This is one of those application that I love. Does it job well, nobody is trying to make interface "modern", that is use sweet colors, big squares everywhere with weirdo icons that you need to guess what they are supposed to mean. Starts fast, works fast, does not encourage me do buy some subscriptions, register somewhere, connect to some "service", just does it job perfectly.
Unfortunately with every year there are less and less such applications, but they are still out there, e.g. SumatraPDF or KeePassXC.
Calibre has the worst possible UI, it's just that nobody knows how to improve it. Icons are beyond meaningless, menus are nested and super-specific, functionality is hidden behind context menus and unintuitive click behaviour, hover title text is abused for option documentation.
Calibre is an incredible piece of software, but of all the things it does great, the UI isn't one of them.
It really doesn't imho. It does by no mean follow the kind of "sleekness" that you expect from contemporary UIs, but it's perfectly functional and takes the least amount of effort of getting used to, at least from the point of view of someone that does not otherwise particularly love to invest too much time in convoluted UIs (á la GIMP :))
What? How? “Add Books” is a book icon with a plus sign. “View” is a magnifying glass. “Remove Books” is a recycling symbol. “Preferences” is the usual settings-esque gear icon. “Device” is an e-reader. “Send To Device” is an e-reader with an arrow. I’ll grant you that some are vague, like “Download Metadata” being a globe, but the other major part you’ve glossed over is that all of these have their titles directly underneath them. There is no need to guess as to what they do.
> menus are nested and super-specific
I fail to see how that’s bad. Tree-like menus are extremely intuitive, and prevent having 50 items in a single column.
Not the worst no, but it definitely could be more readable/discoverable.
But the functionality as an ebook manager is insanely great in my view.
I like the retro style, but new users are always completely lost with the UI, its off putting to a lot. I know, I introduced (or tried to) introduce some people to calibre in an effort to show them that Amazon what not the best and only way.
But, again, hats off to those making calibre. I will moan publicly when my PR for GUI improvement are not approved, until then I’ll shut up.
works great for me and I had zero problems figuring it out. What it does is complex. I'm not sure why it would confuse anyone who has used a computer and wants to keep their book files in one place.
> Much improved Kobo support. calibre can now natively edit, view and convert KEPUB format files used by the Kobo. It also automatically converts EPUB to KEPUB when sending books to Kobo devices.
Most of the Kobo support was already extant in plugins, but their position was precarious because the plugin maintainer for many of those had passed away.
For this release Kovid obsoleted many of those plugins by moving the functionality into the base application. He also has his own Kobo now, so he's able to take on that maintenance.
I’ve been converting to KEPUB[1] for years and two things I noticed immediately as I started doing so and still stick in my mind are more accurate page numbers and faster page-turning performance. Can’t really say anymore how much of a difference it is, since I always convert.
Some ebooks that have extremely long chapters have very slow page turning performance towards the end of the chapter. (e.g. most of the Terry Pratchett Discworlds that are essentially one large chapter)
There's probably an O(n^2) page break algo there which is fixed with the kepub format
This was after a year or two of suffering through bad performance and a janky experience. Except for the purchased books of course. Somehow I never thought it was possible to fix.
The books I buy from the Kobo store always have the page numbers match up with the rendered pages. The books I... acquire through other means... do not.
I haven't tested this yet but kepub imbeds progress data, which means this can probably be synced with Calibre. This is very nice for those of us which keep a larger library and change readers over time. Prior to this, we had to use a very janky workaround to sync this data. Most of us just didn't bother, so when moving books around, the progress data would reset.
There’s some extra stats when you open the book on the device. I _think_ that’s pretty much it though. AFAIK KEPUB is just ePub with bits of added metadata.
I absolutely love this app. It manages my whole digital library with hundreds of ebooks and pdf books. And its developer Kovid Goyal is very responsive. Have reached out to him several times in the forums, he answers questions, fixes bugs fast. And he releases updates every week I think.
