How many minutes a day should you read?
Pick an amount you can keep up on busy days and set it as your weekly minutes goal. The chart shows the last 12 weeks, so you can see whether the habit holds.
Time with books is worth logging. In a study of 155 fifth graders who wrote down their out-of-school minutes on daily activity forms for 8 to 26 weeks, time spent reading books was the best predictor of several measures of reading achievement, yet on most days most of the children did little or no book reading (Anderson and colleagues, 1986).
Logged minutes turn into a finish date: see how long the rest of your book will take at your pace, and measure that pace in a one-minute test if you don't know it yet.
What to write in a reading log
Give each reading session its own row with the date and the book. Add the pages or minutes you read, so the week's totals add up at the bottom of the sheet.
For school, add the columns the teacher asks for, such as an adult's initials or a short note about the story. A rating column lets readers mark the books they would recommend.
Does being read to count?
If a teacher set the log, the teacher decides. For your own log, count it: log the minutes as a session and write "read aloud" or "audiobook" in the note.
Listening builds understanding too. In one study, 91 participants received the same nonfiction chapter in different forms, and those who listened to the audiobook showed no significant difference in comprehension from those who read it on a tablet, both right after and two weeks later (Rogowsky and colleagues, 2016).
Reading log or reading tracker?
A reading log is a sheet where you note each session by hand. A reading tracker follows whole books from the day you add them until you finish, with goals and a streak on top.
This page does both. The Tracker tab keeps your books and sessions in this browser, and the Print log tab turns them into a sheet you can print or save as a PDF, blank or filled in.
Where your list is saved
Saved only in this browser. Export a backup before changing devices or clearing browser data.
Use up to 500 books, with 1–100,000 pages each.
Questions
Is the reading tracker free, and do I need an account?
It is free and needs no account. Your books and sessions are saved in this browser on this device and are not uploaded.
How do I print a reading log with my own entries?
Open the Print log tab and choose the weekly or monthly layout. Then tick Fill in my logged reading. The sheet takes the dates, books, pages and minutes from your sessions. The Print my log button under the chart fills the sheet and opens printing in one step.
How does the reading streak work?
The streak counts the days in a row with at least one logged session, up to today. A day you have not logged yet does not break the streak until that day is over.
How do I move my list to another device?
Select Export backup to download a JSON file, then use Restore backup on the other device. Merge with my list keeps what is already there, and Replace my list starts again from the backup.
Can I open my reading log in a spreadsheet?
Yes. Books CSV and Sessions CSV download files that spreadsheet apps such as Excel or Google Sheets can open.
Sources
- Anderson, R. C., Wilson, P. T., & Fielding, L. G. (1986). Growth in reading and how children spend their time outside of school. Center for the Study of Reading, Technical Report No. 389 (ERIC ED275992).
- Rogowsky, B. A., Calhoun, B. M., & Tallal, P. (2016). Does modality matter? The effects of reading, listening, and dual modality on comprehension. SAGE Open, 6(3).