How to Export Your Goodreads Library to CSV (and What to Do Next)
Step-by-step guide to exporting your Goodreads library to CSV, what the file actually contains, what it drops, and your real options afterwards.
By Daniel Daneshi July 31, 2026 8 min read TL;DR: Log in to Goodreads on a desktop browser, go to My Books, click Import and export in the left sidebar, then hit Export Library. A dated CSV download link appears, usually within seconds to a few minutes. The file holds your books, ratings, shelves, reviews, and dates, but it silently drops rereads, start dates, and sometimes even finish dates. Back it up either way, then decide: import it into an app that accepts CSVs, or start fresh with a habit-first tracker.
Your Goodreads shelves might represent ten or fifteen years of reading history. All of it lives on servers owned by Amazon, and none of it is truly yours until you download a copy. The good news: Goodreads still offers a one-click export, and it takes about two minutes. This guide walks through the exact steps, explains what the CSV actually contains (and what it quietly leaves out), and lays out your honest options once you have the file.
Why bother exporting at all
Two reasons, one boring and one less so.
The boring reason is basic data hygiene. Goodreads accounts get locked, hacked, or accidentally deleted, and support recovery is slow. A CSV on your own drive means a lost account is an inconvenience, not a decade of reading history gone.
The less boring reason is that Goodreads has been owned by Amazon since March 2013, when it had around 16 million members. The platform has changed remarkably little since, and many readers are actively looking elsewhere. We wrote a full breakdown of what Amazon’s ownership means for readers if you want the longer story. Whether you stay or go, the export is your insurance policy, and the people most likely to need it are the ones reading a guide like this one.
How to export your Goodreads library, step by step
The whole flow lives on the desktop website. Here is the current path, as documented in Goodreads’ own help article:
1. Open Goodreads in a desktop browser
Go to goodreads.com and log in. This does not work in the mobile app (more on that below).
2. Click “My Books”
It is in the top navigation bar, next to Home and Browse.
3. Find “Import and export” in the left sidebar
Scroll the left-hand column down past your shelves. Under the Tools section you will see Import and export. Click it. You can also jump straight to goodreads.com/review/import, which is the same page.
4. Click the “Export Library” button
The page has two halves: import at the top, export below it. Press Export Library and Goodreads starts generating your file server-side.
5. Wait for the download link
For a few hundred books this usually takes seconds. Large libraries (thousands of books) can take several minutes, and you may need to refresh the page. When it is ready, a link appears reading something like “Your export from 07/31/2026”. Click it and a .csv file lands in your downloads folder.
That is it. Open the file in Excel, Google Sheets, or Apple Numbers and you will see one row per book.
What about the mobile app?
There is no export option in the Goodreads iOS or Android app. If you are stuck on a phone, open goodreads.com in your mobile browser and request the desktop site (in Safari: the “aA” or page menu, then “Request Desktop Website”), then follow the same steps. It is fiddly but it works. A laptop is easier.
What the CSV actually contains
The export is more complete than most people expect. The main columns:
| Column | What it holds |
|---|---|
| Title, Author, Additional Authors | The book and everyone credited on it |
| ISBN / ISBN13 | Edition identifiers (often blank for ebooks) |
| My Rating | Your 1 to 5 star rating (0 = unrated) |
| Average Rating | The site-wide average at export time |
| Publisher, Binding, Number of Pages | Edition details |
| Year Published, Original Publication Year | Both edition and first-publication years |
| Date Read, Date Added | When you finished it and when you shelved it |
| Bookshelves, Exclusive Shelf | Custom shelves plus read / currently-reading / to-read |
| My Review | The full text of your written review |
| Private Notes | Notes only you could see on Goodreads |
| Read Count, Owned Copies | How many times read, how many copies owned |
A small gotcha: ISBN values are wrapped in a formula-style ="..." format so spreadsheets do not mangle leading zeros. Most apps that import the file handle this automatically; if you are processing it yourself, strip the wrapper first.
What the export silently drops
This is the part most guides skip, and it matters if you are trusting the CSV as your only backup.
- Read dates go missing, sporadically. This is the big one. Users have reported for years that Date Read is blank for many books in the export even though the date shows fine on the site. There are long-running threads about it on Goodreads’ own help forum, with reports going back to 2019 and no fix. Spot-check your file after exporting.
