Getting Started with Google Play Books

Stavan Parikh
3.8
8.77K reviews
Ebook
2
Pages

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3.8
8.77K reviews
Jamie Ellis
November 5, 2013
Needs to have abit more than being 2 pages. Google Play Books needs to add Language and Revision Version selection options to the Google Play Books Store in similar fashion to how they do on the Nexus 5's Google Play Devices Store page (e.g. colour and storage size) more selective. Other Google Play Services such as Google Play Music should also have an Getting Started. Additionally as well being an "Getting Started with" for iOS for Google Play Books. Android should also be in this "getting started" as another book chapter!
42 people found this review helpful
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A Google user
October 16, 2016
Given the fact that every online review I found rated this app to be the best eReader out there, I think it is pretty awful for being the best. - There is no way to choose the download location of the offline dictionary (58MB) to store it on my SD card instead of the phone. - I don't see a way to access/download dictionaries for other languages (what if I'm learning Spanish or French for example?) - There is no way to choose the download location of the ebooks so i could store them too on my SD card rather than my phone. - Basically, the app should keep its 20MB-or-so footprint on my phone and all extra data (books, dictionaries, notes) should be saved to my SD card if i wish to do so. - There is no way to point to a location on the phone (say on my SD card) that already contains more than a 100 ebooks and immediately make them available to my library, reproducing the folder hierarchy that is found at said location. - There is no way to point to a location on my google drive that also already contains a huge collection of ebooks and immediately make them available to my library, reproducing the folder hierarchy that is found at said location. - There is no way to select the path where Notes, highlights, and bookmarks are saved on google drive. - There is no way to create a folder hierarchy in my ebook library so i can easily find my ebooks based on the criteria i used to create my hierarchy. - The library does not show any information about the loaded ebook. It should show metadata such as path it was loaded from, original file name, date and timestamp of when it was loaded into my library, size footprint, etc. - There is no way to edit such metadata. Say, for example, I would want to change the way the author's name or book title shows up in my library. This would be particularly useful if a book is not sorted properly using one of the three options allowed by the app (title, author). - There is no way to see the total size of the library, number of books, and other useful library metadata. - The library allows you to load the same book twice (or multiple times). This is redundant and unnecessary. It takes up extra space for no reason and it makes it even harder to find books in the library and there is no way to know if the book I'm looking at is the copy that I already started reading or a superfluous copy. - The note/annotation scheme only allows for 4 colors. In my opinion, that is not enough. Note: I don't need 256 colors either, but 4 is way too little. Maybe 8 or 16 would be more reasonable. - There is no way to put in a list of URLs of ebook websites so that they can easily be searched from the app. - The reading progress bar is only visible in the "Read Now" view and not in the "My Library" view. Unfortunately, the "Read Now" view is limited to a small number of books. - If I add notes and highlights to a book, then remove it from my library after being done reading it, then load it back a few months later to review the notes/highlights I've made, there is no way to merge those highlights (which are saved in a separate document) with the pages of the newly loaded book. The only way to view those notes is out of context, which is not helpful. - After removing a download, the size of the mysterious data heap used by the application does not change (as can be seen in settings > apps). I deleted every downloaded book from my device in the hope of clearing up memory space in my phone but the size of the data heap was still over 100 MBs despite having deleted ALL downloaded books!
10 people found this review helpful
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Edward Fitz-Gibbon
May 2, 2014
Bit naff. Format of epubs is quite tidy but when you come to highlight text, the top and bottom tool bars cover text so you cant see what your highlighting ! Oh and why do i have to upload every book after i have just downloaded it!? How can we expect other apps to be any good when google apps dont work properly. Lead by example is a good motto. ?Try it google.
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Reading information

Smartphones and tablets
Install the Google Play Books app for Android and iPad/iPhone. It syncs automatically with your account and allows you to read online or offline wherever you are.
Laptops and computers
You can listen to audiobooks purchased on Google Play using your computer's web browser.
eReaders and other devices
To read on e-ink devices like Kobo eReaders, you'll need to download a file and transfer it to your device. Follow the detailed Help Center instructions to transfer the files to supported eReaders.