Bright Passages — Support
Getting started
How do I add a book? Tap the + button on the home screen. You can scan the barcode on the back of the book (fastest), enter the ISBN manually, or type the title and author yourself.
How do I capture a passage? Open a book, tap the camera button, and photograph the page. The app will transcribe the text and detect any highlighting automatically. After processing, you can review the passage, assign a category, and add a personal note before saving.
What highlighter colors does the app detect? Bright Passages detects six colors: orange, yellow, pink, blue, green, and purple. Each maps to one of six categories — Personal Favorite, Fact/Data, Quote, Research/Verify, Definition, and Anecdote by default. You can rename any of these in Settings to match however you think about your reading.
Highlighting detection
The app didn’t detect my highlighting. What do I do? Flash is on by default when you capture with the in-app camera, and it’s the single biggest fix for detection accuracy — consistent lighting is what color detection depends on most, and flash removes almost all the guesswork caused by ambient light. If you’ve turned flash off, that’s the first thing to turn back on. Beyond that:
Hold the phone flat directly above the page, as parallel to it as possible.
Give it a moment after the shutter — processing takes a second or two.
Try the sensitivity setting. In Settings → Capture → Highlighter Sensitivity, try switching to Heavy if you highlight lightly or use older, less saturated highlighters.
Get as close to the page as you comfortably can before shooting — the more of the frame the text fills, the more accurately the app can read highlighter color, which matters most for short words.
The app detected highlighting that wasn’t there. This usually happens in warm or yellow-toned light — lamps, incandescent bulbs, warm LEDs — or when part of the page is in shadow. Flash usually fixes this, since it overrides inconsistent ambient light with one even light source. If flash is off, try turning it back on, or retake near a window or under cooler white light. You can also switch to Light sensitivity in Settings → Capture → Highlighter Sensitivity.
The wrong color was detected. Orange and blue are the most reliably detected colors. Pink, green, and purple can occasionally be misidentified depending on lighting and paper color. Turning on flash solves most of these cases, since even, consistent light is what color detection relies on. You can also assign the correct category manually after capture.
My photo is very dark and nothing was detected. Turn on your camera flash — it solves this instantly without needing to hunt for better ambient lighting. If flash is already on and this still happens in an especially dim room, that’s a real limitation we’re working on improving in a future update.Categories
How do categories work? There are six fixed highlighter categories, one per detected color, plus as many custom categories as you’d like to create for anything you mark by hand rather than by highlighter.
The first time you open Bright Passages, you’ll be asked a quick question about what kind of reader you are — student, book club member, fiction reader, nonfiction reader, or religious study — and the six highlighter categories will be renamed to match. You can skip this and decide later, and you can change your answer anytime in Settings → Categories → Reader Type.
Can I rename my categories? Yes — at two levels. Go to Settings → Categories to rename any category globally, or change your reader-type preset there to relabel all six at once. Those names appear everywhere in the app by default.
You can also override category names on a per-book basis, including applying a different reader-type preset to just that one book. Open any book, go to its settings, and set different category names (or a different preset) just for that book. So if you’re generally set up for nonfiction reading but pick up a novel, you can switch that one book to the fiction preset without affecting the rest of your library. Book-level names always take precedence over global names for that book.
Can I add my own categories? Yes. Beyond the six highlighter categories, you can create custom categories for anything you want to tag manually — there’s no fixed list, you name and color them yourself. Tap the category pill on any passage to assign or change its category.
Your data
Is my data backed up? Yes — Bright Passages uses iCloud to sync and back up your data automatically. Your books, passages, and notes are stored in your personal iCloud account. If you get a new phone or reinstall the app, your data will be there.
If you have iCloud disabled on your device, your data stays local only. In that case, use Settings → Export regularly to save a copy.
Does Bright Passages interact with my Photos library? In two ways:
Choosing a cover photo — when you pick an existing photo from your library as a book cover, Bright Passages reads that specific photo. It only accesses the photo you select, nothing else in your library.
Saving page photos — when enabled, Bright Passages saves copies of captured page photos and book covers into a “Bright Passages” folder in your Photos library, organized into per-book albums. To turn this off: go to Settings → App Settings and toggle off “Save page photos to Apple Photos.” Turning it off stops future saves but doesn’t delete photos already saved.
You’ll be asked for Photos permission the first time you use either feature. You can revoke it anytime in iOS Settings → Privacy → Photos.
You may also be prompted to pin the “Bright Passages” folder in Photos for quick access. Bright Passages can’t pin it automatically, but you can: open Photos, go to Albums, touch and hold the “Bright Passages” folder, and choose Pin.
How do I connect Readwise? Go to Settings → Readwise. Enter your Readwise API token — you can find it at readwise.io/access\_token. Tap Save to validate the token. Once connected, you can sync all your passages manually with “Sync all passages now,” or turn on auto-sync to have each new passage sent to Readwise automatically when you save it.
What gets sent to Readwise? Passage text, book title, author name, page number if you’ve entered one, and your personal note if you’ve added one. Photos are not sent.
My Readwise sync failed. What do I do? Check that your API token is still valid at readwise.io/access\_token. If the token looks correct, check your internet connection and try syncing again from Settings → Readwise → Sync all passages now. If passages are stuck in a pending state, a fresh manual sync will retry them.
How do I disconnect Readwise? Go to Settings → Readwise and delete your API token. No further data will be sent to Readwise.
How do I export my passages? Go to Settings → Export. You can export as CSV (opens in any spreadsheet app) or XLSX (Excel format). The export includes all your books, passages, categories, page numbers, chapter titles, and personal notes.
How do I import passages? Go to Settings → Import and select a CSV or XLSX file. A few things to know before importing:
After import, your books may have incomplete metadata — cover image, genre, publisher, and other details won’t carry over from a spreadsheet. To fill these in, tap any imported book, tap the search icon, find the book, and save — this pulls the full book information automatically.
Photos of pages don’t import. Passages come in as text only — the original page photos can’t be recovered from a spreadsheet. If you have the photos, you can recapture them manually from within each passage.
How do I delete all my data? To delete your Bright Passages data from your device, delete the app. To also remove it from iCloud, go to iOS Settings → your name → iCloud → Manage Account Storage → Bright Passages → Delete Data.
Still stuck?
Email us at nathan@idratherberight.com and we’ll get back to you.
Bright Passages is made by one person who reads a lot of books. Response times may vary but every email gets a real reply.