Zotero and Calibre are my most important tools for managing my digital books and reading material.
Zotero‘s target group is researchers and academics. But I use it for managing, organizing, and syncing my pdf reading material. So I can read my content on the iPad. Calibre can’t do that. I use Calibre to manage my Kindle content. And to manage my ebooks and pdf books. So there‘s some overlap.
I don’t like the reader of Calibre, I prefer reading on my Kindle or in the iPad. Hence Zotero.
But Zotero is way more than that. You can collect / reference / read and highlight research papers and publications. You can add content via browser plugin or via the DOI number of an article. Super smooth UX.
The funny thing about Calibre, which I've been using since the beginning, is that the app always has updates—I think they release one almost every day.
I've been using the Kindle iOS application for reading ebooks for maybe 5-6 years at this point, but last month I archived+de-drm'd all my Kindle books via Calibre and have them stored locally now. Thanks Amazon for forcing me to do this sooner rather than later.
But how do people consume these books on iOS today? I have yet to find any simple and not-get-in-the-way ebook reader for iOS, anyone have any recommendations?
Have you tried the built-in Books app on iOS? I find it to be a simple book reader that allows for ePub files to be opened from the Files app without having to sync them manually using something like a Mac.
I have not, I still consider myself a iOS newbie and tend to avoid the Apple software because of their lack of features and usefulness. But I'll give Books a try, didn't realize it let you read local files, thanks a lot for the recommendation! :)
Don't know, sorry. I did this the 19th of February according to my logs, via the "DeDRM Plugin (v10.0.3)" in Calibre and it worked fine then at least. Seems this is the repository for the plugin: https://github.com/noDRM/DeDRM_tools
Edit: Oh, just saw the warning from the bulk downloader's README now :/
> As of 26th February 2025, Amazon has removed the ability to download backups of your Kindle books. Unfortunately, this means that this tool is no longer functional.
Depends on the method. If you have an old Kindle that doesn't get KFX files like a Kindle 3 that should work. Some older versions of Kindle Desktop can still work but maybe not for all books.
The Kobo (obok) and ADE methods are still fine and easy to do. I wouldn't bother buying new books from Amazon anymore personally.
There are a handful of decent e-reader apps on iOS right now, and unfortunately a few of the best, like KyBook, are dead and no longer being maintained. Of the available options now, the best two IMO are either Apple's own Books app or Yomu EBook Reader. ReadEra is also pretty good.
1. Bluefire Reader: this does epub and PDFs although I’ve rarely used it for the latter. Also handles Adobe DRM which I have personally never used. A couple of issues I’ve noticed with this app: it crashes when you delete a book. Search does not work in some epub files.
2. tiReader: handles more file formats than Bluefire, but is slower and has a strange UI which confuses me even after using it for months. Search works more consistently than in Bluefire.
3. Apple’s own Books app. I don’t like how it mangles epub files rendering them unexportable but it’s great for PDFs
> But how do people consume these books on iOS today?
I don't read much on iOS, but I bought MapleRead[0]. It's quite nice and support OPDS endpoints. Books has a nicer UI, but I dislike the focus on the marketplace (same with Music, I don't like not being able to disable the store when I'm not using it and don't plan to)
I use one called KyBook atm that i've got no real complaints about. If you can set up calibre-web or something similar you can get local network sync working and it can see your library when you're at home and download the books to the device for when you're away.
I just send the liberated epub back to my kindle address (via calibre) and read them as "documents" in the kindle app for iOS. Unless this has recently changed it works fine, and (critically) my last read location syncs with my Kindle.
I'm repeatedly telling myself to do that because I've ended up having multiple copies of the same documents scattered over different devices instead of centralizing my calibre instance. When I considered doing that on fated weekend I abandoned the idea under the impression of not having the possibility of sync reading position, annotations on PDFs and most importantly lacking the support for my e-book... though most likely I simply missed the finer details on how to do all of that
I think you can use Calibre-web as a "store" for Kobo devices pretty easily (basically swap one URL in a config file on the device).
