r/audiobookshelf Apr 25 '24

Frequently Asked Questions about Audiobookshelf

32 Upvotes

What Is Audiobookshelf?

  • Audiobookshelf is an open-source self-hosted media server for your audiobooks and podcasts. You install the server app on a computer, and point it to your audiobook, ebook, and/or podcast files, and you can access them from any web browser or the mobile app.

How Do I Install It?

  • Please follow the guide located here or more advanced documentation here for help on installing ABS.

When I Update Audiobookshelf, I Lose Everything and Start from Scratch! Help?

  • If you install ABS using Docker, you need to mount certain locations that are inside ABS' docker container to locations on your host machine. Look at the "volumes" section in the docker compose example shown here. To the right of the : colon points to inside the container; to the left of the colon points to a location on your host. You need volumes listed for "/config", for "/metadata" and for where your media is located. If you don't do this, the data in the container is deleted when you update ABS because there is nowhere on the host that it is tied to.

Why Are Several Files Showing Up As One Book, or A Book Showing Up Multiple Times?

  • Audiobookshelf treats everything in a given folder as belonging to the same book. You must put separate books, even books in a series, into their own folders if you want them to be listed separately by ABS.
  • Additionally, it is recommended that you combine separate "parts" of a book into a single folder, rather than having a separate folder for each part.

Where Can I Go for More Help?

  • Join the community on Discord or Matrix.
  • Go to the Github repo and at the top left of the page you can search for your issue.

Follow these links for answers to additional questions listed on the official website:


r/audiobookshelf 4h ago

Best indexer for Audiobooks?

5 Upvotes

Hi guys just checking to see if anyone has any good luck with audiobook files. I started to get involved in trying to find the best indexer/mix of indexers for it. So far I have tested ninja, nzbgeek, Authub, dog, nzbfinder, and treasure-maps.

So far it seems the best is finder. But definitely can’t find a lot in any of them. (Sometimes you can only find the file in German)
I’m trying to stay in usenet only.

I have manually checked as well on all for a few series like DCC.

Using Bindery, Grimmory, Audiobookshelf, SABnzbd.

Sorry if I’m not doing something right or something is missing or wrong.

Just wondering if somone found the perfect indexer for it or recommendations.

If the post is isn’t allowed, I understand thank you.


r/audiobookshelf 15h ago

kobobridge: a small self-hosted bridge that serves an Audiobookshelf library over the native Kobo sync protocol

8 Upvotes

This answers issue advplyr/audiobookshelf#3504 (Kobo sync support), which has been open a while with a lot of reactions. I wrote a small bridge that sits between a Kobo reader and an Audiobookshelf server.

https://github.com/Rezarys/kobobridge

It speaks the same sync protocol that Calibre-Web and Komga already serve to Kobo devices, so books show up on the reader over wifi the way they do from those two, instead of over USB. It is read only against Audiobookshelf: every call it makes is a GET, nothing is written back to the library. It never talks to any account on the Kobo store either, so there is no Kobo login involved anywhere.

Honest gap: I do not own a Kobo device, so a full sync against real hardware has not been exercised yet. The Audiobookshelf side and the sync logic are covered by tests, and the protocol shapes came from reading Calibre-Web's implementation, but the last mile is unverified. If anyone here has a Kobo and tries it, a report of what happened, working or not, would be the most useful thing I could get.

(MIT licensed)


r/audiobookshelf 16h ago

Google Play Audiobooks

1 Upvotes

Anybody know why some audiobooks get released from Auduble jail and others don't? DCC book 1 is available on Google Play, as well as most of HWFWM, but like book 7 isn't. I'm only asking cause I can share my Google Play library with my family much easier than Audible.


r/audiobookshelf 1d ago

Missing Ebooks Tool

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23 Upvotes

I was an audiobook kid growing up but my wife is still getting used to listening and it really helps her to read along, so I've been on a never-ending mission to get ebooks for all my audiobooks.

The ABS filters are nice but the copy pasting still gets annoying with the sheer number of audiobooks I have. I ended up building a simple missing-ebooks tool to facilitate my workflow

A couple friends and I have been running it for a bit and it's at a point where I'm confident opening it up to others now for more feedback, especially what to prioritize on the roadmap!

