Readwise
p/readwise
Resurfacing your best highlights from Kindle, iBooks & more
Tristan Homsi
Readwise Beta — Effortlessly rediscover and organize your Kindle highlights
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Readwise sends you a daily email which helps you retain & organize your Kindle highlights effortlessly ✨ Resurface, categorize, and actually remember the lessons from books you read.

Replies
Jason Crawford
@homsit @ddoyon @michpokrass Nice, just signed up! Looking forward to this. Do I have to resync on the web all the time? Or does it automatically sync in the background every time I highlight something? Automatic would be far, far preferable, might even end up being a dealbreaker for me. PS: when I'm logged in to your site, there's no about/FAQ/contact-us or anything :-/
Tristan Homsi
@ddoyon @michpokrass @jasoncrawford Unfortunately you do have to resync on our site every time you have new highlights. I definitely agree it's suboptimal, but unfortunately Amazon does not provide an API for accessing highlights so we have to let you export them using your browser. However, we're soon going to make automatic resyncing really fast and easy (just click one button and forget about it). FAQ -- that's a great idea, I've added it to our todo list. We'll mention the syncing there ;) Thanks for all the great feedback Jason!
John Manoogian III

I love it and can't wait to see what the future holds for Readwise.

Pros:

The service I've been searching for to make sense of my massive pile of ebook highlights

Cons:

Automatic syncing would be nice, as would grouping books by topic or date

Jim Lyons

I put as my only con - "Only as good as the original highlights" which really isn't a con, and of course makes sense - no other way this can work. Fortunately mine are pretty good, and my reading has been diverse. It's fascinating to me how one can read an entire book, highlighting away, but then just one sentence, viewed later, can be so profound/interesting/fun. It's so nice to have this random access into something I have invested my time in (the original highlighting) but was never quite sure how or if I would ever use.

Pros:

Getting these daily updates has been a joy!

Cons:

Only as good as the original highlights.

Will Hoekenga

Readwise is just a really cool way to enhance your reading experience. I love the feeling when I highlight something now that I know I'm going to see it again.

The email digest is already one of my favorite things in my inbox, but I'm also really excited to see them continue building out the actual "hub" for my highlights. It has the chance to be the best record of your reading habits and thoughts on books.

I highly recommend all readers give it a try.

Pros:

Gets the best parts from books I like back in front of my face. Since I know I'll see my highlights again, it's changed the way I highlight.

Cons:

I've been really impressed with how they've consistently improved it already, but automatic syncing would be cool if it's possible.

Tristan Homsi
Thanks Will :) Automatic syncing would be incredible. Unfortunately we haven't quite figured out a good way to implement it yet -- feels mostly infeasible until Amazon creates an API for Kindle highlights.
Théo Blochet
I've had this on my side-project to-do list for a while now - really glad someone tackled this problem and got past the lack of decent API implementation from both Amazon and Goodreads for fetching highlights (besides https://read.amazon.com/notebook nobody knows about). Congrats to the team for shipping this! If you read a ton of non-fiction, going back to a particular excerpt can be a pain. Once you invest enough in ReadWise, this might very well be a solved problem. (Plus the deep links to the kindle app are so useful to see the highlight in context 🙌) Another use case this could solve for is this moment when you read a paragraph and really want to share it with a boss/colleague/friend because it's so relevant to them. But you're outside, sitting in the grass in a park. With your WIFI ad-supported Kindle. Because you're cheap and wanted to save $90. So you highlight and forget. If ReadWise manages to get you engaged with that content again, problem solved again 😀 A couple of ideas/friction points that are probably already on your roadmap I thought I'd share here : • I made 202 highlights in one book, and can't search them via the UI (but thank you for not including any pagination, so I can ⌘+F them 💯) • Could I navigate these 202 highlights by chapter of the book? • I want to bundle a bunch of highlights and share them with a friend via a unique link • I want to share all highlights of a book I just finished with my colleague • I want to associate a note to a highlight, so that I, or the person I share it to, understand the context behind why I highlighted that note • Etc, etc 😇 PS : I am (very?) biased against products that claim to "summarize a book for you" or "let you read a book in just 15 mins", and when I read "ReadWise" for the first time, that's what the name made me thought the product was about. "ReadWise" doesn't really imply the notion of "collecting" or "building wisdom" that an easy to parse database of highlights could.
Tristan Homsi
Hey @theoblochet, thanks for taking the time to give us feedback in such detail -- we seriously appreciate it. > I made 202 highlights in one book, and can't search them via the UI (but thank you for not including any pagination, so I can ⌘+F them 💯) Hah, yeah, a proper search is definitely on our todo! Glad cmd+f could tide you over (we love it too 👌) > Could I navigate these 202 highlights by chapter of the book? Hopefully soon! This data (essentially a location->chapter mapping) is not easily accessible anywhere, but we have a couple ideas on it. As users, we definitely want this too :P > I want to bundle a bunch of highlights and share them with a friend via a unique link Right on. We really like the idea of this style of 1to1 sharing (moreso than bulk sharing like on facebook). > I want to associate a note to a highlight, so that I, or the person I share it to, understand the context behind why I highlighted that note We're overdue to add this -- we'll ship it soon and let you know! >Readwise name Hehe, we're all about reading smarter (even reading wiser perhaps?), not reading shallower, so we're on the same page with you! The name speaks more to our broader aspirations of being more than just a highlight management tool, but that's a bit of a way off :) Thanks again dude, we'll stay in touch!
Wojtek Nosowski
Nice. I thought of something similar but for highlights across kindle, instapaper and chrome. Used Google Keep for ssaving and tagging quotes but it's buggy. Good luck!
Tristan Homsi
@outhipped Thanks Wojtek! Would love to hear more about that project -- I'm tristan@readwise.io
Tim Falls

