Word Holder
Pricing
For Kindle readers

Your Kindle saved every word you looked up. Bring them back before you forget.

Drop your Kindle’s vocab.db on Word Holder and choose the books. Their words become review cards, with the sentence you read each one in and the book as a tag — names and grammar words are left out. The first review is tomorrow.

Import your Kindle words

Free to start, up to your plan’s word limit. Your file is read in your browser — never uploaded.

You import on a computer: the Kindle connects by its USB cable. On your phone? Come back on a computer.

  1. 1 · Looked up on your Kindle

    tirò

    E ripresa l’ascia in mano, tirò giù un solennissimo colpo sul pezzo di legno.

    Le avventure di Pinocchio · Carlo Collodi

  2. 2 · Saved in Word Holder

    tirarefrom tirò

    Note

    E ripresa l’ascia in mano, tirò giù un solennissimo colpo sul pezzo di legno.

    TagPinocchio

  3. 3 · Back for review

    First review: tomorrow

    Then a day later, about a week later, then weeks apart.

Not reading on your Kindle right now?

Look it up once. Remember it tomorrow.

Look it up here while you read or watch. It’s saved with its meaning and your sentence, and comes back for review before you forget it.

Free, no account needed.

  1. Type the word you want to learn.
  2. You see every meaning it has, with examples.
  3. Pin the meaning you're learning. That's your card.
  4. It comes back for review right before you'd forget it.

What Vocabulary Builder doesn't do

  • It never brings a word back. It has flashcards, but no review schedule — nothing returns a word just before you would forget it.
  • It doesn't keep everything. It is widely reported to keep only your most recent 2,000 lookups and to drop the older ones without a word.
  • The words stay on the Kindle. To review them anywhere else, you first have to get the file off the device.

How it works

  1. Connect your Kindle e-reader to a computer with its USB cable and find system/vocabulary/vocab.db. On Windows the system folder is hidden — choose View → Show → Hidden items. On a Mac, recent Kindles don't show up in Finder; a free app such as OpenMTP can copy the file for you.
  2. Drop vocab.db on the Import from Kindle page. It is read in your browser; only what the import needs is sent: the words (as you met them and as the Kindle stemmed them), their sentences, the book titles and the tags you choose.
  3. Choose the languages and books you want, shorten the book tags if you like, and press Import.

Full walkthrough →

What you get

  • The dictionary form. The Kindle records the word as you met it — tirò — and Word Holder files it under tirare. Several forms of one word become one entry.
  • Your sentence. The sentence you read the word in is kept as its note, so you remember where you met it.
  • The book as a tag, so you can go through one book's words again before rereading it.
  • A review card, due tomorrow. Then a day later, about a week later, then weeks apart — on an SM-2-based schedule.
  • Only words worth reviewing. Words that aren't in the dictionary — mostly names and places — and grammar words like articles and prepositions are left out, and the import tells you how many.
  • Next month, do it again. Only your new lookups become new words. A word you already have keeps its note and review progress, and gains what it lacks from the new lookup: the sentence below the note, the book as a tag.

Beyond your Kindle

  • Reading something else? Paste in a text and tap the words you don't know.
  • With an account, a daily email can tell you when words are due — only if you turn it on.
  • Kindle words, lookups and tapped words all come back in the same review. How Word Holder works

Good to know

  • Kindle e-readers only. The Kindle apps for phones and tablets don't let you get at this file.
  • Plans have a word limit. If an import would go over yours, Word Holder says so and keeps the words you looked up most recently. After upgrading, import the same file again to add the rest. See the plans
  • Lookups in a language Word Holder doesn't support yet are shown, but can't be imported.

Bring your Kindle words back.

Import your Kindle words

Free to start, up to your plan’s word limit. Your file is read in your browser — never uploaded.

No Kindle at hand? Or look up a word instead.