Audiobooks discussion
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Best app for listening to audiobooks on Android
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I know a lot of you use Mortplayer. It may be a "user problem" but the app is very unattractive looking and I cannot find my all of my books or albums in this app.It does not seem to put things in Albums either. All of my different tracks are in one big folder.
I use Smart Audiobook Player. You get to set the root folder, so as long as all of your books are in their own subfolders within that folder- they will be displayed separately within the app. The app itself has a widget that you can put on your smartphone.It appears as a system app, so if you have a task killer- the SAP app will be ignored.
Also it will save your place within each audiobook. You may have to upgrade to the paid version if you need to speed up playback, though.
+1 for Smart AudioBook. It does all the things you want (except the volume adjustment). The paid version definitely lets you adjust playback speed. It even has a function where it'll search the internet for a cover image if you don't already have it. I love it and wish Audible's app would adopt some of its features (like it has a setting to automatically rewind when you restart the book, so you can relisten to the last little bit you heard before stopping).
thank you that is two for smart audio book. What is everyone else using?
I just started using Smart Audiobook Player this week and it is sooo good. I will definitely buy the premium version when my 30day trial is over (I think it's only 2$). There are so many useful features in this app. I really like to speed up my audiobooks so that my brain is more active while listening and I don't zoom out. So with this app you have so many ways to speed things up - 1.1x 1.2x 1.3x 1.4x and so on. On my ipod I only have fast, normal & slow which was always the wrong speed.
Then what's great is that when you stop and start again it repeats a few seconds from before, so that you know where you are & it's great if you stopped mid-sentence.
It also has a sleep function you can use. It stops the audio after 10min of not moving your phone. It also slowly fades the audio out when it's going to sleep so that you barely notice that it's off. With my ipod I have a sleep timer as well, but it's not motion activated and it always stopped so abruptly that I woke up from the sudden silence :D
I must say, that I love my ipod more because it's way smaller than my phone, but that app makes me want to never listen to an audiobook on my ipod ever again :D
Smart Audiobook Player is what Audible's app should be. My only problem with the app is that it can't handle the very longest of files for those of us that rip books into a single mp3 track. Because of this I no longer create any files longer than 20 hours.
J. wrote: "Smart Audiobook Player is what Audible's app should be. My only problem with the app is that it can't handle the very longest of files for those of us that rip books into a single mp3 track. Becaus..."Speaking from someone who remembers those 90-minute cassette tapes and how they used to slow down in the middle- I'd rather have multiple shorter mp3 files, rather that one long one. Also because most players cannot handle the longer files.
Another +1 for Smart AudioBook Player. Another feature I haven't seen mentioned is it can pause when you unplug your headphones and play when you plug them back in.
Jennifer wrote: "Another feature I haven't seen mentioned is it can pause when you unplug your headphones and play when you plug them back in."Which is great for me, since I'm a klutz and often get tangled in my headphone wires and pull it out. (This is why I have moved to bluetooth headphones. Much less risk of me causing myself harm. :) )
+1 for Bluetooth headphones. I would never go back to corded ones.
OK, now I have to look into bluetooth headphones. :)
How are you organizing your folders for Audiobook player? Right now I have a folder for each audiobook I have under Music. That works fine for Doubletwist but is not working for Smart Audio Book player at all.After polking around a bit I found a message that is telling me to "Please move the following files from the root folder into separate folders to prevent stacking into one big book"
But each book is in a separate folder already... all I see is one big Music folder and cannot see my books.
Shawn wrote: "How are you organizing your folders for Audiobook player? Right now I have a folder for each audiobook I have under Music. That works fine for Doubletwist but is not working for Smart Audio Book pl..."You can put your Audiobooks anywhere on your smartphone and point Smart Audiobook Player to it. I have a folder on my SD card simply called Audiobooks. Each audiobook is in it's own folder within that folder. I set the folder that SAP sees to Audiobooks, so all of the books appear in it's Library.
Since you have everything in your music folder- SAP doesn't know what it's supposed to be looking for, and just sees all your music.
Shawn wrote: "How are you organizing your folders for Audiobook player? Right now I have a folder for each audiobook I have under Music. That works fine for Doubletwist but is not working for Smart Audio Book pl..."Under my Music folder, I have a subfolder for each book that contains all the book files and cover art, and SAB seems to find it just fine for me.
Is Smart Audiobook Player available for iOS devices?HBJ
Do you have a bunch of music mp3s in your Music folder as well? Smart Audiobook is going to assume those are all audiobook files. If you tap on Music in your library, you will probably see a ton of filenames/radio buttons.I have my folders set up exactly like Natalie. "Audiobooks" folder > sub-folder for each book > mp3s.
Hunchback wrote: "Is Smart Audiobook Player available for iOS devices?"No. Sorry. Hopefully there are some iPhone users out there who can help you with alternatives to the normal iPlayer music app?
I love SMART but definitely set up a separate audiobook file away from your music. Almost every other player I used would never play books in their proper order without a struggle. I've never had a problem with longer files, and often will merge my files from a MP3 CD into one file to make it more manageable.The only thing I wish it did like Audible, is track your overall listening stats. It would be interesting to see how much time I spend.
Thank you all for the information. I will play with the smart audio player some more this weekend. Right now I have just audio under music and a separate folder for each book and SMART can only find one book. I will play around with it some more this weekend.
I use Smart Audio Book and love that I can see where I am in the overall book at a glance (2h 37m of 9h 14m).As for books as a single file, no thanks. I once lost my place in one of those, and that was the last of that!
