The book tracking spreadsheet, and a faster way to keep one

A book tracking spreadsheet is the classic way to keep a reading log: a row per book, a column for each thing you want to remember. It is free, it is yours, and it works. The only catch is that you have to do all the typing, and a spreadsheet cannot time a session, scan a barcode, or draw your year in books. Here is how to build a good one, plus an honest look at when an app is worth it.

The columns that actually matter

Most reading spreadsheets start with too many columns and get abandoned by March. Keep it to the ones you will fill in every time:

• Title and Author
• Date started and Date finished
• Rating (use halves, like 4.5, so the number means something)
• Format (print, ebook, audio)
• Pages (for a yearly page count)
• Status (reading, finished, did not finish)

That is enough to answer the questions you will actually ask at year end: how many books, how many pages, your average rating, and how your reading changed month to month. Add a Notes or Review column if you like to write, and a Mood column if you want to remember how a book felt.

A simple formula or two

Once you have the rows, a few formulas turn them into a year in review:

• Books finished: =COUNTIF(Status, "finished")
• Average rating: =AVERAGE(Rating)
• Total pages: =SUM(Pages)

You can chart finishes by month with a pivot table. This is the part most people never get to, because keeping the data current is the hard part.

Where a spreadsheet falls short

A spreadsheet is a great record and a poor companion. It cannot:

• Time your reading. There is no built-in timer, so reading speed and streaks are guesswork.
• Add a book in a tap. You type every title, author, and page count by hand.
• Travel with you. Editing a spreadsheet on your phone mid-chapter is nobody’s idea of fun.
• Draw itself. The charts only exist if you build them.

A faster way: import the spreadsheet, keep the data

If you like the idea of a reading log but not the upkeep, Endleaf is a private reading tracker that does the logging for you: scan or search to add a book, run a timer as you read, rate in half stars, and watch your year build into stats worth keeping. It stays on your iPhone, with no account and no ads.

And you are never locked in. If you already keep a spreadsheet or a Goodreads export, import the CSV and your books come across. If you ever want to leave, export the whole library back to CSV or JSON. The point of tracking your reading is to own it, in a spreadsheet or an app.

Prefer to stay in a spreadsheet? That is a perfectly good answer. Keep the columns above, fill them in honestly, and you will have a reading log worth having.