Best Apps for Reading in 2026: 9 Reading Apps Compared

Libby, built by OverDrive, turns a public library card into a full reading app. You borrow titles, place holds, and return books automatically at the end of the loan, so there are no late fees to track. The app also works in a web browser, which helps if you read on a shared computer.

The honest catch is availability. A library catalog is not a store, and a new bestseller may have a wait list of weeks or months. Libby also sends borrowed ebooks to a Kindle only for United States libraries. If you read a lot of new releases the week they come out, you will still want a store app beside Libby.

The Kindle app itself is free, and books are priced individually in the Amazon store. That combination suits readers who buy one book at a time and want it on every device they own. Send to Kindle also lets you add your own EPUB and PDF files, which keeps personal documents in the same library.

Kindle+, the subscription formerly called Kindle Unlimited, costs $11.99 per month in the United States and lets you borrow up to 20 titles at a time from a rotating selection. It is a rental, not ownership, so access ends when you cancel. Readers who mainly buy specific titles should skip the subscription and just buy the books they want.

Apple Books is built into Apple devices, so there is nothing extra to install if you already use an iPhone or iPad. You can import PDFs and many EPUB files you got elsewhere, set reading goals, and share purchases with family members through Family Sharing. Audiobooks sit in the same app, which keeps listening and reading in one place.

The limit is obvious and worth stating plainly. If you switch to Android, or if you read on a Windows computer, Apple Books does not follow you. For households that mix Apple and Android devices, a cross-platform app such as Kindle or Google Play Books is a safer home for a paid library.

Google Play Books earns its place here for file handling rather than for its store. You can upload EPUB and PDF files from your own collection and read them on any device where you sign in, with bookmarks, highlights, and notes kept in sync. That makes it a practical home for manuals, course readings, and books you bought without digital rights management elsewhere.

As a store, it is solid but not the widest choice for every genre, and books bought here are read in Google Play Books rather than on a Kindle. If most of your reading is your own files, though, the free upload library is hard to beat, and it costs nothing to try.

Kobo pairs a store with a reader that treats EPUB as a first-class format, which matters if you buy from independent sellers or manage your own files. Reading progress, bookmarks, and notes sync across the phone app, the web reader, and Kobo e-readers, so a phone and a dedicated reader can share one library without extra steps.

The catch is format support for protected files. Adobe DRM files in the ACSM format work on Kobo e-readers through Adobe Digital Editions, but they do not open in the Kobo app itself. Check the format of any back catalog before you move it over, and keep that limit in mind if you buy heavily protected titles.

Hoopla is a second library app, and it is worth having next to Libby rather than instead of it. Where Libby often uses holds for popular books, Hoopla offers instant borrows for titles in its catalog, and it covers comics and manga alongside ebooks and audiobooks. Movies, TV, and music are included too, which makes it useful for households that share one library card.

The limit is set by your library, not by Hoopla itself. Monthly borrow allowances vary, so a heavy reader can run out of borrows before the month ends. Check your library's limit first, and use Libby holds for books you can wait for while Hoopla covers the instant picks.

Everand, formerly Scribd, is a subscription rather than a store. The Standard plan costs $11.99 per month and lets you open one title, with higher plans opening more titles per month. A curated selection is also available without spending an opening, and books you have opened can be reread while your subscription stays active.

That model only makes sense if you read steadily from the Everand catalog. If your favorite authors are missing, or if you read one book every two months, buying that book outright will cost less. Use the trial to search for the authors you actually read before you commit to a monthly payment.

Readwise Reader is not a bookshop. It is a reading inbox for everything else: web articles, newsletters, RSS feeds, PDFs, and EPUB files you already own. Highlights export to note apps such as Obsidian and Notion, and the app can read articles and documents aloud, which turns a saved backlog into listening time.

The price, $9.99 per month when billed annually, is the main barrier. A reader who saves two articles a week will get little value from it. It earns its cost for researchers, students, and heavy article readers who keep highlights and return to them later, and the trial is the right way to test that habit.

Instapaper does one job with little fuss. Save an article from the web, open it later in a clean view, and sort it into folders. The free plan covers unlimited saves and sync across web, iOS, and Android, which is enough for many readers who just want to clear a browser tab without losing the article.

Premium costs $5.99 per month and adds full-text search, unlimited notes, and text-to-speech features. Those extras matter if your saved list grows into the hundreds. If your list stays short, the free plan does the work, and Instapaper stays out of the way in a way busier apps do not.