calibre e-book manger
March 22, 2025 7:25 AM Subscribe
calibre is one of the preeminent pieces of open-source software of our time, and it just reached Version 8, so I thought I would make a post about it.
calibre started life on 31 October, 2006, soon after the release of the SONY PRS-500, the first e-ink based reader to be sold commercially in the US. At the time, I was a graduate student, with a lot of time on my hands. The PRS-500 did not work at all with Linux, my operating system of choice, so I decided to reverse engineer the USB protocol that it used, to get it working on Linux. This was accomplished with the help of the fine folks over at mobileread.com and calibre was born, albeit named libprs500.The software is actively developed.
At the time there were no satisfactory tools to convert content into the LRF format, used by the SONY reader, so I decided to implement a converter to convert the most popular e-book formats to LRF. This converter proved to be wildly popular and far better than the (mostly non-existent) offerings from SONY. It was picked up and used by various publishing houses and content digitizers to produce the first generation of books in the LRF format.
As my e-book collection grew, I realized that managing it was quickly becoming unwieldy, so I decided to write a graphical interface to libprs500 to make it easier. This became calibre, in its present form, as a comprehensive e-book management tool. libprs500 was renamed to calibre in mid-2008. The name calibre was chosen by my wife, Krittika. The libre in calibre stands for freedom, indicating that calibre is a free and open source product, modifiable by all.
For me, the exciting thing about Version 8 is that it can now natively edit, view and convert the KEPUB format files used by the Kobo e-reader. It will automatically convert EPUB to KEPUB when sending to device, which used to require a plug-in.
posted by Lemkin at 7:32 AM on March 22 [8 favorites]
posted by Lemkin at 7:32 AM on March 22 [8 favorites]
Is there anything like this for audiobooks?
posted by Jon_Evil at 7:58 AM on March 22 [3 favorites]
posted by Jon_Evil at 7:58 AM on March 22 [3 favorites]
"preeminent pieces of open source software in our lifetime" I'd have to take your word for it, but this wording caught my attention. Also the typo, unless the software was designed to vanish the user's e-books YOUR. UPLOAD. HAS BEEN. MANAGED
either way, sharing with sister and sister-in-law because this is up their alley
posted by ginger.beef at 7:59 AM on March 22 [2 favorites]
either way, sharing with sister and sister-in-law because this is up their alley
posted by ginger.beef at 7:59 AM on March 22 [2 favorites]
Calibre's functionality is great. I don't like its UI, or how it doesn't normally let you opt out of its iTunes-style book library system - but if you're a curmudgeon like me who wants to manage things your own way, it's worth knowing that when you install calibre you also get some commandline utilities for ebook format conversion and a few other things so you can just avoid the graphical UI altogether. (Unless you need the DRM removal plugins, alas. Though there might be commandline versions of those too somewhere.)
Anyway, as a brief overview for anyone who's not familiar with it, people use calibre for:
- converting ebooks to different formats, fixing bad ebook formatting, and customizing or creating ebook formatting
- automatically and instantly removing DRM from ebooks (with external plugins)
- adding or downloading book metadata for collections, series, genres, etc. Some devices (...kindles...) make this annoying or impossible to do on the device itself.
- automatically creating ebooks out of webpages or RSS feeds. Or almost any random document you might have.
- automatically uploading books to another device over wifi or usb
- setting up a server for your ebook collection
- automatically creating an iTunes-style metadata-based library
...and a lot of other things. Its default settings let you do a lot even if you know nothing about ebook formatting or DRM or any other technical stuff. And if you do want to get a little technical you can create automatic workflows - I think you could even do stuff like have a daily ebook made of Mefi threads automatically created and sent to your ereader, if you wanted.
posted by trig at 8:08 AM on March 22 [10 favorites]
Anyway, as a brief overview for anyone who's not familiar with it, people use calibre for:
- converting ebooks to different formats, fixing bad ebook formatting, and customizing or creating ebook formatting
- automatically and instantly removing DRM from ebooks (with external plugins)
- adding or downloading book metadata for collections, series, genres, etc. Some devices (...kindles...) make this annoying or impossible to do on the device itself.
- automatically creating ebooks out of webpages or RSS feeds. Or almost any random document you might have.
- automatically uploading books to another device over wifi or usb
- setting up a server for your ebook collection
- automatically creating an iTunes-style metadata-based library
...and a lot of other things. Its default settings let you do a lot even if you know nothing about ebook formatting or DRM or any other technical stuff. And if you do want to get a little technical you can create automatic workflows - I think you could even do stuff like have a daily ebook made of Mefi threads automatically created and sent to your ereader, if you wanted.
posted by trig at 8:08 AM on March 22 [10 favorites]
Been loving this software since somewhere around 3.something.
Does anyone know of a way to sync read data (on Kobo)? Losing that everytime I get a new device is extremely annoying.
posted by Mitheral at 8:23 AM on March 22 [1 favorite]
Does anyone know of a way to sync read data (on Kobo)? Losing that everytime I get a new device is extremely annoying.
posted by Mitheral at 8:23 AM on March 22 [1 favorite]
Been loving this software since somewhere around 3.something
If I boast about being in since 0.8, does that get me clout?
