A reading tracker that takes books seriously.
Four shelves you actually use. A running journal for every book. A hedgehog who notices when you've kept your streak. Built quietly, by one person, for the people who still keep a notes app full of underlined passages.
Free forever for the basics. £2.99/mo for the bits that take real work to make.
Currently reading
The Way of Kings
Brandon Sanderson
Streak
47d
This session
34p
Pace
42 p/h
Est. finish
May 12
Journal · today
Four shelves
Four shelves. That's it.
Books move between four shelves you'll actually use, not fifteen generic categories. ISBN-scan a cover with the camera and the metadata fills in from Open Library — the open, community-run book database.
Currently Reading
What you're in. Track pages, time, and streak per book.
Want to Read
The pile. ISBN-scan a cover and it's on the shelf.
Finished
Your year, on a wall. Honest counts, no quotas.
Did Not Finish
Some books aren't for you. That's allowed here.
Per-book journal
A real journal for every book.
Every book gets a running thread. The line that knocked you sideways on page 47. The slow patch you almost quit at. The bit you read aloud to someone. Tag entries — plot twist, great writing, slow section, made me cry — and the patterns surface across your shelf.
Export the lot to PDF or markdown when you're done. It's yours.
“The first step in becoming honest with yourself is admitting how much you've been lying.” Underlined twice.
Shallan's flashbacks landing better the second time round. First read I almost skimmed them.
Did not see Szeth coming back like that. Re-read the chapter twice.
Yearly report
A proper year in books.
December rolls around and Spindl hands you a real PDF. Books read, total pages, longest streak, your three favourite passages, the patterns in what you actually picked up. Designed to be printed, not just shared on Instagram.
Spindl · 2026
23
books finished
Pages
9,481
Streak
62d
Avg / book
412p
“Most read genre: epic fantasy. Most surprising: three books of poetry in March.”
What never changes
Six things I've promised myself.
Independent, on purpose
Spindl is built outside the big platforms. No corporate ties, no affiliate links in your shelf, no hidden data pipes. Just an app you pay for, that does what it says.
Your shelf is yours
Export to CSV, PDF, or markdown whenever you want. If Spindl ever shuts down, you walk away with everything intact. That's a hard commitment.
Reading is private here
There's no feed of what your friends are rating, no algorithm picking what you should read next, no leaderboard. Reading is between you and the book.
No ads, ever
Free tier stays free. Premium subscribers fund the work. That's the whole business model — nothing else slipping in.
Open Library, by choice
Book metadata comes from Open Library — the open, community-run book database run by the Internet Archive. Free, independent, well-loved by librarians.
Built by one person
Hi, I'm Mikey. I made Spindl because my reading deserved better tools than I could find. If something annoys you, you can email me.
Why Spindl exists
It started as a spreadsheet.
I'm Mikey. A few years ago I started keeping a spreadsheet of what I was reading, what I thought of it, and the lines I wanted to remember. It got out of hand. The columns multiplied, the formulas got fussy, and eventually the spreadsheet started doing things a spreadsheet really shouldn't.
Spindl is the app that spreadsheet wanted to grow up into. The hedgehog came later. He stayed because he's good company.
Pricing
Free for the basics. £2.99 for the rest.
Free
- Four shelves, ISBN scanning
- Reading sessions — pages, time, notes
- Per-book journal
- Streaks & basic stats
- Annual reading goal
- Goodreads CSV import
- Spindl in all his moods
or £19.99/year — saves you £15.89
Everything in Free, plus —
- Mood tracking & mood-vs-genre insights
- Streak insurance — catch-up days when life happens
- Smart suggestions from your own shelf
- OCR page-snap straight into your journal
- Yearly reading report PDF
- Quarterly mini-reports
- Custom shelves & richer reading challenges
- Journal export (PDF + markdown)
- Reading speed tracking
- Advanced stats & genre breakdowns
- Spindl theme variants
Lifetime
Pay once. Premium forever. No renewals.
For the no-subscriptions crowd —
- Everything in Premium, every future feature
- Founding Reader badge in-app
- First say on roadmap features
- A direct line to me if anything breaks
- Capped at the first 500 readers— when they're gone, this tier is gone
A handful of Premium features ship across v1 and the months after launch. The yearly report, journal, and core stats are there from day one — mood tracking, streak insurance, OCR snap, and quarterly reports follow shortly after.
Before you ask
The usual questions.
Is Spindl a Goodreads alternative?
That's why it exists. I kept a reading spreadsheet for years and used Goodreads grudgingly alongside it, mostly for release dates. Spindl is the part I actually cared about: what I'm reading now, where I'm up to in a series, and what I thought about it. It doesn't try to replace the community side, and I still use Goodreads occasionally for that.
Do I need an account to use Spindl?
No. The shelves, the timer, the journal and the streak all work without one. Signing in only adds syncing your library across devices, so if you'd rather keep everything on one phone, you can.
Can I import my Goodreads library?
Yes. Goodreads gives you a CSV export of your library, and Spindl imports it. That's on the free tier.
What's free, and what costs money?
The four shelves, reading sessions, the per-book journal, basic stats, your annual reading goal and the Goodreads import are free and stay free. Premium is £2.99 a month, £19.99 a year, or £49.99 once as a Founding Reader, capped at the first 500. It adds the deeper analytics, journal export, custom shelves, reading speed, mood tracking and the quarterly reports.
Does Spindl work on iPad and Apple Watch?
Yes. There's an iPad layout, an Apple Watch app for starting a session from your wrist, and Home Screen widgets.
Does Spindl tell me what to read next?
No. There's no recommendation engine. Working out what to read next is the good bit, and I'm not going to automate it or sell it to a publisher.
Who can see my journal?
Only you. There are no public reviews, no ratings feed and no social side. The journal is for remembering what you thought, not for performing it.
Is there an Android version?
Not at the moment. Spindl is native iOS, built by one person, and doing it properly twice isn't something I can promise yet.
Spindl is out.
On the App Store now. Free to download, and the basics stay free — shelves, sessions, the journal, the streak. Premium is £2.99 a month, £19.99 a year, or £49.99 once as a Founding Reader (capped at the first 500).