I gave up on the synced reading position at the same time I sold my Kindle, but I can live with that.
Getting stuff on the device is a bit of a hassle too, because I can't exactly go plug it in to my NAS, but exporting 50+ books to a directory and copying them manually takes a few minutes and I'm set for a year or more - so it's time well spent :D
Having everything (except for comics) consolidated in one place is the main reason I tolerate Calibre's quirks and eccentricities. It's ... opinionated, but it's still by far the best tool available for the price.
I think the OP was unclear. He is suggesting running it on a NAS or similar, storing the files on network storage and then simply being able to use calibre-web instead of having to install it on different devices.
Calibre can update the metadata on your books semi-automatically. Grab hi-res covers, get the back cover texts, mark the book as a part of a series (and which number it is).
It can also automatically convert the books to different optimised formats, for example: you don't need a 4000x3000 resolution full colour front cover if you're uploading the book to a 6" BW eInk reader.
Also Kobo has their own "KEPUB" format that is optimised for their devices and converting standard EPUB to that format results in faster page turns etc.
Calibre is amazing, but I have one big gripe with it: In its default settings, both the main application and the ebook reader insist on modifying the source file even when only viewing it (to store the current page).
I think I've even seen (self-published) ePubs getting contaminated with these annoying bookmark tags, and as a result had Calibre open them on some random page (presumably precisely the one at which the editor or author have closed it before deciding that it's now fit for publishing).
Imagine VLC storing the current playback position in every audio or video file! I think not even iTunes does/did that, unless the user actively edits some metadata, and that wasn't very considerate with source files either.
And then, on the other hand, Calibre does not automatically propagate actual metadata updates to the ePub file even after explicitly editing them in the library manager view – the one place where that's usually arguably user intent... (Except when opening and closing the book source editor without touching anything, because that rewrites the metadata at every opening time in its default settings, i.e. not at saving time! Make it make sense...)
The most infuriating thing is that these decisions can all be overridden with some preferences – it just happens that the default is exactly the opposite of what I'd expect to happen. (The reader should not write things by default, but if it must, the metadata editor should damn well too.)
As always, many complaints about the UI. I will say what I always say about Calibre: I love Calibre, and I double-love its user interface, maybe a little arcane, but free of modern ux nonsense.
Readit News
Unfortunately with every year there are less and less such applications, but they are still out there, e.g. SumatraPDF or KeePassXC.
Calibre is an incredible piece of software, but of all the things it does great, the UI isn't one of them.
That's...why it exists?? What else would you do with hover titles besides showing additional information about an options?
I recently picked it up for the first time and had no issue whatsoever getting it to do what I needed it to do without any guidance.
Are tooltips abuse now?
What? How? “Add Books” is a book icon with a plus sign. “View” is a magnifying glass. “Remove Books” is a recycling symbol. “Preferences” is the usual settings-esque gear icon. “Device” is an e-reader. “Send To Device” is an e-reader with an arrow. I’ll grant you that some are vague, like “Download Metadata” being a globe, but the other major part you’ve glossed over is that all of these have their titles directly underneath them. There is no need to guess as to what they do.
> menus are nested and super-specific
I fail to see how that’s bad. Tree-like menus are extremely intuitive, and prevent having 50 items in a single column.
But the functionality as an ebook manager is insanely great in my view.
I like the retro style, but new users are always completely lost with the UI, its off putting to a lot. I know, I introduced (or tried to) introduce some people to calibre in an effort to show them that Amazon what not the best and only way.
But, again, hats off to those making calibre. I will moan publicly when my PR for GUI improvement are not approved, until then I’ll shut up.
www.mumble.info
Great to see improved Kobo support.
For this release Kovid obsoleted many of those plugins by moving the functionality into the base application. He also has his own Kobo now, so he's able to take on that maintenance.
