Open Library Reader

Loomis House, LLC

About this app

Open Library is an online library with millions of books to browse or check out. You can track the books that you're reading, want to read, etc. and read many of them right there.

This app is one reader's effort to create the ideal portable experience for taking advantage of Open Library's amazing collection.

You'll get the best experience out of this app on an iPad, but you can use it on a smaller screen (if you don't mind squinting).

The moment you open the app and log in, any books you've already saved on the Open Library site are laid out on your screen. You can sort them by title, author, publication date, and date saved, see which books are available to read, and open them with a single tap.

Once you've opened a book in the familiar reading interface, a tap at the top of the screen will trigger the full screen mode, removing every distraction and expanding the book pages to the limits of your screen for the perfect reading experience.

Other features include:
- Built-in search: find and add books to your shelves from inside the app.
- Shelf management: move books between shelves, remove books, change the edition of a book.
- Related title search: choose a book on your shelf and quickly find more books like it.
- Checkout tracking: see at a glance how long you have left on limited-access books you've checked out.
- Customization: choose which shelves you want to see and manage the size of the books and their titles.

This app is essentially an alternative interface to the Open Library site — all of your data is stored there, and the books you read are hosted online, not in the app. As a result, an active internet connection is required when you are using this app.


Open Library is an initiative of the Internet Archive, a 501(c)(3) non-profit, building a digital library of Internet sites and other cultural artifacts in digital form. The developer of this app has no legal or contractual relationship with Open Library or the Internet Archive, and bears no responsibility for the content found there.

Ratings and reviews

This app needs to be updated. The app will not open any book and when you do open the app it stalls and tells you there is nothing there and to retry the app, again. When you do it tells your book can't be read.

I've logged in this app thousand times but still it asks me to log in fresh everytime I opened it, I thought I will consume my time by reading books but instead of it it's wasting my time. I face problems in borrowing books and even I've added a book in my shelf still it won't come... and asks me to log in again and again, please fix this. I want to consume my time, don't want to waste it....

I hate to leave this review. I've never had this issue. But there's this book y'all have. The Seesaw Girl and Me by Dick York. I had to borrow the book 2x when I took a break from reading it. The 3rd time it said it's been borrowed. This is totally unfair! I'm upset cuz i really want to read it! And now i guess someone else is. I pushed force stop and cleared out the data. And it was still messing up! Please fix your app! And if possible. Please help me get the opportunity to read the book soon!

What’s new

Welcome to the all new OL Reader! It looks the same, and your favorite features are still there, but it's all new under the hood and there are some great new features:

• More information on the shelf pages
• An expanded search interface allows you to find books both on your shelves and in Open Library
• Support for Open Library Lists (still a bit experimental)
• Poke around and see what else you can find!
• OL Reader is now an open source project — see the app help page for more information