Still not clear on the clout thing.
[MetaTalk joke]
posted by Lemkin at 8:58 AM on March 22 [5 favorites]
If I boast about being in since 0.8, does that get me clout?
Still not clear on the clout thing.
[MetaTalk joke]
posted by Lemkin at 8:58 AM on March 22 [5 favorites]
The interface is definitely the area where the developer, Kovid, spends the least time -- but I think it's a utilitarian decision, and not like an impaired aesthetic sense or anything. He spends his time fixing bugs and added functionality, which is great!
I have been using this for years, and now I sync my library to the Synology NAS in the basement for browsing via Calibre-Web.
Love this software! I have sent him money before, but it feels like it's time for a few more bucks.
posted by wenestvedt at 9:13 AM on March 22 [6 favorites]
I have been using this for years, and now I sync my library to the Synology NAS in the basement for browsing via Calibre-Web.
Love this software! I have sent him money before, but it feels like it's time for a few more bucks.
posted by wenestvedt at 9:13 AM on March 22 [6 favorites]
I've used Calibre for years to manage a large collection of EPUBs, PDFs, TXTs, CBZs, etc, edit their metadata, load it onto a number of different devices (An old Sony ereader, a Kindle, and Readera on a couple Android phones and a tablet). It works great mostly, but that top tool bar still looks like some student in GUI 101 would have done for their first class project.
posted by Clever User Name at 9:14 AM on March 22 [2 favorites]
posted by Clever User Name at 9:14 AM on March 22 [2 favorites]
Calibre has an absolutely terrible UI. Also bad software quality, it's way slower and buggier than it should be. I hate to slag on open source software, and it is pretty good at the nuts and bolts of converting ebook formats. I'm grateful it exists. But it occupies all the mindshare for this software category so there's no competing products
The world could really use a better ebook manager. But it's a niche area and no volunteers have come forward to do something better.
posted by Nelson at 9:17 AM on March 22 [7 favorites]
The world could really use a better ebook manager. But it's a niche area and no volunteers have come forward to do something better.
posted by Nelson at 9:17 AM on March 22 [7 favorites]
Part of it is its initial market was folks who were scanning their physical books in, putting it through OCR, and fixing the errors by hand (hi, dad in law) back before e-books were being published en masse. Many folks are more than satisfied with where things have progressed in terms of ease of e-book management. But now there are a lot more people interested in e-books than that group, and they’re understandably less satisfied.
posted by brook horse at 9:23 AM on March 22 [2 favorites]
posted by brook horse at 9:23 AM on March 22 [2 favorites]
bad software quality, it's way slower and buggier than it should be
Mine runs a 7,000 title library at perfectly acceptable speed on a PC* that was no more than average specs when I bought it 3 years ago. Other than it being touchy about being disconnected from its library on a remote drive mid-session, I have never had any technical issue with it performing the basic program functions that I ask of it.
* He does Mac and Linux too!
posted by Lemkin at 9:37 AM on March 22 [7 favorites]
Mine runs a 7,000 title library at perfectly acceptable speed on a PC* that was no more than average specs when I bought it 3 years ago. Other than it being touchy about being disconnected from its library on a remote drive mid-session, I have never had any technical issue with it performing the basic program functions that I ask of it.
* He does Mac and Linux too!
posted by Lemkin at 9:37 AM on March 22 [7 favorites]
Ereaders themselves are terrible for library management, and Calibre fills that gap nicely. Yes, the way it operates is totally weird, and it has a lot of features I'll never understand. But without it my ereader would be magnitudes less useful.
posted by Flexagon at 9:42 AM on March 22 [9 favorites]
posted by Flexagon at 9:42 AM on March 22 [9 favorites]
CAL lih bur or cuh LEE bray
vote by favouriting this comment
posted by glonous keming at 9:57 AM on March 22 [2 favorites]
vote by favouriting this comment
posted by glonous keming at 9:57 AM on March 22 [2 favorites]
I love Calibre. My library is around 2,000 titles, and works great. If you spend a little time on it, you can tweak the UI so that it's a lot more polished and responsive. Best of all, I don't have to worry that the software will be completely transformed in the future to the point I don't recognize it anymore (I'm looking at you Apple Books and iTunes). I really wish there was something like it for music.
posted by Omon Ra at 10:02 AM on March 22 [5 favorites]
posted by Omon Ra at 10:02 AM on March 22 [5 favorites]
CAL lih bur or cuh LEE bray
The developer says the former, but he’s wrong.
posted by Lemkin at 10:04 AM on March 22 [6 favorites]
The developer says the former, but he’s wrong.
posted by Lemkin at 10:04 AM on March 22 [6 favorites]
you can tweak the UI so that it's a lot more polished and responsive
I'd love to hear more detail. Do you know why it doesn't ship already more polished and responsive?
posted by Nelson at 10:05 AM on March 22 [2 favorites]
I'd love to hear more detail. Do you know why it doesn't ship already more polished and responsive?
posted by Nelson at 10:05 AM on March 22 [2 favorites]
"Actively developed," that's certainly true, there's constantly new versions to install! That's not really a fault, but it's amazing how often it updates.
