What you need to know about StoryGraph, Amazon’s Goodreads competitor

We are seeing a mass exodus from X (formerly known as Twitter) as a protest from owner Elon Musk. Former X users are outraged that the billionaire befriended Donald Trump throughout his campaign and spent nearly $120 million to help him return to the White House. And there is another corner of the Internet where something similar is happening.

People are leaving Goodreads, which Jeff Bezos’s Amazon bought in 2013, for The StoryGraph, a Black woman-owned company. Founder and CEO Nadia Odunayo, who started the book tracking app as a side project, launched the space in 2019.

Conversations about the app began online and on BookTok, a TikTok community of book lovers, several years before the 2024 election. But since the election – when Bezos banned The Washington Post, which he also owns, from endorsing the presidential candidate, and then congratulated Trump on his victory – more and more people say they are protesting Amazon by switching to Odunayo’s app.

StoryGraph currently has 3 million users, up from 2 million in December 2023. The app had 25,000 signups as of Nov. 11, 10 times its daily average, according to The StoryGraph newsletter. (However, it is still a much smaller reader community than Goodreads, which has 150 million users.)

“Here’s the thing: I never set out to create an alternative to Goodreads,” Odunayo told HuffPost.

“And I really think it helped me because if I said, ‘I’m going to create an alternative to Goodreads,’ first of all, it would have scared me… but on the other hand, it would have been limiting,” she said . “Because if I just tried to build Goodreads, I would just look at Goodreads and be like, ‘Okay, what can I do better?’ “and that wouldn’t be different enough.”

“But to create something independent of Goodreads and just listen to my customers, I feel like I ended up creating an alternative, but it wasn’t just based on (Goodreads),” she explained. “It was based on the question: ‘Where is the gap in the market?'”

StoryGraph really bridges the gaps in the Goodreads product and is also a necessary space for people interested in social change.

“I think, especially since the election results, more and more people have become more conscious of the things they support and realized that just as our dollars are votes, the apps and things we use are also little micro-voting.” , Ellie, a BookTok content creator who asked that her last name not be used to protect her privacy, told HuffPost.

Many booktokers call this move an act of resistance and a way to support platforms that truly deserve it.

“Community and supporting each other is going to be so important, especially over the next few years, and that’s something many of us in the BookTok community can do right now,” TikTok user kaitlyninthecity said in a viral video. Odunayo credits the surge in registrations this month.

Want to learn more about the growing app? Here’s what you need to know:

“The StoryGraph team makes regular updates to improve the user experience, and this is based on user feedback. I don’t know the last time Goodreads released any meaningful update, let alone any updates at all,” TikTok user Bunnysbooktalk said in a recent video. Goodreads users often complain about glitches and outdated functionality.

Some people say it’s easier to leave reviews on StoryGraph.

“The StoryGraph review process is very simple: you can check a few boxes, you can use a drop-down box and select something, and it gives you a very comprehensive overview very quickly,” Ellie told HuffPost. “So it’s very accessible and easy—you don’t have to spend a ton of time coming up with a very well-thought-out review. You can just walk in, take a quick test, and you’re good to go.”

Users love it. The StoryGraph allows you to leave half-star and quarter-star ratings. The app also has content and trigger warnings for each book, helping readers know what they’re getting into if they want to avoid certain topics. Content warnings cover a range of topics including cancer, animal cruelty, infertility, murder, addiction, parental death and more.

On BookTok, users of The StoryGraph praise it for the wealth of data it provides: your reading mood, the genres of books you like, characteristics of books you Not for example, your reading pace and your personal recommendations.

There is also an option to mark books as “DNF” or “not finished.” Another popular feature is the reading log, where you can take notes on books as you read them.

“I just think it adds a more interesting element and you can understand yourself better by looking at the StoryGraph data,” Ellie explained.

If you’re already a Goodreads user, you can export and load your data into The StoryGraph with a few clicks so you don’t lose your reading history. When you register, you will see a screen that gives you the option to import this data.

From here, you can set privacy and community settings that control who can follow you and who can send you friend requests. You can also share your likes and dislikes of books in a customized recommendation survey, set reading goals, and more.

StoryGraph is free to use, but there is a paid version, The StoryGraph Plus, which offers additional data and features.

Ellie noted that some of the app’s features are still in beta testing. “Be patient with the company, give them time to adjust to the number of people they have, and be prepared to give good feedback if things don’t work out,” she advised.

Some people argue that it’s easier to see other people’s reviews and comments on Goodreads, Ellie says. But she thinks it’s a complaint the app’s creators will look into. “It will be interesting to see what changes now that everyone has started coming to them,” she said.

Indeed, Odunayo confirmed that there will be big changes as early as January. “I feel like we’ve had the same core issues for the last few years, and I just really don’t want to go into 2025 with the same core issues,” she said. “So I’m just trying to keep my game face on and focus on that.”

She’s also working to address the BookTok complaint by building more community on the app, such as making it easier to find friends and create circles, “without sacrificing the fact that StoryGraph can be a very private and quiet place.”

“I want people to know at a high level: We are not done yet. We are far from finished and will continue to work on improving this app for readers to make it the best reading app ever,” Odunayo said. “We know we have a lot of work to do and we’re excited to continue doing it.”