How to Export Apple Books Highlights (2026 Guide) | Chapterly Blog
How to Export Apple Books Highlights (2026 Guide) Quick Answer: The fastest way to export Apple Books highlights on Mac is to open a book, click the Notes icon, and copy individual highlights — but that does not scale. For the full library, the most reliable methods in 2026 are: (1) the dedicated Mac app Highlights (one-time clean export to Markdown/HTML), (2) Readwise's Mac sync (automatic, requires the Mac to be running), or (3) directly querying the AEAnnotation SQLite database for power users. There is still no official Apple export. After exporting, import into a retention tool that uses spaced repetition for readers — sitting highlights in a notes app produces almost no learning. Apple Books is a great reading experience—but Apple makes it surprisingly difficult to get your highlights and notes out. Unlike Kindle, there's no official web portal for viewing your annotations, and Apple provides no native export feature. If you've been highlighting passages in Apple Books and want to do more with them—like reviewing them with spaced repetition or importing them into a learning tool—here's how. (If you also read on Kindle, the workflow and tradeoffs are different — see our parallel guide on exporting Kindle highlights.)...