How to export your Goodreads library from an iPhone

How do I export Goodreads from my iPhone?

You do it on the Goodreads website, not inside an app. Safari on the iPhone is enough. The path below is the one Bookstub's own import guide uses, and it matches how the site has worked for years, but menus move, so read the labels and not the position.

The whole routine takes about five minutes, plus the wait while Goodreads builds the file. The download is usually named goodreads_library_export.csv. Rename it with the date, for example goodreads-2026-10-10.csv, so you can tell versions apart if you export again later.

You need the file only once per move, but it is worth repeating the export every few months while you still rate books on Goodreads, because the file is your only offline copy of those ratings.

1. Open Goodreads in Safari and sign in.
2. Go to My Books, then find Import and export.
3. Tap Export Library. Goodreads starts building the file and shows a link when it is ready. Large libraries can take a few minutes.
4. Tap the link, then Download. Safari asks to confirm.
5. Open the Downloads folder in the Files app and move the CSV somewhere you can find it, such as iCloud Drive.

The export link is missing on my phone. What now?

Goodreads can show a reduced layout on small screens, and some account pages are easier to reach in the desktop layout. In Safari, tap the aA button in the address bar and choose Request Desktop Website. Reload the My Books page and look for Import and export again.

If the page still does not offer the file, the quickest fix is a computer. Export there, then use AirDrop or iCloud Drive to send the CSV to the phone.

What is inside the CSV file?

A CSV (comma-separated values) file is plain text where each row is one record and commas separate the fields. The Wikipedia article on CSV explains the format. Spreadsheet apps open it, and so do trackers.

The Goodreads file has one row per book. The columns that matter most when you move are the title and author, the ISBN, your rating, the date you read it, the shelves a book sits on, the page count and your review text.

One more detail saves trouble. Reviews often contain commas and line breaks, so a CSV writer wraps them in quotation marks. That works in every tracker and spreadsheet, but it breaks if you open the file in a plain text editor and save it. Open it in Numbers to look, and close it without saving over the original.

How do I check that the export is complete?

Before you do anything else, open the file in Numbers or a similar app and compare. Scroll to the bottom and compare the row count with the number of books Goodreads shows on All. Look at a few books you rated and make sure the rating and date read are present.

Keep the original file. Copy it into a second place, since an export is the only backup of your shelves that you control.

A third check catches duplicates. Sort the sheet by title and scan for repeated names. Two rows with the same title are usually two editions of one book, a paperback and an ebook, or a reread that you shelved twice. Decide before you import which row you want to keep, because most trackers bring in both.

• Row count matches the book count shown on All shelves.
• Five books you rated show the correct rating.
• Five books you finished show a Date Read.
• Your custom shelves appear in the Bookshelves column.

How do I export from StoryGraph instead?

StoryGraph has an equivalent: open it in Safari, sign in, go to Manage account, then Export StoryGraph library, and save the CSV to Files. Bookstub reads both formats on the device and tells you which one it recognized.

The StoryGraph file uses different column names from Goodreads, so a tracker has to recognize both. Do not rename columns to make them look alike. A file edited by hand is more likely to be rejected than one left as exported.

If you use both services, export from each and import them one at a time, checking the preview in between. You will likely see overlaps, and that is normal.

How do I bring the file into Bookstub?

Bookstub is in development, and this is how the import is built. In Settings you choose Import from Goodreads or StoryGraph, pick the CSV, and see a preview such as We found 214 books and 31 finished in 2026. Nothing is added until you press Import.

Shelves come in as Want to read, Reading and Finished. Finished books print stubs, which gives you a stack for the year at once. Reviews become private notes. The file is read on the iPhone and not uploaded anywhere. If the file is not a Goodreads or StoryGraph export, the app says so and changes nothing. The support page covers common import problems.

1. Open Settings, then Import from Goodreads or StoryGraph.
2. Choose where the file came from and open the export page if you still need to download it.
3. Press Choose CSV file and pick the file from Files.
4. Read the preview: the number of books found and how many were finished in the current year.
5. Press Import. Finished books print stubs and a stack for the year is ready to share.

Does moving my library delete anything on Goodreads?

No. Exporting only copies your data. Your account stays as it was until you decide otherwise. Goodreads launched in 2007 and was acquired by Amazon in 2013, as the Goodreads article on Wikipedia notes, and many readers keep an account there for friends while using another tool for tracking.

If you plan to leave, export first, import elsewhere, and wait a few weeks before you remove anything.

It also helps to think about what Goodreads keeps that a CSV does not. Your friends list, the groups you joined and your activity feed live on Goodreads and are not part of a library file. If those matter to you, keep the account and use a second tool only for tracking. Many readers do exactly that.

What if the new tracker gets a book wrong?

Matches by title alone sometimes pick the wrong edition. Page counts differ between editions, and a tracker that uses ISBNs will usually pick the right one. When an entry is wrong, fix the total pages or the title by hand. In Bookstub, any book can be edited, and Edit book lets you change the pages, dates and rating.

Ratings are a common wrinkle. Goodreads uses whole stars from one to five, while some trackers use half stars. A rating of four comes across as four, and you can change it afterward. In Bookstub the rating scale has half steps and is drawn on the stub as squares, so an imported four fills four of five squares.

Dates deserve one last look. A book with a missing Date Read cannot be placed in a month, so check that the books you finished this year have one. If a book has no date, add it by hand in Edit book, and it will join the right stack.

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