Do you love reading non-fiction books, but struggle to finish them due to your busy schedule? Are you one of those readers who like to get a few takeaways before buying the whole book? If the answer to these questions is “Yes,” you might find the Blinkist app interesting.
Today, we’re going to review this top-rated book-summarizing app that provides you with summaries of more than 3,000 bestselling non-fiction books.
In this post, we will review Blinkist so that you know more about what it is and whether you should get it.
What is Blinkist?
Founded in August 2012, Blinkist is a book summary app that enables busy professionals to read a summary of the best selling non-fiction books. Think of it as CliffsNotes for the digital age.
The team at Blinkist reads top non-fiction books, summarizes the major points, and puts them in plain words to readers and listeners. The app provides you 15-minute book summaries that you can read and listen to in English and German languages.
Blinkist is available as both a mobile application and web-app, which means you can use it on your smartphone as well as desktop. Depending on the operating system you’re using, you can download it from iTunes and Google Play. Blinkist even works with Amazon Alexa.
Signing up for Blinkist is quite straight forward. Just visit their website, enter your email or your Facebook account, and start getting insights from books. You can use this app to get a brief overview of some of the most popular books on the market or to determine whether a particular book is worth reading in its entirety.
What Types of Books Can You Read on Blinkist?
As mentioned above, the app allows you to read summaries of popular non-fiction books. As of now, Blinkist has 19 book categories. There is something for everyone.
Some of the popular book categories include:
- Corporate Culture
- Biography & History
- Parenting
- Entrepreneurship & Small Business
- Health & Fitness
- Money and Investment
- Management & Leadership
- Politics & Society
- Science
- Marketing & Sales
- Mindfulness & Happiness
- Productivity & Time Management
- Technology & the Future
- Economics
- Personal Growth & Self-Improvement
- Psychology
- Sex & Relationships
Some of the best non-fiction books you can find on Blinkist include:
- Getting Things Done – by David Allen
- Drive-by Daniel Pink
- Mindset by Carol Dweck
- Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell
- The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People – by Stephen R. Covey
Pricing
Blinkist gives you both free and premium plans. Of course, the free plan comes with limited features. With the free plan, you can read and listen to the Blinkist Daily Pick that changes every day.
Talking about the premium plans, you get two plans: Premium Yearly and Premium Monthly.
If you want a monthly subscription, you will need to pay $12.99/per month, but if you can buy it for the entire year, the cost will reduce to $6.67 monthly as on the annual plan, you get 50% off.
The good news is that the Premium Yearly plan starts with a 7-day free trial, which means you can explore it without having to worry about any risk. Some of the features you get with the premium plans include:
- You get unlimited access to more than 3,000 non-fiction books.
- You can access the library offline.
- The app highlights ideas that are of particular concern to you.
- You can synchronize your favorite summaries with the Evernote app.
- You can learn hands-free with audio.
User Experience
Using the Blinkist app is quite easy. Since the design is quite minimalistic, even newbies can use it without any prior training. When you use the app, you will find that everything is to the point. You won’t find a lot of fancy buttons and unnecessary advertisements. This is the one primary reason the app loads quickly on both the web app and smartphone.
The company is very focused on the user experience, therefore, provides the best reading and listening experience.
The Blinkist app has 4.6 ratings (out of 5) in the Google Play store, and most of the users are happy with its navigation and overall services.
Pros & Cons of the Blinkist App
Pros
- Blinkist helps you broaden your viewpoints and open you to fresh thoughts.
- It allows you to enjoy book summaries in multiple formats, including ebook and audio.
- You can point out the book sections you find interesting and send them to your Evernote account.
- If you don’t want to spend too much time reading the books you think won’t be useful, you can look over the app and determine if you wish to read the whole book or not.
- The Blinkist app saves your time in finding what to read next. It allows you to see which subjects you should focus on and what you should skip.
- The app is quite user-friendly – even your kids can figure out how to read and listen within a few minutes.
- You get the complete summary, not just a few concepts.
- The audio experience is exceptional. You can listen to summaries during your commute to work or while performing your household chores.
Cons
We didn’t find any significant cons. However, according to some people, with Blinkist, you miss out on the value of reading an entire book. Of course, reading a complete book gives you more value than a summary, but the app is designed for a different purpose.
If you’re a busy professional who doesn’t have a lot of free time, this app is a must.
Final Verdict
Blinkist has summaries of thousands of books in its database that you can read anytime and anywhere. More than 14 million people are already learning every day. If you love reading and want to learn from some of the brilliant non-fiction books, you must give Blinkist a try. Since they are offering a 7-day free trial, you shouldn’t hesitate to sign up for their service. We hope you’ve enjoyed this Blinkist review.
