Don’t Pay for a PDF Reader: 5 Awesome Features of the Apple Book

Following my digital minimalism series, I have prepared a story for decluttering your digital excess by using Apple’s built-in apps and services for every user on its platform.

I believe Apple Books is helpful for most people, especially those who want to read PDF books and articles without experiencing any distraction.

I think Apple Books has advanced enough to be considered the primary PDF and ebook reader on your iPhone, iPad, and Mac. Paying for alternative apps might not be the best idea as most features you demand from a PDF reader already exists in Apple Books.

This story will introduce ten features from Apple Books that will hopefully save you money by not paying for a third-party app.

Habits are the key to making lasting effects in our lives. Most people suggest doing something consequently for over 21 days to become a habit.

To achieve the goal of making reading a habit, you need a system to remind you to read every day. The great thing about Apple Books is its ability to help you set a goal that pushes a notification to your Apple devices reminding you to read.

The app tracks your reading and gives excellent statistical information. It has a system to encourage you to read more.

You can activate it by opening the app and scrolling down until you find Reading Goals and then adjusting the settings to your preferences.

Using the Apple Books app, you are not limited to the books provided by Apple. You can easily share your PDF files with the app. It supports ePub and PDF files.

An excellent organizational feature within this app is its collection feature allowing you to select multiple files and categorize them.

You can create a collection by tapping on the Collections tab, selecting Collections, and choosing the New Collection option.

You can add your file to the Books app by using the Share feature on iOS.

If you are on Mac, you can simply drag and drop your file into the Books app and let it upload to your iCloud account.

Audio Books are awesome. They save time and help you go through your tedious tasks by adding value to your life. An underrated feature I’ve found in the Books app is its ability to play Audiobooks by providing the following features:

Speed up audio playback

Slow down audio playback

Set a sleep timer

Jump to a chapter

Play a specific time

Overall, if you are looking for a good audiobook player, don’t miss Apple Books. As far as I know, you can upload your own audiobooks, but the Store covers different genres and provides quality content for audiobook enthusiasts.

In the toolbar of the Books app, there is a button shaped like aA which provides plenty of options to adjust the book reading to your preference. Here are some of the great things you can do with it:

Increase and decrease brightness and font size.

Change the typeface

Change background color

Enable vertical scrolling

Enable auto dark mode

These options help you have a better reading experience which is super helpful on smaller iPads.

Most PDF Reader apps have a search feature, yet most of them either can’t search properly or find the wrong result. That is not the case with the Books app. I have found the search feature quick and accurate, better than most third-party apps.

Many people read books just for the sake of reading them, and they tend to forget essential materials from their books. Some want to digest what they read — take notes and remember them. They want to use what they learned later in their lives.

That is why they bookmark certain pages to take notes or re-read them once they decide to remember certain things from their books. Apple Books comes with a bookmark feature in the Toolbar, and it works flawlessly synchronizing between all your Apple devices using iCloud.

Last but not least, the Highlight feature helps you highlight a specific portion of the text and write notes on a sticky note. It is a valuable feature that allows you to expand what you’ve learned without adding any visual clutter.

This story is focused on people who don’t want to clutter their Apple devices with unnecessary apps. I use Digital Minimalism to help create a zen-like experience on my iPhone and other devices.