I've used it quite a bit, and sometimes use it to create alternate versions of books I make for sale on Storybundle. It and Sigil are indispensable.
posted by JHarris at 10:06 AM on March 22 [5 favorites]
I've used it quite a bit, and sometimes use it to create alternate versions of books I make for sale on Storybundle. It and Sigil are indispensable.
posted by JHarris at 10:06 AM on March 22 [5 favorites]
Do you know why it doesn't ship already more polished and responsive?
See the “actively developed” link above.
posted by Lemkin at 10:11 AM on March 22 [2 favorites]
See the “actively developed” link above.
posted by Lemkin at 10:11 AM on March 22 [2 favorites]
Huge props to calibre for its ebook-convert tool. It converted a book manuscript in Word format to a particularly tidy epub with no additional cleaning or touch-up required. True, it did require a > 1000 character command line to make that epub, but most of that is metadata
posted by scruss at 10:36 AM on March 22 [4 favorites]
posted by scruss at 10:36 AM on March 22 [4 favorites]
Just a reminder that it is a user-supported product so even though it's given away free if you want it to stick around please donate, either by the button on the top right of the web page or from within the application.
posted by Runes at 10:39 AM on March 22 [10 favorites]
posted by Runes at 10:39 AM on March 22 [10 favorites]
Calibre support happens on the MobileRead forums, a vBulletin board that proclaims
Calibre’s developer frequently posts there, as well as scores of very knowledgeable Calibre users. For example, this thread explores the new Kepub features and what earlier Kobo-oriented tools are no longer needed.
My favorite Calibre tool is the FanFicFare Plugin. With two clicks, I can copy the link to a series page at the fanfiction repository ArchiveOfOurOwn.org, paste it in to Calibre with FanFicFare, and get an ePub anthology of all the individual works from the series. The MobileRead Forums also host FanFicFare tech support questions.
posted by Jesse the K at 10:46 AM on March 22 [14 favorites]
if you love reading eBooks and tinkering with mobile technology, you came to the right place.Whenever I have a Calibre question, it’s the first place I go.
Calibre’s developer frequently posts there, as well as scores of very knowledgeable Calibre users. For example, this thread explores the new Kepub features and what earlier Kobo-oriented tools are no longer needed.
My favorite Calibre tool is the FanFicFare Plugin. With two clicks, I can copy the link to a series page at the fanfiction repository ArchiveOfOurOwn.org, paste it in to Calibre with FanFicFare, and get an ePub anthology of all the individual works from the series. The MobileRead Forums also host FanFicFare tech support questions.
posted by Jesse the K at 10:46 AM on March 22 [14 favorites]
I have a Kindle I bought in 2016 and I'm looking for a new reader. Any recommendations for e-readers that are not tied to a single market like Amazon ?
posted by Pendragon at 10:56 AM on March 22
posted by Pendragon at 10:56 AM on March 22
Is there anything like this for audiobooks?
It depends on what you mean by "like this". There are two main functions that folks use Calibre for, the DeDRM plugins and managing their library.
For DeDRM of Audible libraries, there's Libation and OpenAudible.
For library management, there's audiobookshelf, booksonic and plex (use the guide for best results).
I don't think there's a currently supported way of downloading Kobo DRM'd audiobooks.
posted by Runes at 10:57 AM on March 22 [8 favorites]
It depends on what you mean by "like this". There are two main functions that folks use Calibre for, the DeDRM plugins and managing their library.
For DeDRM of Audible libraries, there's Libation and OpenAudible.
For library management, there's audiobookshelf, booksonic and plex (use the guide for best results).
I don't think there's a currently supported way of downloading Kobo DRM'd audiobooks.
posted by Runes at 10:57 AM on March 22 [8 favorites]
See the “actively developed” link above.
Yes, I understand the code is under development. But it sounds like you know about a bunch of UI tweaks to make it work better. Can you share what those are?
posted by Nelson at 10:58 AM on March 22 [2 favorites]
Yes, I understand the code is under development. But it sounds like you know about a bunch of UI tweaks to make it work better. Can you share what those are?
posted by Nelson at 10:58 AM on March 22 [2 favorites]
I have a Kindle I bought in 2016 and I'm looking for a new reader. Any recommendations for e-readers that are not tied to a single market like Amazon ?
With Calibre your ebooks are no longer tied to the vendor. Any e-reader with side-loading can be used, as can an Android or iOS tablet that can read epubs. Without knowing more details on your requirements , the market ranges from a cheap generic Android tablet for less than $50 to over $600 for a Remarkable Pro.
posted by Runes at 11:10 AM on March 22 [3 favorites]
With Calibre your ebooks are no longer tied to the vendor. Any e-reader with side-loading can be used, as can an Android or iOS tablet that can read epubs. Without knowing more details on your requirements , the market ranges from a cheap generic Android tablet for less than $50 to over $600 for a Remarkable Pro.
posted by Runes at 11:10 AM on March 22 [3 favorites]
But it sounds like you know about a bunch of UI tweaks to make it work better. Can you share what those are?
