

8. Simple Book Catalog

itunes.apple.com

itunes.apple.com

What it costs: Free (iOS only)

What it offers: Just one thing — a way to organize your entire library. Plain and simple, true to its name.

9. Storyville

itunes.apple.com

What it costs: $4.99 per six-month subscription (iOS only), or $1.49 per month (Kindle only)

What it offers: A short story every week — modern gems and classics — which you'll have permanent access to, writers' commentaries, customizable reading settings, and social media sharing.

10. Kobo

play.google.com

What it costs: Free, plus in-app purchases (iOS, Android, Blackberry, and Windows)

What it offers: An extensive catalogue of ebooks and magazines for purchase; frequently updated reading lists; customizable text; free previews of thousands of titles; and automatic syncing of bookmarks, notes, and highlighting among devices.

11. Audible

itunes.apple.com

itunes.apple.com

What it costs: Free, plus in-app purchases (iOS, Android, and Windows)

What it offers: A collection of over 180,000 audiobooks for purchase, a system for tracking your reading list and reading habits, sleep and button-free modes, syncing to Facebook and Twitter to share with friends, multitasking capabilities for background downloading and listening, and a newsfeed frequently updated with author events and more.

12. Moon+ Reader

play.google.com

play.google.com

What it costs: Free, $4.99 for Pro (Android only)

What it offers: A user-friendly ebook reader with access to thousands of free books available for download, highly customizable reading experiences (landscape or portrait layout, font size and color, night mode, customizable autoscroll, page swiping), tracking of your reading stats, and additional options (highlight, annotating, and dictionary) in Pro mode.

13. Libib

play.google.com

play.google.com

What it costs: Free (iOS and Android)

What it offers: A comprehensive library cataloguing tool — for books, movies, music, and video games — with keyword search option, automatic add with ISBN scan, multiple library options, customizable tagging system, well-designed statistics about cataloged items, social feeds for sharing and recommending, public and private profile options, and an annotation tool.

14. The Pickle Index

itunes.apple.com

What it costs: $4.99 (iOS only)

What it offers: An experiential novel from the people behind The Silent History— one central narrative (about a rough-and-tumble traveling circus who manage get themselves on death row) enhanced with mini-games, reader participation, interactive maps, recipes, and Q&A.

15. Serial Box

itunes.apple.com

What it costs: Subscription fee of $1.59 per episode (iOS only)

What it offers: Great books broken up into episodes — new chunks delivered weekly, in audio or ebook format, and a different story every 10-16 weeks. Right now: the 16-episode urban fantasy by Max Gladstone, Bookburners.

16. Pocket

itunes.apple.com

itunes.apple.com

What it costs: Free (iOS and Android)

What it offers: An archiving tool to save articles, videos, and pages you want to read or watch later — even offline.

17. Gerty

itunes.apple.com

itunes.apple.com

What it costs: Free, $3.99 for premium features (iOS only)

What it offers: A little bit of everything, tbh— a customizable ebook reader; library management; customizable integration with apps and services like Facebook, Google Maps, IMDB, Wikipedia, Goodreads, Merriam-Webster, Dropbox, etc.; and a whole bunch of journaling tools to remember what it was like to read the book you're reading (options for note taking, private journal, annotating, creating a photo essay, geo-tagging, and exporting your timeline into EPUB format).

18. The Paris Review

itunes.apple.com

What it costs: Subscription purchase ($29.99/year, iOS only)

What it offers: Mobile access to one of the most-loved literary magazines, including rare back issues, new archival collections, and the complete interview archive.

19. QuizUp

itunes.apple.com

itunes.apple.com

What it costs: Free (iOS, Android, Windows, and Kindle)

What it offers: So, it's a social trivia game covering many topics — but book nerds especially are bound to find something that interests them.

20. Indigo

itunes.apple.com

What it costs: Free, plus in-app purchases (iOS and Android)

What it offers: Canada's biggest bookstore, but for your phone— discover and buy new books — though you can't read them in-app — track your rewards points, get personalized recommendations, curate your wish lists, share your faves with friends, and get notifications for special offers and promotions.

21. Marvin

itunes.apple.com

What it costs: Free, $3.99 for premium edition (iOS only)

What it offers: An ebook reader with clean and user-friendly interface, customizable reading settings, customizable gesture commands, a vast variety of fonts, reading timer, integration of external apps, Dropbox sync, sharing tools, personalized recommendations, and library management tools that let you customize your collections by subject, series, tags, word counts, and more.

22. Kindle

play.google.com

play.google.com

What it costs: Free, plus in-app purchases (iOS, Android, and Windows)

What it offers: A library of over a million ebooks for purchase; a collection of free ebooks; access to local libraries to borrow ebooks; a chance to sample books before purchasing; built-in dictionary, Google, and Wikipedia; customizable reading settings; and the ability to switch from reading to listening.

Thumbnail photo credit sam74100 / ThinkStock