Amazon's web interface for accessing Kindle highlights is pretty unruly, so hoping this is a good alternative.

Pros:

it works!

Cons:

perhaps too many items in each daily digest?

Chris Lee Jacob
Hi @michpokrass, @ddoyon & @homsit, congrats on your launch anniversary for Readwise Beta 🎉 What are your highlights from the past year? Epic Wins 🏆 1. 2. 3. Epic Fails 💩 1. 2. 3. What advice would you give to founders launching today? (...or yourself a year ago 🤔) What's the next year look like for Readwise? 🚀 p.s. double congrats for you recent launch too! Readwise
Tristan Homsi
Hey PH! We're huge fans of Kindle, but we were pained by how hard it is to revisit and organize your highlights. It would often feel like we'd read a book and have phenomenal new insights, only to forget them a couple months later. Readwise sends you a daily email with some of your best past highlights, helping you actually remember what you read. We also let you effortlessly tag and rate your highlights. This lets you organize the insights you had from your books, turning them into long-lasting wisdom. The main features: - 💫 Effortlessly sync your Kindle highlights - 📬 Receive an email with some of your best highlights, every day - 💌 Categorize your highlights with different tags e.g "entrepreneurship", "happiness" - 🤓 Never forget what you learned from a book again Even if you don't read on Kindle, we'd love to hear what you think about the product and where you'd like us to import highlights from next! We're huge reading nerds, and are just getting started on our mission of improving how people read and learn from books.
Aishwarya Hariharan
@homsit I just signed up and it looks great :D I sometimes forget that I can go through my highlights and this is a great way of reminding me of books I've read and loved :) I also love that you a) sent me an email immediately with my highlights and b) recommended a book to me based on the insights. Kudos!
Tristan Homsi
@ashpapoye thanks so much for the feedback Aishwarya! It means a lot 🙏 do let us know if you think of any way we can make Readwise even better.
Sarah L. Lovemore

I absolutely have loved this service since I started receiving the daily mails. I would prefer to receive them weekly though, and it would be great to also then choose what day to receive them.

I would love to be able to also highlight articles that I read on a browser and receive a similar service. I'm not sure if this is possible, but since I've been voraciously highlighting in my kindle, I now similarly want to highlight everything I read digitally because the idea that the content can be resent to me in bite sized bits in the future, is JUST BLOODY BRILLIANT. Can the Chrome app please be made to do this too?! i.e. I can highlight some content on a webpage and then click the r. icon for the chrome app, and voila - the snippit is saved. Writing this makes me feel that this service probably already exists, but I haven't found one yet, and I feel you guys could do it.

LOVE what you've done here. Thank you!

Pros:

The concept

Its encouraged me to read more so that I can have more quotes!

Cons:

Can we do this for websites too?

Can we change the frequency of the newsletter?

Tristan Homsi
Hey Sarah! Thanks for this wonderful review. We're really happy you like it. As for your email frequency, you can definitely change your settings! Just go here: https://readwise.io/preferences/... and you can choose either "weekly" or "every 2 days" :) Thanks for the suggestion to highlight web content! That's a super interesting direction that we're looking more into... I've bumped it up our todo list thanks to your feedback.
Jim Lyons
Love your point about being encouraged to read more - I feel exactly the same way, though thrilled that the Readwise newsletters bring back highlights from my reading of five and more years ago, combined with the more recent.
Dan Pardi

Just getting started using this but have wanted something like it for a while. Reminds me a bit of oh life journal.