That was the other person. But Preferences > Appearance gives plenty of control over what you interact with.
My screen looks like this. It works for me just fine. I need a job done, not an esthetic experience.
posted by Lemkin at 11:47 AM on March 22 [3 favorites]
That was the other person. But Preferences > Appearance gives plenty of control over what you interact with.
My screen looks like this. It works for me just fine. I need a job done, not an esthetic experience.
posted by Lemkin at 11:47 AM on March 22 [3 favorites]
if you use Calibre, which I do happily, then you will most likely need this tool as well. They go nicely hand-in-hand:
https://github.com/noDRM/DeDRM_tools/releases/tag/v10.0.9
posted by alchemist at 12:41 PM on March 22 [4 favorites]
https://github.com/noDRM/DeDRM_tools/releases/tag/v10.0.9
posted by alchemist at 12:41 PM on March 22 [4 favorites]
With Calibre your ebooks are no longer tied to the vendor.
That's true if you can get them into calibre and if their DRM can be removed. Amazon's recently made it much harder to actually get books onto your computer in the first place, and the latest version of its DRM is not 100% cracked.
I have a Kindle I bought in 2016 and I'm looking for a new reader. Any recommendations for e-readers that are not tied to a single market like Amazon ?
tl;dr If you're in the US and happy with your current kindle, I'd get a Kobo Clara BW, which will be similar to your kindle in terms of price, size and features, have a slightly sharper screen, and have not just built-in lighting but also adjustable color temperature for said lighting. It's very nice, especially if you like to read at night. The UI is (imo) much nicer than a kindle's and it can easily be tweaked to be even better. It also has built-in bluetooth for page turners and other input devices. (Prices/availability might be different in other countries.)
General info: All eink ereaders use screens made by the same company (Eink). The main variations between readers have to do with software; with design decisions like flush versus recessed screens (some people have strong feelings in favor of one or the other); with features like color screens, lighting, page-turn buttons, and stylus support; and with privacy/DRM/etc-related policy shenanigans or lack thereof from the companies making and/or selling the devices. These days, I think they all have wifi and the ability to connect to computers as regular USB devices (except, to a certain extent, the latest kindles...)
I think the two biggest changes since 2016 have been (1) built-in lighting with adjustable color temperature, and (2) color screens. Almost all (or all?) the current models that use color screens use the same screen technology (it's called Kaleido) which works by adding a color eink layer on top of the black-and-white eink layer. This makes the screen somewhat darker and less crisp than a BW screen, generally requires higher lighting levels to look good, and introduces a bit of a "screendoor effect". Some people hate this; other people don't feel any difference; some people even feel it looks more like paper. Colors are more muted than on non-eink screens. If you're in the US, you *might* be able to check out some color devices at Best Buy. In some other countries you might have more options.
Eink screens are prone to some amount of variability, especially with respect to the built-in frontlights in terms of brightness, evenness, and color temperature. This seems to be true across all brands.
The main ereader companies/brands are:
- Kobo: originally Canadian, now owned by Rakuten, a giant Japanese conglomerate but both less giant and, thus far, much less evil than Amazon. Like Amazon, kobo has its own bookstore that you can buy from directly from your device. Unlike Amazon, it doesn't try to push its store at you at every opportunity. You can easily never see it. Most of the books from the Kobo store come with Adobe's DRM, which calibre can easily remove. Kobo has some kind of subscription like Kindle Unlimited if you're into that kind of thing, though I hear the selection is different. Also, the selection in the Kobo store (and any other ebook store) is more limited than Amazon's, because Amazon locks a lot of authors (and possibly other publishers?) into exclusivity contracts.
If you like you can happily use a kobo device without ever registering it (you can manually edit a file on the device to fake register if you want). Like Amazon, kobo has an android (and possibly desktop?) app. Like Amazon, kobo will sync your books across devices if you bought the books from the official store; unlike Amazon, it doesn't sync sideloaded books (but you can sync if you use KOReader). If you want to install your own software on the device you don't have to painfully jailbreak it like you do with kindles; "your own software" could include KOReader, which is a great, extremely customizable alternative for reading and file management; NickelMenu, which lets you customize a lot of the device's UI; tweaks to enable downloading from Google Drive (I think) and such; etc.
Current kobo models are the 6" Clara, which comes in both color and BW versions, both with recessed screens; the 7" Libra Color, also with recessed screen; the 8" Sage (BW); and the 10.3" Ellipsa 2E (BW). All the models except for the Claras have an option to use a stylus to write on the screen. (Kobo sells its own stylus but apparently there are good generic options for much less.) Also, the Libra and Sage both have page turn buttons (which you don't have to use since the screen is a touchscreen, but can be very nice).
