Add bookmarks, notes and highlights in an eBook

To fit your screen when you change page features like font size or line spacing, most books on Google Play Books use flowing text mode. You can take notes, add bookmarks, translate, define and search for words.

Check whether you’re in Flowing text mode

If you highlight a word and a list of options appears, you’re in Flowing text mode.

Add bookmarks, highlights and  notes

1. On your iPhone or iPad, open the Google Play Books app .
2. Open a book.
   • To add a bookmark, tap the top right of the page.
     • To remove a bookmark, tap the top right again.
   • To highlight text, touch and hold the word. To select more than one word, use the blue sliders select a highlight colour.
     • To remove a highlight, tap the highlighted text Remove .
3. To add a note, touch and hold the word. To select more than one word, use the blue sliders Tap Add note .
   • To edit a note, tap the highlighted text where you added the note.
   • To delete a note, tap the highlighted text, then tap Delete .
   • To find all your notes, tap Notes .

Tip: You can't add notes on a sample book.

Translate, define or search for a word

1. On your iPhone or iPad, open the Google Play Books app .
2. Open a book.
3. Long press to select the text. To select more than one word, use the blue sliders.
4. Tap an option:
   • To find a definition, highlight a word. Only one word can be selected.
   • To translate, tap Translate . Select languages to translate to and from.
   • To search for the selection in the book or on the web, tap Search .

Turn on notes saving

You can find your Play Books notes, highlights and bookmarks in Google Drive. Your notes are saved in a document specific to the book that you’re reading.  

1. On your iPhone or iPad, open the Google Play Books app .
2. At the top right, tap your profile picture.
3. Tap Play Books settings Save your notes, highlights and bookmarks.
4. Name the folder where you want to save your notes. By default, the folder is named 'Play Books Notes'.
5. Turn on Save notes, highlights and bookmarks.
6. Tap Done.

Sync notes that you added before you turned on notes saving 

If you added notes before you turned on syncing, you’ll need to:

1. On your iPhone or iPad, open the Google Play Books app .
2. Open the book that you want to sync.
3. Add a new note, highlight or bookmark. This creates a new document with all the notes from that book.

Find your notes, highlights and bookmarks

1. On your iPhone or iPad, open Google Drive .
2. Make sure that you’re signed in to the same account that you use for Google Play Books.
3. Open the folder that you created to store your notes. By default, the folder is named 'Play Books Notes'.

Why can't I see the highlighted text in the notes document in Drive?

There are two reasons why highlighted text doesn't appear:

• If no highlights appear: The publisher of this book didn't enable the copy-paste feature.
• If some highlights appear: The number of highlights that you made exceeds the copy-paste maximum that the publisher set for this book.

To check the text that you highlighted, select the page number in the notes document.

Edit a notes document

If you edit a notes document in Drive and then add notes to the same book, your changes in the Drive document will be deleted. To edit and save to a synced document, make a copy of the document first.

1. On your iPhone or iPad, open the notes document.
2. Click File Make a copy.
3. Name your new document.
4. Make edits to the new document.

Tip: If you add notes to a book, they'll be saved only in the original notes document. If you want them in your new document, you'll need to manually add them to the new document.