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TBR Pile Calculator
How long would it take to read every book on your to-read list? Enter the size of the pile, a typical length and the time you read each day. It’s a curiosity, not a deadline: a TBR is a menu, not a debt.
Time to read the whole pile
– months
Enter the number of books on your to-read list. You’ll see the pages and hours it holds, and roughly when you’d reach the last one.
Nothing waiting.
An empty list is a fine place to be. The next book can be anything you like.
Time to read the whole pile
Your list grows faster than you read.
- pages in the pile
- hours of reading
- books a month at this pace
- last book, around
This uses a pace you guessed. ReadList learns your real pace from your reading sessions, and an Up Next queue keeps the next few books in view, not the whole pile.
Free, through Apple’s TestFlight app. Your library carries over to the App Store release.
ReadList is on iPhone first. Leave your email and we’ll tell you the day it’s ready for Android.
How it works
How the pile is measured
The pile in pages is the number of books times their average length. Your pages a day are your pace times the minutes you read. Divide one by the other and you have the reading days it holds. If you add books along the way, the pile shrinks by the difference between what you finish and what you add.
Days to clear=books × average length÷pages a day
48 × 320=15,360 pages
40 pages an hour×30 min a day=20 pages a day
15,360÷20=768 days≈about 2.1 years
Adding 2 books a month needs→about 32 min a day just to keep level
A menu, not a debt
A to-read list is a record of curiosity. Nobody reads all of it, and nobody needs to. The number above is how much good reading is waiting for you, not how far behind you are. Choose the next book because you want to read it, not because it has waited longest.
Living happily with a long list
- Keep a short next list of three to five books, and let the rest of the pile rest.
- Give a book fifty pages. If it isn’t working, let it go without guilt.
- Prune once a season: remove what no longer interests you. That’s tidying, not giving up.
Questions
Frequently asked questions
What does TBR mean?
TBR stands for to be read: the books you’d like to read some day. Some readers keep it as a list, some as a physical pile, many as both.
How long would it take to read 100 books?
At 40 pages an hour and 30 minutes a day, 100 books of 320 pages is 32,000 pages, or 1,600 reading days: a little under four and a half years.
My list grows faster than I read. Is that a problem?
Not at all. It means you keep finding books you want to read. The calculator shows how many minutes a day would keep the pile level, but a growing list is a good sign, not a failure.
Does “last book” count today?
Yes. Today is the first reading day, so a one-day pile is finished today.
How does ReadList handle a long to-read list?
You keep the whole list there, and choose a few books for Up Next so the next read is always clear. Collections help you sort the rest by mood, topic or anything else.