Kobo has better Overdrive integration than Amazon outside of the US, and (I think?) good integration in the US but complicated if you want to connect multiple library accounts. (Note that Overdrive mostly uses Adobe DRM, which calibre can easily remove, such that you can use Overdrive books with any reader if you're got a library account.)
For a few models kobo has some kind of partnership with ifixit.
In some countries (Germany?) kobo devices are sold under the brand name Tolino with a different operating system that's integrated with some local ebook store. I think there's a way to replace the Tolino firmware with Kobo's, at least for some models.
- PocketBook: a European company that I don't know as much about, but they also have a full product lineup with different sizes, color/bw, page-turn buttons, and so on. Software-wise I think they're even more open than kobo (and way more than amazon) about customizing your reader and installing third-party software. I think they have their own bookstore but you're even less tied to it than with kobo (and again way less than with amazon). I believe in some countries they're even set up to let you hook up your device directly to other online bookstores.
Kindles, Kobos, and PocketBooks all run their own custom operating systems, which are based on either Android or Linux but limit their abilities to reading-related features.
A different category of ereaders is ones that are basically Android tablets with eink screens. Advantages include being able to install any ebook app that runs on Android, including the Kindle and Kobo apps and so on. Disadvantages include the fact that eink doesn't do well with anything requiring animation or scrolling, so a lot of apps that include those things will give you a not-great experience with lots of slow loading and ghosting. Some of the big eink-Android device makers include tweaks to minimize that problem, as well as customized apps.
As far as I know all the Android-eink brands are Chinese, and there's some debate about how worried to be about the fact that (all? most?) of them seem to "phone home" (i.e., send data back to the parent company) quite a bit. For that reason, there's been some work on installing clean Android roms on them, but I'm not up to date with how that's been going. You can also easily keep the devices offline, or not connect them to any other accounts you might have.
Brands/companies include:
- (Onyx) Boox: a Chinese brand that's probably the best-known Android eink device maker. They have possibly the biggest range of devices out of all the ereader companies, including one with a phone-like form factor that's been getting good reviews. (They also sell eink monitors! As do some other companies.)
- Bigme - I don't know a ton about them other than that their official store is https://store.bigme.vip and not https://bigmestore.com/.
- Hisense - I think they mostly make eink phones, but also some non-phone devices?
- Meebook - popular for relatively low prices, available (officially, I think?) from aliexpress.
- and many many others. If you want to read about all these, there are brand-specific subreddits and a general subreddit (/r/ereader, not ereaders), and mobileread has extremely comprehensive forums. I've noticed that all the subreddits seem to be full of people who apparently don't believe in searching to see whether a question's already been asked and answered; I'd recommend just searching, since the same question can get more or less answers depending on who's online and in a mood to provide the same exact info for the hundredth time.
All the above is about devices primarily meant for reading ebooks. There are also companies making eink devices intended primarily for largely for handwriting and annotation (like Remarkable, Supernote, and some others I don't remember). Most of the Android companies also have contenders, and Kobo kind of does (there's a bunch of handwriting support on all the models except for the Claras, but from what I've read it's not as extensive as in more specialized devices). And if your use case requires giant screens (maybe you'll be reading only research articles or PDFs), there are a bunch of 10+" models, of which I think the biggest might be the Fujitsu Quaderno A4 (13.3"), but don't trust me on this.
posted by trig at 12:46 PM on March 22 [38 favorites]
That's true if you can get them into calibre and if their DRM can be removed. Amazon's recently made it much harder to actually get books onto your computer in the first place, and the latest version of its DRM is not 100% cracked.
I have a Kindle I bought in 2016 and I'm looking for a new reader. Any recommendations for e-readers that are not tied to a single market like Amazon ?
tl;dr If you're in the US and happy with your current kindle, I'd get a Kobo Clara BW, which will be similar to your kindle in terms of price, size and features, have a slightly sharper screen, and have not just built-in lighting but also adjustable color temperature for said lighting. It's very nice, especially if you like to read at night. The UI is (imo) much nicer than a kindle's and it can easily be tweaked to be even better. It also has built-in bluetooth for page turners and other input devices. (Prices/availability might be different in other countries.)
General info: All eink ereaders use screens made by the same company (Eink). The main variations between readers have to do with software; with design decisions like flush versus recessed screens (some people have strong feelings in favor of one or the other); with features like color screens, lighting, page-turn buttons, and stylus support; and with privacy/DRM/etc-related policy shenanigans or lack thereof from the companies making and/or selling the devices. These days, I think they all have wifi and the ability to connect to computers as regular USB devices (except, to a certain extent, the latest kindles...)
I think the two biggest changes since 2016 have been (1) built-in lighting with adjustable color temperature, and (2) color screens. Almost all (or all?) the current models that use color screens use the same screen technology (it's called Kaleido) which works by adding a color eink layer on top of the black-and-white eink layer. This makes the screen somewhat darker and less crisp than a BW screen, generally requires higher lighting levels to look good, and introduces a bit of a "screendoor effect". Some people hate this; other people don't feel any difference; some people even feel it looks more like paper. Colors are more muted than on non-eink screens. If you're in the US, you *might* be able to check out some color devices at Best Buy. In some other countries you might have more options.