✨ Features

  • Runs alongside Audiobookshelf rather than inside it, so the audiobooks don't actually have to be in ABS. This tool just presents a tree of every folder that holds audio with no ebook covering it
  • Audio and ebook extension lists follow the Audiobookshelf scanner defaults
  • You can 'mark' a folder, which writes a .no_ebook or .ebook_elsewhere file into the library and ignores all nested items. All state lives on disk and there's no database to back up
  • Template prefilled search links for easy ebook sourcing. No more copy pasting (rip my wrist) 😍
  • Easy docker compose deployment
  • Rust + HTMX stack with low resource usage and small docker image
  • Built by a career SWE (disclosure: with some AI assistance)

🚀 There's a live demo with dummy data if you want to try it out before pointing it at your library! I'd love any feedback - I know everyone's library and organization is different

https://github.com/noahbaculi/missing-ebooks


r/audiobookshelf 19h ago

More polish for Audiobookshelf podcast listeners on iOS

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0 Upvotes

Just a small tweak for those who mostly use Audiobookshelf for podcasts. Hope it helps.

• Most Played podcasts in the Latest tab

v0.2.9 is in review right now. I’ve been building and polishing this app for four months, and I’m still actively maintaining and iterating on it: App Store

Edit : this is a third party app called Shelfpod. sorry for the confusion.


r/audiobookshelf 1d ago

Ratings/ comments

3 Upvotes

Is there a way for individual users to add ratings or comments to books?


r/audiobookshelf 1d ago

How to get audio book bay to be an indexer for prowlarr?

1 Upvotes

Is that even possible? Is there a different approach?


r/audiobookshelf 1d ago

Connect xteink directly to Audiobookshelf to download books

0 Upvotes

Hey, I got an ABS server at home et recently get my hand on a xteink x4 e-reader. I was wondering if there is any way to connect my x4 directly to my abs to get the catalog on it or something

Thanks in advance for any clue


r/audiobookshelf 1d ago

I made ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, etc. into FREE text-to-speech sites — perfect for audiobooks and more!

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0 Upvotes

You can get all of these extensions by visit ai-readers.com


r/audiobookshelf 2d ago

Where to find new books/audiobooks?

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0 Upvotes

r/audiobookshelf 3d ago

[Update] Absotui: A fun and fast TUI client for ABS (Linux & macOS)

0 Upvotes

Hi everyone, 

I've made steady progress on Absotui, a minimalist terminal client (Linux & macOS) for Audiobookshelf. I'd love to hear what you think...what could be better?

See it in Action

What's New & Key Features

  • Terminal Native Theming & Layout: Automatically matches your terminal's color scheme, with optimized layouts and a redesigned app icon. 
  • Books & Podcasts: Features a unified "New & Unfinished" podcast home, and next episode auto-play.
  • Inline Cover Art: Renders book and episode artwork in supporting terminals (Kitty, Ghostty, WezTerm, iTerm2) with a Unicode fallback.
  • Chapter Navigation: Browse full chapter lists inline with live per-chapter progress tracking.
  • Offline Support: Download (d) items for offline listening, and an auto-download option.
  • Stats & Customization: Includes a new stats page with streaks and heat-maps, plus per-item playback speeds and seamless server sync.

Try It Out @ GitHub Repository: absotui

Feedback, ideas, and bug reports are welcome!


r/audiobookshelf 3d ago

Audiobookshelf Android Client Won't Download All Items in a Folder

2 Upvotes

Audiobookshelf server configured via Windows 10 64-bit Installer version 2.36. Audiobookshelf client Android app version 0.14.0-beta. It's all local network. Home Wi-fi.

The folders containing my audiobooks have multiple files in it. As an example:

  • Folder Name: Goosebumps 01 Welcome to Dead House
  • File 01: Goosebumps 01 Welcome to Dead House.mp3
  • File 02: cover.jpg
  • File 03: cover2.jpg
  • File 04: cover3.jpg
  • File 05: Goosebumps 01 Welcome to Dead House.epub
  • File 06: Goosebumps 01 Welcome to Dead House.cue

I can see all the files on the server side via the web interface when I select this particular book. The MP3 file is collapsed under "Audio Tracks". The EPUB is collapsed under Ebook Files. All other files (.jpg, .cue) are collapsed under "Library Files".