I have tried Listen ? I think it might be Listen audiobook or Listen Player? Because it also plays music too, the good thing with Listen is that it has variable speed playback (as does Smart Audiobook player after you pay) along with Equalizers (I think it is called, it looks like 6-8 sliding bars) so you can adjust the frequencies of the sound playback, if the narrators voice bugs you for some reason.
For the IOs, most people I know use the regular iPhone/iPad music player, I forget what it is called.
I used Smart Audiobook Player for about a year, but was having some minor annoyances here and there; the last one was the book kept stopping at the end of a part. The author was unable to solve it, so I decided to try another to compare. I found Listen Audiobook Player for $.99, and installed it.I've glad I did. I like it a lot better. I pointed it at my audiobooks folder, and it immediately recognized all the books - even the "Smart" player kept forgetting the books and needing refreshing. Listen can handle multiple folders, if you want to have some on an SD card and others on the device.
It has all the features, but no unneeded ones. Nicer UI, IMHO, and more configurable. The author wrote it for his own use as a labor of love, and keeps it updated. After less than 10 minutes, it has replaced Smart Player, which cost me at least twice as much.
Thanks for the info, Marty! For some reason one book that I've had on my phone for reading "someday" doesn't appear initially, only after Smart is sync'ed (refreshed). The only other drawback to Smart for me is that it indicates which part of the book I'm on, but not the total number of parts, although the counter showing the actual time of the entire book pretty much takes care of that concern.
I find that SAP focuses on what you're currently reading and what you've just read. You always need to refresh to see what is currently in your library.
Well, I've been happy so far with Listen Audiobook player; it doesn't have the problem that I was having with SAP, and it has everything I need, plus I like the UI better.Also, in another forum, I saw that the author of the app is a Goodreads memeber, and answered someone's question about the app.
Thanks Marty for your recommendation! I'm very happy you are enjoying the player. It has been nearly 3 years since I started working on Listen Audiobook Player. I am still actively working to improve it and incorporate user feedback I receive. While obviously its not going to be everyones perfect player, (is that even possible?), I think it is definitely worth a look for any serious audiobook listener. I have tried to make it the most feature complete and user friendly player I possibly can. It has all the common features found in other players as well as some unique features currently only available in Listen. There are too many to list here, but if you'd like you can see a list of most features on the play store page... I couldn't even fit all the features on the play store page with their max character limit. ;) www.acme-android.com will forward you there.
It may be just a hobby but I devote most of my spare time to it and find it has been very satisfying to hear all the positive user feedback. Thanks again.
I've been really enjoying it now that I got it up and running!
Any chance the Listen app will become available for Kindle fire? The only real alternative for my (non-DRM) WMA books is Gone Mad, which is ok, but not great.
Oh I forgot to mention, I use TTS eReaders more than I use any audiobook listening device. I use VoiceDream app for the IOS with Bluetooth earbuds for reading ebooks, I have a few favorite voices and sometimes I'd prefer the slightly mechanical voice without any type of annoying traits than some narrators that might have strange ways of speaking. VoiceDream is the bomb! I only wish it came in Android for the phone. The best android TTS eReader I've come across is NaturalReader but the full version is $99 and out of my budget.
John wrote: "Any chance the Listen app will become available for Kindle fire? The only real alternative for my (non-DRM) WMA books is Gone Mad, which is ok, but not great."@John, send me an email and I'll try to help figure out a solution for you. :) support@acme-android.com
"support@acme-android.com" as an address was returned to me as undeliverable.
John wrote: ""support@acme-android.com" as an address was returned to me as undeliverable."Hmm, that's the right address. I just sent myself an email to make sure there wasn't something wrong and it came through... Could you try again? Maybe there was a character typed in wrong? Try to copy and past it just to make sure. There's also an email link on the play store listing.
If you audiobooks are showing up in your music player, you can prevent this by adding a zero byte file called .nomedia in each folder you want to exclude from the audio player.For anyone writing an audiobook player app, a preference to do this for you would be a nice touch.
Mark wrote: "If you audiobooks are showing up in your music player, you can prevent this by adding a zero byte file called .nomedia in each folder you want to exclude from the audio player.For anyone writing ..."
Listen Audiobook Player asks to write this file when you add a library folder if a .nomedia file doesn't already exist in that location.
+1 for Smart Audibook player.+ for reversing a few seconds after paused/stopped
+ for it's utter simplicity
Hello.How can I add my audiobooks from the SD card on Listen Audiobook Player?
When I'm trying to add a folder into the library, I can't see my SD card...
Jared wrote: "Thanks Marty for your recommendation! I'm very happy you are enjoying the player. It has been nearly 3 years since I started working on Listen Audiobook Player. I am still actively working to impro..."I looked at your features for Listen, but I'm not sure if this is on there...My fav feature on Smart Audiobook Player is adjusted playback time left in book after you speed up the player. Your second screenshot in the app on Google Play may suggest that it does that, just wondering if it does? It would also be awesome if the widget showed what percentage is read.
What app do you like the best?
I am looking for:
1) An app that keeps my place when I stop listening
2) an app that I can find quickly. I have one app(ones that do not book mark where I am when I stop listening unfortunately) that stays on the front screen of my android and looks like a little tape recorder so I can play and stop when I have a few minutes to listen.
3) one that is "pretty" and shows all of my album folders. I tend to keep about 15 books on my android and like easy access to scroll between all of them and I find having an album does this best)
4) a way to increase the volume more than just the standard.
5) the ability to speed up or slow down the audio
Right now I like Double Twist the best. Advantages pretty album display makes finding what is on my phone easy. can turn up the volume louder than with other apps. Keeps my place but I have to know what album and what part I am on.
Disadvantages. tape player type feature does not stay on my main screen once I use another app. cannot change audio speed.
thank you for your help!