Eink screens are prone to some amount of variability, especially with respect to the built-in frontlights in terms of brightness, evenness, and color temperature. This seems to be true across all brands.
The main ereader companies/brands are:
- Kobo: originally Canadian, now owned by Rakuten, a giant Japanese conglomerate but both less giant and, thus far, much less evil than Amazon. Like Amazon, kobo has its own bookstore that you can buy from directly from your device. Unlike Amazon, it doesn't try to push its store at you at every opportunity. You can easily never see it. Most of the books from the Kobo store come with Adobe's DRM, which calibre can easily remove. Kobo has some kind of subscription like Kindle Unlimited if you're into that kind of thing, though I hear the selection is different. Also, the selection in the Kobo store (and any other ebook store) is more limited than Amazon's, because Amazon locks a lot of authors (and possibly other publishers?) into exclusivity contracts.
If you like you can happily use a kobo device without ever registering it (you can manually edit a file on the device to fake register if you want). Like Amazon, kobo has an android (and possibly desktop?) app. Like Amazon, kobo will sync your books across devices if you bought the books from the official store; unlike Amazon, it doesn't sync sideloaded books (but you can sync if you use KOReader). If you want to install your own software on the device you don't have to painfully jailbreak it like you do with kindles; "your own software" could include KOReader, which is a great, extremely customizable alternative for reading and file management; NickelMenu, which lets you customize a lot of the device's UI; tweaks to enable downloading from Google Drive (I think) and such; etc.
Current kobo models are the 6" Clara, which comes in both color and BW versions, both with recessed screens; the 7" Libra Color, also with recessed screen; the 8" Sage (BW); and the 10.3" Ellipsa 2E (BW). All the models except for the Claras have an option to use a stylus to write on the screen. (Kobo sells its own stylus but apparently there are good generic options for much less.) Also, the Libra and Sage both have page turn buttons (which you don't have to use since the screen is a touchscreen, but can be very nice).
Kobo has better Overdrive integration than Amazon outside of the US, and (I think?) good integration in the US but complicated if you want to connect multiple library accounts. (Note that Overdrive mostly uses Adobe DRM, which calibre can easily remove, such that you can use Overdrive books with any reader if you're got a library account.)
For a few models kobo has some kind of partnership with ifixit.
In some countries (Germany?) kobo devices are sold under the brand name Tolino with a different operating system that's integrated with some local ebook store. I think there's a way to replace the Tolino firmware with Kobo's, at least for some models.
- PocketBook: a European company that I don't know as much about, but they also have a full product lineup with different sizes, color/bw, page-turn buttons, and so on. Software-wise I think they're even more open than kobo (and way more than amazon) about customizing your reader and installing third-party software. I think they have their own bookstore but you're even less tied to it than with kobo (and again way less than with amazon). I believe in some countries they're even set up to let you hook up your device directly to other online bookstores.
Kindles, Kobos, and PocketBooks all run their own custom operating systems, which are based on either Android or Linux but limit their abilities to reading-related features.
A different category of ereaders is ones that are basically Android tablets with eink screens. Advantages include being able to install any ebook app that runs on Android, including the Kindle and Kobo apps and so on. Disadvantages include the fact that eink doesn't do well with anything requiring animation or scrolling, so a lot of apps that include those things will give you a not-great experience with lots of slow loading and ghosting. Some of the big eink-Android device makers include tweaks to minimize that problem, as well as customized apps.
As far as I know all the Android-eink brands are Chinese, and there's some debate about how worried to be about the fact that (all? most?) of them seem to "phone home" (i.e., send data back to the parent company) quite a bit. For that reason, there's been some work on installing clean Android roms on them, but I'm not up to date with how that's been going. You can also easily keep the devices offline, or not connect them to any other accounts you might have.
Brands/companies include:
- (Onyx) Boox: a Chinese brand that's probably the best-known Android eink device maker. They have possibly the biggest range of devices out of all the ereader companies, including one with a phone-like form factor that's been getting good reviews. (They also sell eink monitors! As do some other companies.)
- Bigme - I don't know a ton about them other than that their official store is https://store.bigme.vip and not https://bigmestore.com/.
- Hisense - I think they mostly make eink phones, but also some non-phone devices?
- Meebook - popular for relatively low prices, available (officially, I think?) from aliexpress.
- and many many others. If you want to read about all these, there are brand-specific subreddits and a general subreddit (/r/ereader, not ereaders), and mobileread has extremely comprehensive forums. I've noticed that all the subreddits seem to be full of people who apparently don't believe in searching to see whether a question's already been asked and answered; I'd recommend just searching, since the same question can get more or less answers depending on who's online and in a mood to provide the same exact info for the hundredth time.