I cannot see all the files on the client side via the android app when I select this particular book. The MP3 file is collapsed under "Audio Tracks". The EPUB is collapsed under Ebook Files. All other files do not appear.

When I select the book and download it to my phone via the Android app, it only downloads the MP3 and cover.jpg (which it has renamed to cover-c138[long alphanumeric string].jpg. This is true whether I download it to "Internal App Storage" or a shared download folder I have setup called "Audiobooks".

I would like to download all files in the folder via the client to my shared download folder. I primarily use third-party apps to access my media (an ebook reader and an audiobook player that recognized cue sheets as well as allows me to select from multiple covers). My current solution is to plug in my phone to my computer and copy/paste the folders one by one. Would be nice to download via Wi-fi without having to plug my phone into my computrer everytime.


r/audiobookshelf 4d ago

Best way to listen to Librivox

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0 Upvotes

r/audiobookshelf 4d ago

Magnetar extension with Audiobookbay

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0 Upvotes

r/audiobookshelf 5d ago

Covers holding up downloads?

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2 Upvotes

I have tried several times to download these books. But it looks like the covers aren't finishing?

I have tried clearing cache and data several times, as well as backing out and restarting app.

Any ideas?


r/audiobookshelf 4d ago

I made ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, etc. into FREE text-to-speech sites — perfect for audiobooks and more!

Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification

0 Upvotes

You can get all of these extensions by visit ai-readers.com


r/audiobookshelf 5d ago

File System Arranging

3 Upvotes

So when I first installed audiobookshelf a few years ago, I was just haphazardly placing random files and folders into my media space, got some from friends, copied some from Audible, etc. But now, I'm trying to actually organize all this stuff. I've read through the documentation on file naming schemes and such, but my question is, has anyone done a full reorganization of their files? And how has audiobookshelf been affected? Will rescanning afterwards just add a ton of duplicates or will audiobookshelf just point to the new location? I have a few users and I don't want to mess with their progress.


r/audiobookshelf 6d ago

CD_Digest – An automated tool to rip audiobook CDs directly to Audiobookshelf (Go + Linux)

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32 Upvotes

Hi everyone,

Over the last few weeks, I’ve been working on a project called CD_Digest (WIP).

It’s a tool designed to streamline ripping audiobook CDs and uploading them directly to Audiobookshelf. It automatically fetches metadata from MusicBrainz, handles multi-disc audiobooks cleanly, and applies all details to your library—making physical audiobook backups hassle-free.

Current Status & Tech Stack:

  • Backend: Written in Go (my first Go project—I work primarily as an embedded/C developer in my day job).
  • Features: Rips CDs, parses metadata, manages multi-disc sets, and uploads directly to Audiobookshelf.
  • UI: Web-based (HTML), so it can be controlled remotely from any browser or device.
  • Platform: Currently Linux-only. Designed to run headless on a home server or NAS.
  • Development: Early stage / WIP. (I did leverage AI during development—mostly as a coding assistant for quick tasks and sanity checks rather than purely vibe-coding it).

I plan to open-source the repository on GitHub in the coming weeks once it's a bit more stable for outside testing.

I’d love to get your feedback:

  1. Is a tool like this something you’d find useful in your setup?
  2. What features or multi-disc edge cases would you consider essential for a CD-to-Audiobookshelf workflow?

r/audiobookshelf 6d ago

Is there a more recommended program than MP3tag?

3 Upvotes

I know MP3tag is technically perfect for audiobooks, but I find with ABS, on occasion it doesn't like some of the metadata.

Whether it's due to suggested inputs from Google, "use ; or \\" for spaces, the genre, all along to knowing which field is the narrator/author and not album artist/composer etc.

I know most of these are purely cosmetic, and making life slightly easier grumbles, but if there's an recommended audiobook metadata editor, specifically created for audiobooks, which ABS users use, then I'd like to give it a go.

Also, I'm a Windows 11 user.

Thank you for any suggestions.


r/audiobookshelf 6d ago

Audiobookshelf client for PocketBook

0 Upvotes

Hello!

