The world’s best guides to 1,000+ nonfiction books. Make key ideas and insights stick with context you won't find elsewhere. Made for busy professionals, book lovers, and curious people. Ready to take your growth to the next level?
"I LOVE Shortform as these are the BEST book companions I’ve ever seen...and I’ve looked at lots of similar sites. The 1-pager and then the longer review is so useful. I read Shortform nearly every day."- Jerry McPhee
The World's Best Book Summaries, Bar None
With multiple guide styles, added commentary, tools, and crafted exercises, the Shortform experience is unparalleled.
Features
Shortform
Blinkist
Headway
1-page quick summaries
Audio recorded guides
Chapter-by-chapter detailed summaries
Interactive exercises to increase understanding
Expert commentary with analysis & alternate viewpoints
Make Better Sense of the World — Way More than Book Summaries
Shortform guides are never surface-level or "bite-sized". Our world-class writers extract major themes & ideas.
Providing depth and context by connecting related concepts. We aim to add knowledge to the world by providing alternate modes of deeper learning & comprehension.
Cut Through the Noise
Learn, and Learn Quickly
Achieve Holistic Comprehension
Dense literature can be confusing. Our team demystifies complex topics for you by balancing succinctness and thoroughness. Ideas are organized and presented with examples & commentary, including dissenting commentary when relevant. We strive to be objective and balanced.
Can't decide what book to read? Shortform's guides are written to give you a high-level understanding of a book's key points, without fluff. Use guides to figure out what topics to dive into before committing to a book. Or, read several guides on a topic to gleam an umbrella understanding.
Shortform uses multiple levels of guidance with key topic summaries, historical context,and exercises, in order to help you internalize your reading. Shortform guides are useful for efficiently learning all the broad strokes of a field, for personal or professional use.
We provide varied levels of detail so that you can use Shortform based on your personal interests and time constraints
Succinct Top Level Guides
6-10 pages, readable in around 15 minutes on average. Our top level summaries are guides in their own right. They cover key points and frameworks. They are useful for pre-screening information.
Deep Chapter Guides
The bulk of a Shortform guide, readable in around 2 hours on average. Our chapter guides are detailed insights into the author's key points. They also provide carefully constructed examples, and commentary from other thinkers, be it affirming or dissenting viewpoints.
Constructive Exercises
We ask you questions at the end of sections in order to cement your recall and application of actionables. This is a critical learning tool for developing a holistic and firmly entrenched understanding.
Engaging Audiobook Summaries
Shortform on the go! Our professionally voiced audiobooks provide the exact same content as our guides, but in audio form. Perfect for commuters and podcast lovers.
You guys really hit it out of the park again with The 48 Laws of Power! I’ve never seen such a great analysis of this book. The exercises are perfect – not overwhelming or meager, but just right. Thanks for making me smarter every day.
Shortform’s most valuable benefits are understanding a book's key ideas better, the satisfaction of grasping difficult books with speed and ease, and understanding subjects that really interest me.
I LOVE Shortform as these are the BEST book companions I’ve ever seen...and I’ve looked at lots of similar sites. The 1-pager and then the longer review is so useful. I read Shortform nearly every day.
Brad Bergan
Jerry McPhee
Stacey Morris
"A high quality hand-crafted result"
"Clear and concise writing"
"Most other services are too superficial"
I appreciate your careful approach to your content—one that aims for a high quality hand-crafted result instead of a mediocre one that scales. Please keep up the good work and the high bar of quality.
I love the attention that your team has put in—like the logical organization of ideas, the clear and concise writing, the smart connections you make between books, and the choice of books you cover.
I’ve read a dozen of your book guides already—they are extremely well done. Most other services are too superficial...with Shortform I understand the book better than when I first read it.
Darcy Menard
Kannika Khanabba
Tom Lippscomb
The Six Pillars of a Shortform Guide
Our team of writers and editors obsess over the details so that you can have the best possible learning experience
Relentlessly Useful
Objective & Unbiased
Obsessively Focused
Our guiding goal is to create useful content. We explain ideas fully so you understand them better. We do extensive research and analysis to share ideas beyond the source material. We want to help you find epiphanies and new insights.
We add original commentary, which can include alternate perspectives and even dissenting arguments, to give you a more holistic understanding of the concepts. Our goal is to present information as raw knowledge.
Ever read a book, get confused, and wonder what its main points are? We avoid that with crystal-clear logic. If necessary, we overhaul the organization, surface key ideas, and explain them clearly.
Oriented For Action
Respectfully Succinct
Cross Disciplinary
It’s better to spend serious time planning key improvements to your life, than to spend 10 minutes reading stuff you won’t remember the next day. We help you apply the ideas to your real life through exercises and actionables.
Your time is valuable, and we don't want to waste any of it. We make every word and every sentence deserve your effort - whether that's a key idea, illustrative example, or subtle nuance of an author's intent.
The best ideas can come from surprising combinations of distant fields. Behavioral economics came from psychology + economics. Genomics came from computer science + biology. We believe in covering every genre of idea out there.