All the above is about devices primarily meant for reading ebooks. There are also companies making eink devices intended primarily for largely for handwriting and annotation (like Remarkable, Supernote, and some others I don't remember). Most of the Android companies also have contenders, and Kobo kind of does (there's a bunch of handwriting support on all the models except for the Claras, but from what I've read it's not as extensive as in more specialized devices). And if your use case requires giant screens (maybe you'll be reading only research articles or PDFs), there are a bunch of 10+" models, of which I think the biggest might be the Fujitsu Quaderno A4 (13.3"), but don't trust me on this.
posted by trig at 12:46 PM on March 22 [38 favorites]
if you use Calibre, which I do happily, then you will most likely need this tool as well. They go nicely hand-in-hand:
https://github.com/noDRM/DeDRM_tools/releases/tag/v10.0.9
And for Adobe DRM you can make your life easier by also using the de-acsm plugin. (If you're on Linux this basically solves all the problems of Adobe not making a Linux version of ADE.)
posted by trig at 12:50 PM on March 22 [6 favorites]
https://github.com/noDRM/DeDRM_tools/releases/tag/v10.0.9
And for Adobe DRM you can make your life easier by also using the de-acsm plugin. (If you're on Linux this basically solves all the problems of Adobe not making a Linux version of ADE.)
posted by trig at 12:50 PM on March 22 [6 favorites]
Does anyone know of a way to sync read data (on Kobo)? Losing that everytime I get a new device is extremely annoying.
I've never tried but googling suggests a calibre plugin called Kobo Utilities.
If you ever switch to using KOReader on your kobo I think there are built-in sync utilities (and I think you can also just find the relevant data files and copy them over to a new device).
posted by trig at 12:56 PM on March 22 [1 favorite]
I've never tried but googling suggests a calibre plugin called Kobo Utilities.
If you ever switch to using KOReader on your kobo I think there are built-in sync utilities (and I think you can also just find the relevant data files and copy them over to a new device).
posted by trig at 12:56 PM on March 22 [1 favorite]
Calibre+Marvin=CompleteHappiness 2
Years ago I used calibre to make an epub of a long form news article. It was remarkably easy! These days I use it mostly to manage my library, download metadata and covers, sometimes to fix some egregious formatting errors and send things to my tablet. I know that it does a billion things more than that and I’m confident that should I need to make use of any of those things that they’ll be there waiting for me. Not once have I even thought about the UI but now that you mention it, sure, it could be cleaner.
I miss Marvin because it was perfect. Pocketbooks is the best I’ve found since Marvin went away but it’s a distant second for me.
posted by ashbury at 1:03 PM on March 22 [4 favorites]
Years ago I used calibre to make an epub of a long form news article. It was remarkably easy! These days I use it mostly to manage my library, download metadata and covers, sometimes to fix some egregious formatting errors and send things to my tablet. I know that it does a billion things more than that and I’m confident that should I need to make use of any of those things that they’ll be there waiting for me. Not once have I even thought about the UI but now that you mention it, sure, it could be cleaner.
I miss Marvin because it was perfect. Pocketbooks is the best I’ve found since Marvin went away but it’s a distant second for me.
posted by ashbury at 1:03 PM on March 22 [4 favorites]
I am sad over Marvin, especially as I let the app on my iPad lapse into redownload and thus lost all the books.
using Yomu and Readest now, seem OK if not perfect
posted by chavenet at 1:06 PM on March 22 [2 favorites]
using Yomu and Readest now, seem OK if not perfect
posted by chavenet at 1:06 PM on March 22 [2 favorites]
Oh, and I'll stop derailing the thread but there's this giant comparison table someone made of not all ereader devices ever made, but a fair bunch of them.
posted by trig at 1:36 PM on March 22 [4 favorites]
posted by trig at 1:36 PM on March 22 [4 favorites]
But it sounds like you know about a bunch of UI tweaks to make it work better. Can you share what those are?
The preference settings in Calibre are pretty powerful and granular, to the point that you can even delete or add actions to the menu bar (on a Mac, at least).
By adjusting the settings, I made my ebook viewer look as close as possible to the Apple Books viewer. And for the main window, I went with a really minimalist—just what I need, bare bones text-based UI style.
Granted, the preferences aren't exactly user-friendly. But once you get them to work, you never have to touch them again, and the app basically remains mostly unchanged for years.
posted by Omon Ra at 3:39 PM on March 22 [4 favorites]
The preference settings in Calibre are pretty powerful and granular, to the point that you can even delete or add actions to the menu bar (on a Mac, at least).
By adjusting the settings, I made my ebook viewer look as close as possible to the Apple Books viewer. And for the main window, I went with a really minimalist—just what I need, bare bones text-based UI style.
