How to Manage Your Book Collection

I have roughly 500 books in my personal library. After I bought several books twice, it was time to get a handle on which books I own. There are countless online tools to manage your book collection, but none of them compares to the simple-to-use LibraryThing.

There are plenty of useful aspects to LibraryThing, including:

• It is all online, giving you access to other online collections such as Amazon and the Library of Congress. This makes it easy to import book data.
• You can add your own book covers. As you know, there many older or obscure books whose covers have never been online. LibraryThing allows you to snap a pic with your phone and upload it. In addition, other members can use your covers and you can use theirs.
• There are many different views for your collection, including a list sorted by the latest additions, a covers view, and of course, a view by category.
• You will be able to see the profiles of other book collectors. LibraryThing goes through the trouble of letting you know who owns similar books to you. Then you can view their library and see what you might be missing. Or you can make a new contact with the same interests as you.

LibraryThing is free for the first 200 books. After that, there is a one-time fee of $25.00 to store more than 200 books. I paid that fee several years ago and I have never regretted it. Students with large book collections will benefit from LibraryThing.