[1]: https://pgaskin.net/kepubify/
There's probably an O(n^2) page break algo there which is fixed with the kepub format
This was after a year or two of suffering through bad performance and a janky experience. Except for the purchased books of course. Somehow I never thought it was possible to fix.
Nice, but not game changing.
Zotero and Calibre are my most important tools for managing my digital books and reading material.
I don’t like the reader of Calibre, I prefer reading on my Kindle or in the iPad. Hence Zotero.
But Zotero is way more than that. You can collect / reference / read and highlight research papers and publications. You can add content via browser plugin or via the DOI number of an article. Super smooth UX.
But how do people consume these books on iOS today? I have yet to find any simple and not-get-in-the-way ebook reader for iOS, anyone have any recommendations?
I have not, I still consider myself a iOS newbie and tend to avoid the Apple software because of their lack of features and usefulness. But I'll give Books a try, didn't realize it let you read local files, thanks a lot for the recommendation! :)
For downloading the files themselves, I think I ended up using this: https://github.com/treetrum/amazon-kindle-bulk-downloader
Edit: Oh, just saw the warning from the bulk downloader's README now :/
> As of 26th February 2025, Amazon has removed the ability to download backups of your Kindle books. Unfortunately, this means that this tool is no longer functional.
The Kobo (obok) and ADE methods are still fine and easy to do. I wouldn't bother buying new books from Amazon anymore personally.
2. tiReader: handles more file formats than Bluefire, but is slower and has a strange UI which confuses me even after using it for months. Search works more consistently than in Bluefire.
3. Apple’s own Books app. I don’t like how it mangles epub files rendering them unexportable but it’s great for PDFs
I don't read much on iOS, but I bought MapleRead[0]. It's quite nice and support OPDS endpoints. Books has a nicer UI, but I dislike the focus on the marketplace (same with Music, I don't like not being able to disable the store when I'm not using it and don't plan to)
[0]: https://www.maplepop.com/web/mr/overview.php
Drop your books in a directory on your NAS, let Calibre pick them up from there and do your actual processing with Calibre-web.
I gave up on the synced reading position at the same time I sold my Kindle, but I can live with that.
Getting stuff on the device is a bit of a hassle too, because I can't exactly go plug it in to my NAS, but exporting 50+ books to a directory and copying them manually takes a few minutes and I'm set for a year or more - so it's time well spent :D
Having everything (except for comics) consolidated in one place is the main reason I tolerate Calibre's quirks and eccentricities. It's ... opinionated, but it's still by far the best tool available for the price.
I could install it on my laptop, but then nobody else could access it when it's in my backpack :D
It can also automatically convert the books to different optimised formats, for example: you don't need a 4000x3000 resolution full colour front cover if you're uploading the book to a 6" BW eInk reader.
Also Kobo has their own "KEPUB" format that is optimised for their devices and converting standard EPUB to that format results in faster page turns etc.
I think I've even seen (self-published) ePubs getting contaminated with these annoying bookmark tags, and as a result had Calibre open them on some random page (presumably precisely the one at which the editor or author have closed it before deciding that it's now fit for publishing).
Imagine VLC storing the current playback position in every audio or video file! I think not even iTunes does/did that, unless the user actively edits some metadata, and that wasn't very considerate with source files either.
And then, on the other hand, Calibre does not automatically propagate actual metadata updates to the ePub file even after explicitly editing them in the library manager view – the one place where that's usually arguably user intent... (Except when opening and closing the book source editor without touching anything, because that rewrites the metadata at every opening time in its default settings, i.e. not at saving time! Make it make sense...)
The most infuriating thing is that these decisions can all be overridden with some preferences – it just happens that the default is exactly the opposite of what I'd expect to happen. (The reader should not write things by default, but if it must, the metadata editor should damn well too.)
What settings should we change to avoid this behavior you described?