Granted, the preferences aren't exactly user-friendly. But once you get them to work, you never have to touch them again, and the app basically remains mostly unchanged for years.
posted by Omon Ra at 3:39 PM on March 22 [4 favorites]
I manage a 20k ebook library with this and I utterly adore it. I've used it since 2018. I have tags, and so many columns for metadata. I don't mind the filesystem, I would stop after like 5 books if I had to edit metadata in the actual files. That's what I use Calibre for, to manage the metadata. If I need a copy of the book with correct metadata, I can export a copy and it'll have the exact metadata I have set with the correct cover. I've had to explain to a few people on Reddit that yes, that's by design. Don't worry about the files not being in whichever order you'd prefer, but you can always export the books to organize the way you want, you'd just lose the ability to update (like adding a read date, rating, notes) the book information in a convenient way.
I have books from Amazon, Kobo, Google Play & indie stores (Haymarket, Verso, Tor's ebook club) plus books from Gutenberg & Standard Ebooks. Oh and fanfic (via FanFicFare) + books from Humble Bundle and PDFs from Zotero. I send books to my Kindle Paperwhite, my phone and my tablet (I use Moon+ Pro). The tablet gets my library (I have a 512GB SD card and it's not even half-full with 20k books in EPUB, PDF, and CBZ.), and I put fanfic, novels, and non graphics heavy nonfic on my Paperwhite, since the screen's not great for detailed graphics or tables. PDFs go to my tablet. I also have digests from Readwise and Instapaper of read it later links/emails sent to my Paperwhite, so plenty of reading material. I also import those into Calibre, with tags, wordcount, and converting to a couple of formats.
My library is synced to an external HD, and I mak a catalog of books every quarter in CSV for safekeeping.
posted by tlwright at 4:22 PM on March 22 [4 favorites]
I have books from Amazon, Kobo, Google Play & indie stores (Haymarket, Verso, Tor's ebook club) plus books from Gutenberg & Standard Ebooks. Oh and fanfic (via FanFicFare) + books from Humble Bundle and PDFs from Zotero. I send books to my Kindle Paperwhite, my phone and my tablet (I use Moon+ Pro). The tablet gets my library (I have a 512GB SD card and it's not even half-full with 20k books in EPUB, PDF, and CBZ.), and I put fanfic, novels, and non graphics heavy nonfic on my Paperwhite, since the screen's not great for detailed graphics or tables. PDFs go to my tablet. I also have digests from Readwise and Instapaper of read it later links/emails sent to my Paperwhite, so plenty of reading material. I also import those into Calibre, with tags, wordcount, and converting to a couple of formats.
My library is synced to an external HD, and I mak a catalog of books every quarter in CSV for safekeeping.
posted by tlwright at 4:22 PM on March 22 [4 favorites]
I'm a longtime Calibre user (though I haven't upgraded yet) and a reformed Kindle user, now happily married to a Kobo Clara B&W.
However, I often need to read on my iPhone or iPad, and thus far have just been tossing stuff into Apple Books (and therefore needing to keep myself updated with the Kobo manually). Is there an app or other way of using Calibre with the iDevices that I'm not aware of?
posted by lhauser at 5:59 PM on March 22 [1 favorite]
However, I often need to read on my iPhone or iPad, and thus far have just been tossing stuff into Apple Books (and therefore needing to keep myself updated with the Kobo manually). Is there an app or other way of using Calibre with the iDevices that I'm not aware of?
posted by lhauser at 5:59 PM on March 22 [1 favorite]
Geez, you people with <10k books... my total is north of that (I've legit been collecting "ebooks", starting with pdf, since '99, and there are still files floating around in my archive that I read on my Palm Treo. (Is #bookz still around?)
So my strongest reaction? "Ugh, I have to update the software. Again."
posted by stormyteal at 9:26 PM on March 22 [1 favorite]
So my strongest reaction? "Ugh, I have to update the software. Again."
posted by stormyteal at 9:26 PM on March 22 [1 favorite]
I use Calibre for DeDRM on my Kobo books, but I don't like it for library management. I've been using Kavita for that, via the official Docker container, on my Synology, and it works great.
posted by mystyk at 8:57 AM on March 23 [1 favorite]
posted by mystyk at 8:57 AM on March 23 [1 favorite]
And for Adobe DRM you can make your life easier by also using the de-acsm plugin. (If you're on Linux this basically solves all the problems of Adobe not making a Linux version of ADE.)
Thanks for the tip, trig! I have a decade-old mac Mini that I haven't decommissioned because I needed it to remove DRM from ebook purchases and hadn't been able to accomplish that on my Linux laptop.
posted by fogovonslack at 9:25 AM on March 23 [1 favorite]
Thanks for the tip, trig! I have a decade-old mac Mini that I haven't decommissioned because I needed it to remove DRM from ebook purchases and hadn't been able to accomplish that on my Linux laptop.
posted by fogovonslack at 9:25 AM on March 23 [1 favorite]
I’m glad somebody is keeping up with the technology for me. I went from a Rocketbook to a PRS-350 that still works so I haven’t had to read a review in centuries.
posted by The Monster at the End of this Thread at 2:11 PM on March 23 [1 favorite]
posted by The Monster at the End of this Thread at 2:11 PM on March 23 [1 favorite]
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