- Rereads are collapsed. You get a single Date Read and a Read Count number. If you read a book three times, the individual dates of those rereads are not in the file.
- No start dates. Goodreads tracks when you started a book, but the export only carries the finish date.
- No social graph. Friends, followers, comments, and likes on your reviews stay behind.
- No progress updates. Every “on page 154 of 320” status you ever posted is not exported.
- Edition quirks. The export reflects whichever edition you shelved, so ebooks frequently come through with blank ISBNs, which can cause mismatches when another app tries to look the books up.
None of this makes the export worthless. It captures the core: what you read, what you thought of it, and how you organised it. Just know that it is a summary of your Goodreads life, not a perfect clone.
What to do next: your three real options
You have the file. Now what? Honestly, it depends on what you were using Goodreads for.
Option 1: import it into an app that accepts the CSV
If your priority is preserving the catalog, several trackers ingest the Goodreads file directly:
- booksense (our app, free on iOS) imports the file inside the app: it is parsed on your phone rather than uploaded, ratings, reviews, and read dates come along, and imported reads are backdated so they arrive as history rather than a feed flood. More on what happens after the import in Option 3 below.
- The StoryGraph has the most mature importer, and imports can take up to 24 hours for large libraries. Note that as of 2026, the Goodreads import sits behind the paid StoryGraph Plus plan (around $4.99/month), so budget for at least one month of it. Still weighing whether it is the right destination at all? Our honest StoryGraph vs Goodreads comparison covers the trade-offs.
- Fable offers a free beta CSV importer at fable.co/goodreads-import; log in with the same account you use in the app and the books appear after processing.
- Hardcover imports libraries from both Goodreads and The StoryGraph, and positions itself explicitly as a Goodreads alternative.
Expect some cleanup on any of these: missing dates (see above), edition mismatches, and shelves that map imperfectly. Our complete guide to moving your Goodreads data to a new app covers each destination in more depth, including what survives the trip and what does not.
Option 2: keep it as a pure backup
Nothing says you have to migrate. If Goodreads still works for you, export a fresh CSV every few months and file it away. Each export is a snapshot, so a couple of dated copies gives you version history for free. This is the two-minute habit that makes an account lockout survivable.
Option 3: bring it into a habit-first tracker
Here is a question worth sitting with: how much of that CSV is a to-read list you will genuinely get to, and how much is a decade of aspirations? For a lot of readers, the catalog was never the problem. The problem was that the books on it were not getting read.
That is the case booksense makes, and you no longer have to choose between the history and the habit: booksense imports your goodreads_library_export.csv directly. The file is parsed on your phone rather than uploaded, your ratings, reviews, and read dates come along, imported reads are backdated so they arrive as history instead of a day-one feed flood, and covers and blurbs fill in automatically afterwards. Then booksense attacks the actual problem: a reading timer for focused sessions, streaks that keep you showing up daily, reading goals, page-anchored notes you can share as image cards, and per-book stats that show your real pace. Readers on booksense have logged over 480,000 minutes of reading and finished more than 12,000 sessions, one timed sitting at a time.
If that resonates, start with our guides on building a daily reading habit and how reading streaks work. And if the export made you realise your to-read pile is out of control, here is how to organise your TBR before it follows you to the next app.
FAQ
Can I export my Goodreads library from the mobile app?
No. The export tool only exists on the desktop website, under My Books > Import and export. On a phone you can request the desktop version of the site in your browser, but the official app has no export button.
What does the Goodreads CSV export include?
One row per book with title, author, ISBN, your rating, the average rating, publisher, page count, date read, date added, your shelves, your review text, private notes, read count, and owned copies. It does not include friends, comments, progress updates, or Kindle highlights.
Can I import my Goodreads CSV into booksense?
Yes. booksense imports the goodreads_library_export.csv file directly: it is parsed on your phone rather than uploaded, your ratings, reviews, and read dates come along, and imported reads are backdated so they land as reading history. From there the reading timer, streaks, and goals take over, which is the part Goodreads never did.
How often should I back up my Goodreads data?
A few times a year is plenty for most readers, or right after any big shelf reorganisation. The export takes about two minutes, and each file is a snapshot, so keeping a couple of dated copies costs you nothing.