My Journey With Blinkist (US)
First of all, I started my test of this app a few long years ago. I felt very tired of reading super long and slow books in my free time. At that time, my daily reading list was getting way too huge for my eyes. I knew I could never finish all the books on my long list of tasks.
I downloaded the new app straight to my personal smart phone to test it out. I signed up for a yearly plan to save some good money for my wallet. The total cost was around $99.99 for the full twelve months of the year. I wanted to learn faster and get much smarter every day of my long life.
Time is money. Gradually, I built a brand new and healthy habit to follow every single morning now. I started to listen to one short book per day on my way to work. I chose great books about business and sales to help my daily work tasks grow.
I really liked the clear and high audio quality very much inside the new app. The voice actors sound highly professional and very easy to hear with my two ears. They do not use bad computer voices for the main books you want to read. Pure brilliance.
How The Core Features Work
Though the app is simple, it has many great features that you will surely love. You can download all your summaries directly to your phone to save for much later. This cool feature works perfectly without any active internet connection in your home or car. You can easily use it on a long airplane flight across the big blue sky.
The offline mode is perfect. A total game changer. Additionally, the app has a fun tool called Spaces to use with your good friends. You can create a Space for a specific topic of choice you like to learn.
You can invite your best friends to this shared Space to read along with you. You can share your favorite books with all of them inside the small digital room. It is just like a digital book club for your peers to enjoy together now. You can give great recommendations to help them learn more facts in a short time.
Also, you can highlight important words in the text view to save for your notes. The app safely saves all of your best highlights for you in a special folder. You can send them to your Evernote or your Kindle to read on a screen. It helps me remember the data for a very long time in my busy mind.
A Look At The Content Library
The content library is massive and full of great wisdom for you to dig into. It currently holds more than 7,500 non fiction books inside its digital walls today. The smart team adds around 40 new books every single month to keep it fresh. They have 27 different categories for you to browse through when you open the app.
You can easily find books on psychology, history, and physical health to read right now. However, the main focus is always on business and personal growth to help your career. You will not find any made up fiction books here in this huge digital library. The editors choose the best sellers to put on the app for you to view.
They pick popular books written by very famous and smart authors from all over the world. They read the entire book many times to learn the facts and details inside out. They find the main ideas to share with the end user in a short text. They call these fast ideas blinks for you to read on your phone screen daily.
On top of that, they offer very short and sweet podcasts for you to hear. They proudly call them Shortcasts on the main app screen to grab your full attention. These are fifteen minute versions of popular podcast shows you love to hear each week. A smart idea.
The Financial Cost And Value
Let us talk about the price to use this app on your own smart phone. You can choose to use a free plan at no cost to your bank account. The free plan gives you one random book per single day to read for free. You cannot choose the book you want to read today with this basic free plan.
You do not get to use the nice audio versions on the free plan either. The free plan is very limited in what it can do for your daily growth. Therefore, the premium paid plan is a much better choice for a true business worker. The monthly cost is $15.99 if you pay per month for the premium service plan.
The yearly plan costs $99.99 for the full twelve months of access to the app. The yearly plan saves you a lot of your hard money over the long term. You get unlimited access to all the books they have in the large digital library. You get the offline mode and the great audio features to use all day long.
| Plan Type | Monthly Cost | Yearly Cost | Features |
| Free Plan | $0.00 | $0.00 | One daily book, no audio |
| Premium Plan | $15.99 | $99.99 | All books, audio, offline |
| Pro Plan | $21.99 | $139.99 | All premium features, AI tool |
This helpful table shows the exact prices of the app for you to clearly see. I chose the premium yearly plan to get the best value for my hard work. I happily share my main account with my lovely wife to give her great access. We split the total cost to save even more money for our shared bank account.
Blinkist (US) Compared To Other Apps
There are many apps for book summaries on the web for you to buy today. I tested a few of them to see the real truth behind all the hype. I tried an app named Headway for a short time to see how it works. Headway is very similar to the main app I use on my phone right now.
It costs $89.99 per year to use the full version on your personal smart phone. Headway uses fun games and challenges to keep you reading every day of the week. It gives you badges when you finish reading a new book on the home screen. It feels exactly like a game on your cell phone to play in your break.
