THE PROBLEM
Avid readers collect highlights in Kindle, physical notebooks, Notion, and Apple Books — but they're fragmented. When you want to revisit an insight or share a quote, you can't remember which app it lives in. Highlights get lost and the value of all that reading evaporates.
APPROACH
Built a native iOS app that imports highlights from Kindle (via the CSV export), manual entry, and photo-to-text OCR for physical books. All highlights live in a unified library with full-text search, tagging by book and author, and a daily 'rediscover' card that resurfaces forgotten gems. The design emphasises calm, readable typography — not a productivity tool, but a companion.
KEY DECISIONS
- 1
Prioritised Kindle import first — it covers the majority of digital reading among target users.
- 2
Added OCR via iOS Vision framework to avoid requiring a third-party dependency.
- 3
Kept the data model local-first with optional iCloud sync to avoid a backend cost and privacy concerns.
- 4
Chose a minimal, paper-like aesthetic to make reading highlights feel different from checking a task manager.
OUTCOME
Live on the App Store. Users report re-reading highlights weekly after importing their full Kindle library. The OCR feature became the most-shared moment — users photograph sticky notes and old notebooks and are surprised by how well it works.