Pros:

Provides a valuable service to remind you of what you've read

Cons:

Haven't identified one yet

Tristan Homsi
Thanks for the review Dan! Do let us know if you think of any ways we can make Readwise even better :)
Swami Venkataramani
So useful! Would be nice to also see all the popular highlights in a book.
Stas Ostrouhov
Would want it for Google Play Books
Michelle Pokrass
@sostrouhov Coming soon :) We'll keep you posted!
Stas Ostrouhov
@michpokrass What about Instapaper? Did you thought about it?
Michelle Pokrass
@sostrouhov on the to-do list as well :)
Charles Pensig

I've been using this for several weeks and continue to enjoy reading my old highlights. The best part of it is seeing themes emerge in the things I highlight--my values. I look forward to seeing how my relationship with my books evolves as I read and highlight more.

Side bonus: I even buy more kindle books just so I can revisit them with Readwise.

Pros:

Lets me remember book in a way I never thought possible.

Cons:

Requires a lot of highlights in order to keep a daily digest going.

Conrad Irwin

There's something really fun about being able to highlight part of a book and get it reiterated over email — passive learning is really important if you're trying to retain lots of information.

Pros:

Finally a reason to highlight stuff in Kindle! I've been looking for a way to organize the information I've pulled out of books.

Cons:

It's still really early, it wasn't quite clear how some of the features (like deletion) work, but overall seems solid.

Tristan Homsi
Thanks Conrad! We're working hard on making the mental models for our users simpler and more clear. More to come soon :)
Kenna
This is great. It has some of the features that I loved with Readmill. Do you plan on having profiles and more social sharing capabilities?
Tristan Homsi
Key @kenna, thanks for this! Glad you like it. We're currently still hyper-focused on giving readers the best way to organize and retain what they read. What really excites us, moreso than social, is making books a better way to learn. That being said, anything is possible -- super interested to hear more about why you loved Readmill.
Kenna
@homsit I see. Then the only difference right now with Amazon's native highlights page are tags and favourites. Although I'm not sure how favourites work, cos if I highlighted something, aren't they a favourite already? In Amazon you can search which is not available with Readwise. I would like to see a tag cloud and drag and drop functionalities. Because to be honest, I will not go through all my highlights just to tag each of them. Another thing, I've been looking for something like this for years now and I mainly use the old school pen and paper because I read on both Kindly and iBooks and also quite a lot of physical books, a possible integration for all of them perhaps? Although the daily email for me is already a winner.
Tristan Homsi
@kenna Gotcha. For favorites, we've found that people usually indeed highlight what they like, but there are a few highlights per book which really draw out some insight or make an impact on the person -- favoriting is usually for those :) Searching: to come soon! :) Tagging gripes: I hear you. We've actually built a clever way to tag your highlights as you make them while reading, which may help. I'll shoot you an email about how it works in a bit. Different reading integrations: for sure! We're very excited to add integrations for different platforms. iBooks sounds interesting, I'll do some digging into how feasible it is to get the highlights out of it.
Tristan Homsi
@kenna Aha, glad to hear it! The iBooks import is still a bit experimental, so definitely let me know how it works for you :)
Doug Lane
I really enjoyed using Readwise during the private beta. It was fun to re-surface things that I once found interesting (but soon after forgot about), and I now find myself highlighting more often. It was clear from all of my interactions with the team that you guys are listening to users and really thinking hard about how to make the service great. Congrats on the milestone!
Cory Bray

There's no point in reading a book if you're going to forget everything. Use Readwise and retain your knowledge!

Pros:

It reinforces what I read so I get more value out of my reading time

Cons:

Keep doing what you're doing!

Cory Bray
I've been using Readwise (f/k/a Rekindled) for a few months and LOVE IT! Like the Dos Equis guy...I don't read all the time, but when I do, I re-inforce it with Readwise. It's a graet product with a talented and passionate team behind it!
Jacob Simon

I actually stumbled upon Readwise in searching for a way increase the efficiency of the time I spend reading. It's been awesome to see it grow from 5 highlights in an email to the customization features today. Not only has it succeeded in helping me to retain more of the books I've read, it's also encouraged me to form positive habits around highlighting key sections as I read.

Pros:

I love how it keeps the things I've read fresh in my mind, and incentivizes me to pay attention to key passages as I read

Cons:

Some limitations around organizing highlights into groups but the newest features are making strong strides in that direction

Tristan Homsi
Thanks for being candid Jacob. We're still figuring out the best way to implement tagging and organization in a way that's useful. This article is very much front of mind: https://praxis.fortelabs.co/tagg... More to come on this front soon!