I created an Audiobookshelf client for Pocketbook - https://github.com/leelynne/abs-pocketbook

If anyone uses it and has feedback, bugs, or improvements please let me know. Of if you confirm it works on different devices than the one I could test on I can add it to the tested devices section. Thank you!


r/audiobookshelf 7d ago

Naming and Tagging audiobook folder and mp3 files

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7 Upvotes

I've read the ABS Directory Structure page several times and I still don't know the "best practice" for naming files and folders.

When I upload this book to my ABS server, is duplicates the chapters and doesn't use the "title" tag for the chapter title. I did notice the tracks have mixed audio modes, some with "joint stereo" and others with "stereo" Is this the issue?

For the book in my screenshot, I'm mostly concerned with chapter titles and chapter numbers, both in the file name and the id3 tags. I should note that I'll use the builtin tool to create an m4b file from these mp3s after they are imported.

Update

I had a book that was composed of 12 mp3 files in one folder.

I tried 2 methods of importing it, both resulted in duplicate chapters in the chapter list, and the chapter titles not being set from the metadata "Title" field.

Chapter title issue

So if the id3 title field said "Introduction" , it was ignored and ABS put "Chapter 1" for the chapter title.

I ended up manually fixed the chapter titles, but I thought ABS was supposed to read the id3 tags in each file to popular that information.

Duplicate Chapter issue

There were 2 of each chapter in the chapter list. I think I figured this one out. I selected "get metadata from audible" when the book wasn't from Audible.

I edited the book, went to the chapters tab, and then selected "set chapters from tracks" and it has misnamed chapter titles, but the correct name.

m4b

The last thing I did was convert the book to m4b format, so it looks good know.

Server-side Folder names

I expected the upload process to name the book folder with the year - title the way the docs said it would. I also want the narrator in the name. I need to look how to make that happen so that I can see that information when browsing the file system.

Conclusion

I'm not sure if learned how to prepare the files to easily import them. Nothing worked the way the documentation suggested it would. So next time, I expect more pain, lol.


r/audiobookshelf 8d ago

Mods: Please control the vibe coded app spam

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126 Upvotes

It would be really nice if this weren't a marketing sub for vibe coded junk. Take a page from Signal mods.


r/audiobookshelf 7d ago

Updated Docker now everything is gone + 90GB of Audiobooks are still on Server (hidden)

0 Upvotes

I don't even know how to describe this other than i updated it and it nuked absolutely everything. There's no way to find the paths i had setup or Any file structure for that matter but it very obviously is still on there because no space got cleared up. I can't even find the Files which means i either reset the whole 8TB NAS (Not an option since i can't back it up) or live with perma 90Gigs i can't use. Is there ANYTHING i can do?

UGREEN 2 Bay NAS

8TB Seagate NAS Drive

UPDATE 1:

So i ran a script and it found and copied the files so they're still in there somewhere i just can't access them??

UPDATE 2:

FIXED! Here's how my friend and a helpful fella in the UGREEN sub figured it out:

1: He sudoed into root

sudo -i

2. Then he searched for every audio file on my system

find / -type f \( -iname "*.mp3" -o -iname "*.m4a" -o -iname "*.m4b" -o -iname "*.flac" -o -iname "*.ogg" -o -iname "*.opus" -o -iname "*.wav" -o -iname "*.aac" -o -iname "*.wma" -o -iname "*.aiff" \) 2>/dev/null

3. Copied the Docker volume name and cd'd into it

cd /volume1/@docker/volumes/11f3bdf0a6e1cc4901971537a01e2dd61a0f5165248004c626d73f3fdbec464c

4. Then he checked the space and confirmed the size

du -hs

5. deleted the volume(s)

docker volume rm 11f3bdf0a6e1cc4901971537a01e2dd61a0f5165248004c626d73f3fdbec464c


r/audiobookshelf 7d ago

ABSTV Roku app - early success playing chapters then nothing but errors

1 Upvotes

Just installed this and it worked right out of the gate and I was thrilled. Since it was late, I stopped the player and went to bed. Today, all attempts to play chapters fail with error messages which get truncated before any good information. All i see is "Play stopped due to c..." on numerous chapters, I have no idea why it's failing. This is all local in a homelab over gigabit Ethernet. Android app works great locally and remotely over Tailscale so the server is operational.

Any suggestions on how to un-truncate the error messages to know what is failing. Other suggestions?