Not exactly for me. Similarly, I looked at an app called Shortform to see if it was any better. Shortform is much more expensive to buy for a year of access to the library. It costs around $197 per year to get access to all of their deep guides.
| App Name | Yearly Cost | Library Size | Best Feature |
| Blinkist (US) | $99.99 | 7,500+ | Professional audio |
| Headway | $89.99 | 2,500+ | Game design |
| Shortform | $197.00 | 1,000+ | Deep guides |
This table compares the top three apps on the market for you to clearly view. The library of Blinkist (US) is much bigger than Headway and the other new apps. It has 7,500 books compared to 2,500 on the other app in the digital store. I prefer the larger library to read more new books every single day of the week.
The Business Growth And History
The company has a very interesting story to tell you about its early startup days. Four good friends started it in the city of Berlin to help the whole world. The exact year was 2012 when they built the app from the ground up completely. They wanted to help very busy people learn much faster in their busy daily lives.
They built a simple app to test out their idea on the new phone market. They added plain text summaries first for users to read on a small glass screen. Later, they added clear audio versions for users to hear in their cars or trains. This brand new feature changed everything for the small team and made them grow fast.
Audio became very popular with all the busy business workers around the whole wide world. Today, 70 percent of active users prefer the audio format over the plain text format. The company raised a whole lot of money to grow their team to be huge. They raised $34.8 million from big investors to build it to the very top level.
Insight Partners led the biggest funding round for the firm to help them grow fast. Huge success. Finally, a big company bought them out for good cash to add to their brand. Go1 acquired the app in the recent year of 2023 to expand their business goals.
The Science Of Fast Learning
To read a full book takes many hours of time you do not always have. You might forget the facts after a few long days pass by in your life. The app uses real science to help you learn better and remember facts much longer. They use a cool method called fast micro learning today to help your brain grow.
This means you learn new facts in very small steps to keep your mind fresh. It is very effective for your brain to remember things for a very long time. On the contrary, traditional learning can be very long and boring for a modern worker. The app breaks complex ideas into small pieces for you to eat up very fast.
It uses active recall to test your brain right away after you read a book. You can easily review your saved highlights at any time you want on your phone. You can use the spaced repetition method to learn more over a long time span. This makes the data stick in your memory for good so you can use it.
Science says yes. Plus, the audio format helps you learn while you move your body around the town. You can listen on a walk in the green park with your dog or kids. You can listen at the gym while you lift weights to grow your muscles fast.
FAQ’s
What is the exact price of the app?
The app has three plans for you to pick from on the main web site. The free plan costs zero dollars for the basic tools you can use every day. The premium monthly plan costs $15.99 for a full month of access to the books. The premium yearly plan costs $99.99 for a whole year of access to the library.
Does the app have a free trial?
Yes, it does. You can get a free seven day trial to test the app on your phone. You must sign up for a yearly plan to get it active on your account. You must cancel before the seven days end to stop the bill from hitting you.
Can I read fiction books on this app?
No, you cannot. The app only has non fiction books for you to read and learn from daily. It focuses on business, history, and self help life skills to make you much better. You will not find made up novels on this app at any time of day.
Do real people read the audio summaries?
Yes, they do. Professional voice actors read the main book summaries for you to hear in your ears. They do not use bad computer voices for the core books in the big library. The audio quality is very high and sounds very natural to a normal human listener.
Can I share my account with my wife?
Yes, you can. The premium plan has a cool feature called Connect inside the main app settings menu. This feature lets you invite one person for totally free to share the whole cost. You both get full access to all the good books in the big digital library.
How does the AI feature work?
The pro plan includes a brand new AI tool inside the app for you today. This tool can summarize your own files very fast indeed with no extra hard work. You can upload a document straight from your smart phone to get a quick summary. The AI will create a short summary for you fast to save you much time.
Conclusion About Blinkist (US)
In conclusion, my experience is very positive and extremely good after a few long years. Blinkist (US) changed the exact way I learn new things to help my daily work. I consume new books much faster now than ever before in my whole entire life. The audio quality is fantastic and very clear to hear on my long car rides.
The app design is clean and simple to use daily without any bugs or stops. I highly recommend it to all smart business professionals today who want to learn fast. I use it to filter books I want to buy in the real book store. I listen to the fast summary first to check it before I spend more money.
If I like the ideas, I buy the full book to put on my shelf. This saves me a lot of time in my week to do more hard work. This saves me a lot of money in my wallet to spend on my family. It is a wonderful tool to have on my phone at all times of day.
Truly amazing. Ultimately, you must decide for yourself if you want it to help your daily life. You can try the free version to see it first before you pay any money. You can see if it fits your busy daily lifestyle and helps your mind grow.