Someone synced their whole ebook library across five devices with a home server, and I'm jealous

Published Oct 26, 2026, 4:02 AM EDT Simon is a Computer Science BSc graduate who has been writing about technology since 2014, and using Windows machines since 3.1. After working for an indie game studio and acting as the family's go-to technician for all computer issues, he found his passion for writing and decided to use his skill set to write about all things tech. Since beginning his writing career, he has written for many different publications such as WorldStart, Listverse, and MakeTechEasier. However, after finding his home at MakeUseOf in February 2019, he would eventually move on to its sister site, XDA, to bring the latest and greatest in Windows, Linux, and DIY electronics. Sign in to your XDA account Summary This BookOrbit + KOReader project syncs an ebook library, progress, and highlights across five devices seamlessly. The library lives on a Linux BookOrbit server with unified covers and metadata. Handheld notes don't sync on Boox KOReader, but highlights push to Readwise automatically. If you're an avid e-reader fan, there's a good chance you've got more devices than you need (and I don't blame you). However, as much as owning a fleet of e-readers feels great, how do you keep your books synced up between them? Well, one person managed to achieve a good sync between five devices using a self-hosted BookOrbit server and KOReader on each device, and it makes me want to try it, too. Someone got BookOrbit and KOReader working together to unite five devices Now their books go wherever they go Over on the eink subreddit, user richelle_gomez showed off how they got their ebooks syncing across their devices. They have five of them: a Boox Note Max, a Boox Go Color 7 II, a Kobo Libra Colour, a Galaxy Tab S9, and a Galaxy S24 Ultra. As you might imagine, keeping all of them updated with reading progress and bookmarks was no easy feat. However, by running BookOrbit on a Linux server and putting KOReader on each device, they found a way: How it actually works day to day: I open a book on whatever is closest. Progress, highlights and bookmarks go up to BookOrbit and come down on the next device. The library itself lives in one place with proper covers and metadata, so I browse one shelf instead of five half-synced folders. BookOrbit also pushes highlights to Readwise for me, so my notes end up where I review them without doing anything. Unfortunately, they do claim that handheld notes do not sync up with KOReader on the Boox devices. However, after spending a weekend cleaning up the metadata and making everything look nice, they now have a really impressive-looking ebook library they can dip into on any device they please. Very slick.