Skip to content

Instantly share code, notes, and snippets.

@darnocer

darnocer/kindle.md

Last active October 27, 2023 16:01
Show Gist options
  • Star 0 You must be signed in to star a gist
  • Fork 0 You must be signed in to fork a gist
  • Save darnocer/e1deba1f9503c690717b9f28f4a93647 to your computer and use it in GitHub Desktop.
Save darnocer/e1deba1f9503c690717b9f28f4a93647 to your computer and use it in GitHub Desktop.
Download ZIP
Stubborn Syncing Issues with Kindle Highlights
Raw
kindle.md

Not sure if my Kindle is just old, but I have the hardest time syncing my book notes & highlights to my Macbook so that I can export them. Below are the steps for my future reference.

Device: Kindle Paperwhite 7th Generation

Troubleshooting Syncing Issues

  • Ensure both devices are connected to the same Wifi
  • Ensure both devices are connected to the same Amazon account
  • Ensure Whispersync* is enabled
  • Try to 🔄 Sync from both devices
  • Disconnect/reconnect account from Kindle App for Mac
  • Disconnect/reconnect account from Kindle device
    • ⚠️ Warning: This caused all of my highlights to disappear from my Kindle device :( However, they were recovered.
  • Factory reset Kindle
    • Should be last resort

✅ Your sync was successful if the notes & highlights appear in the web browser notebook here

*Enable Whispersync for Kindle Books

  1. Go to Manage Your Content and Devices
  2. Select the Preferences tab
  3. Select Device Synchronization (Whispersync Settings) and confirm that the feature is turned ON

Exporting Highlights

Method 1: Export from Web Notebook

Once you are able to see the highlights synced to the web browser notebook here:

  1. Select the book whose highlights you want to export
  2. On one of the highlights, select the Options dropdown > Open in Kindle (This should load all of the synced highlights for the book into the Kindle app)
  3. From the Notes & Highlights sidebar in the app, click Export
  4. Click Save As > save the document

This will export the highlights as an HTML file. I am not sure if exporting as .csv is actually possible, but this met my needs. From here, I was able to copy/paste them into my notetaking app, Obsidian (plain text / markdown files).

Method 2: Export .txt File

  1. Plug Kindle into Mac (note - I needed to use a USB-C cable for my Mac as my device was not recognized with a USC-C adapter. A micro-USB adapter for the Kindle device worked)
  2. Locate the Device in Finder
  3. Go to Documents
  4. Locate My Clippings.txt

All highlights from all books will be in one file and not the best format.

✅ Method 3: Readwise (recommended)

After struggling for months with this, Readwise is the only thing that worked. My highlights appeared to be deleted from my device after deregistering/re-registering my account, yet Readwise somehow pulled them out of the ether and I was able to effortlessly have them sync to Obsidian. Well worth the subscription.

Sign up for free to join this conversation on GitHub. Already have an account? Sign in to comment