The Inside Story Of How Blinkist Started A Self-Help Revolution

The Blinkist app has introduced millions of people to a brand new way of learning and has become a leading name in the self-improvement field. This is the story of how the app started, skyrocketed in popularity, and sparked a learning revolution.

Blinkist shares key insights from nonfiction books in 15-minute reads and listens. It has 4,000 titles to choose across 27 categories like entrepreneurship, psychology and personal development.

With bite-size, book-focused, on-the-go content, Blinkist has changed the way people learn. It now has 14 million users around the world and has won awards from the likes of Google and the UN. It’s even been named one of the top 20 apps for lifelong learning by Apple.

It all started with four friends—Holger Seim, Niklas Jansen, Sebastian Klein and Tobi Balling—who loved self-development. They know how much knowledge they could get from reading nonfiction books, but found that between a full-time job and personal commitments, they didn’t have much time for reading.

LtoR: The Blinkist founders: Niklas Janse, Tobi Balling and Holger Seim. Not pictured: Sebastian Klein

Sebastian remembered that at university he used to take notes while reading nonfiction books to help him remember what he learned. He would then email these notes to friends, so that they could get the key takeaways from books, too. The friends wondered if there was a way to turn this note-taking idea into an app that could help others access the knowledge in books in less time. That’s when the idea for Blinkist was born.

‘When we started most apps were for social media or gaming. We wanted to do something different and build an app that would add genuine value to someone’s life’. – Holger Seim, CEO of Blinkist

Now, eight years later, the app has thousands of titles and millions of users. What started with some simple notes has changed the way the world learns. Here’s how.

A Book Explained in 15 Minutes

The app launched in 2012 with 15-minute book explainers as the core concept, and it’s proved a popular idea ever since. It turns out that the founders weren’t the only people who struggled to find time for self-development. In fact, a study from Bersin by Deloitte found that employees typically only have 24 minutes a week for learning for their job. Outside of work, family life and personal commitments don’t leave much time for learning either.

Blinkist, therefore, solves a problem many people have: a desire to learn, but not enough time to do it. The app shares only the most important insights from nonfiction books, so users can fit learning into their busy lives.

“Time is everything. It’s all we really have. Blinkist is useful because reading is powerful. It helps me to learn every day.” — Ian Warner, Olympic Athlete and FIXT Founder

For example, if someone wanted to read the self-help classics Rich Dad, Poor Dad, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People and How to Win Friends and Influence People, it would take them more than 16 hours—and that’s only three of the thousands of life-changing books out there. With Blinkist, users can get the key ideas in about 15 minutes, so they can check out all three of these titles in under an hour.

Get the most important parts of a book in 15 minutes

Learning On the Go

Two years after launching, the app had its first big change. At the end of 2014, the Blinkist team added audio explainers to allow users to listen to the content.

Inspired by the growing success of audiobooks and podcasts, the team thought that audio content would make learning with the app even more accessible as people could learn while multitasking. They were right: 70% of users now choose to listen to content on the app, often while commuting, cooking or working out.

This audio content was more than just the explainers being read out. The team makes sure the audio is as engaging as possible and now uses features like sound effects, two narrators and scripts written specifically with listeners in mind.

“We created Blinkist as a way to make it easier for people to fit more learning into their lives. With the addition of audio, we’re moving closer to our vision to become the ultimate destination for lifelong learners.” – Holger Seim, CEO of Blinkist

A Shift to Self-Improvement

Adding audio attracted even more people to the app, but Blinkist’s biggest pivot was yet to come. In 2016, the app shifted its focus from being a reading app to being a tool for self-improvement.

The app was no longer simply about explaining books, but instead it focused on helping people learn and grow in a variety of topics. Nowadays, there are categories for work—like entrepreneurship, leadership and productivity—and personal life—like health, relationships and personal finance.

“With Blinkist you can boost your knowledge and gain new perspectives so that you can be a better professional, a better partner, or a better you.” – The United Nations

It’s Backed by Science

With this shift, Blinkist cemented its position in the learning field with content that uses science-backed learning techniques. Neuroscientific research methods ensure that everything users learn on the app sticks, including real-life examples and case studies to make big ideas easy to understand and relatable.

For example, in How to Win Friends and Influence People, the app shares actionable advice from the book that’s easy to apply to everyday life. Stories and anecdotes are included, too, to make this advice easy to imagine in real life, and more memorable, too.

Blinkist shares key takeaways and straight-forward advice from nonfiction books

Endless Learning Opportunities

Blinkist’s users responded well to this pivot to learning and more people began using the app for self-improvement. In 2018, Blinkist continued to expand its content to offer a wider range of things to learn. More categories were added, bringing the total up to 27, and now 70 new titles are added to the app each month, so there’s always something new to learn.

To help users decide which books to check out first, Blinkist added a recommendation feature in the same year. The feature uses machine learning to figure out what users like and make spot-on recommendations for other titles they’ll probably like, too.

“I read a lot of management, self-improvement, and entrepreneurial books through Blinkist because I can gain specific knowledge on my industry or on ways to improve myself.” – Steven Renwick, CPO of Regis24

One of the World’s Best Apps

After switching the focus to self-improvement, Blinkist skyrocketed in popularity. The team had clearly tapped into something many people were interested in. From entrepreneurs and CEOs to academics and life coaches, Blinkist began helping more and more people fit self-improvement into their days.

@blinkist is my now favorite thing to read. Such an amazing way to consume information. Reading books I’m interested in but too far down the list to get to any time soon, are now super easy to consume. Thank you!!

— Benjamin Montrose (@rebelliousBen) April 28, 2020

By presenting itself as a self-improvement app, Blinkist caught the attention of the press, including in The New York Times, The Guardian and HuffPost. Plus, in 2018, the app received funding from venture capital firm Insight Partners who loved the app for its potential to change the self-improvement field. The app has gone on to raise $35 million in funding.

“As a concept and an investment opportunity, Blinkist offers something genuinely unique. The company presents an exciting model which is defining and spearheading a whole new category of self-development.” – Harley Miller, Vice President at Insight Partners, Blinkist Investor.

Big organizations took note, too, and Blinkist won awards from the UN and Google, and even an award for its audio content. Apple CEO Tim Cook became a fan and Blinkist was mentioned in Tim Ferriss’ latest book Tribe of Mentors.

The app grew to reach people in almost every country in the world and now has 14 million users—and counting. Plus, its users see first-hand the self-help potential of the app. In a survey of 3,500 users in the US, Blinkist found that 87.5% often make changes to their lives based on what they learn through the app.

At the Forefront of Learning Trends

Blinkist created a whole new style of self-development, and it’s a style that’s here to stay. As the app continued to grow in popularity, many competitors emerged to try and replicate the same idea.

The app is also at the forefront of booming trends in the learning field, including online, mobile and microlearning. Research company Research and Markets predicted that the online learning market will be worth $325 billion by 2025. What’s more, microlearning—or learning in bite-sized chunks of time—is growing, too. Another research company, Markets and Markets, predicted that microlearning will be worth $2.7 billion by 2024.

Blinkist was one of the first apps to offer these styles of learning way back in 2012, and it’s already helping millions of users around the world learn with its unique bite-sized, on-the-go book explainers.

“As a productivity coach and one of the life long learners, I can’t tell you how happy I was to find Blinkist. If you enjoy nonfiction reading and are short on time, Blinkist will be your new favorite app.” – Karen Trepte, HuffPost

What began as simple book explainers has become a self-help revolution with millions taking part already. If you want to join them, download the Blinkist app today to get started