calibredb

calibredb is the command line interface to the Calibre database.

NOTE:

On macOS, the command line tools are inside the Calibre bundle, e.g. /Applications/calibre.app/Contents/console.app/Contents/MacOS/.

Documentation

• man 1 'calibredb' [EN]

Syntax

calibredb SUBCOMMAND [PARAMETER ...]

Subcommands & Parameters

add

Add the specified files as books to the database.

-a AUTHORS, --authors AUTHORS

Set the AUTHORS of the added book(s).

-c PATH, --cover PATH

PATH to the cover to use for the added book.

-d, --duplicates,

Add books to database even if they already exist. Comparison is done based on book titles.

-l LANGUAGES, --languages LANGUAGES

A comma separated list of LANGUAGES.

-t TITLE, --title TITLE

Set the TITLE of the added book(s)

-T TAGS, --tags TAGS

Set the TAGS of the added book(s).

add (Additional parameters for directories)

You can also specify directories.

-1, --one-book-per-directory

Assume that each directory has only a single logical book and that all files in it are different e-book formats of that book.

-r, --recurse

Process directories recursively.

export

Export the books specified by ids (a comma separated list) to the filesystem.

--dont-save-cover

Normally, Calibre will save the cover in a separate file along with the actual e-book files. Specifying this switch will turn this behavior off.

--dont-save-extra-files

Save any data files associated with the book when saving the book. Specifying this switch will turn this behavior off.

--dont-update-metadata

Normally, Calibre will update the metadata in the saved files from what is in the Calibre library. Makes saving to disk slower. Specifying this switch will turn this behavior off.

--dont-write-opf

Normally, Calibre will write the metadata into a separate OPF file along with the actual e-book files. Specifying this switch will turn this behavior off.

--formats LIST

Comma separated LIST of formats to save for each book. By default all available formats are saved.

--replace-whitespace

Replace whitespace with underscores.

--single-dir

Export all books into a single folder

--template TEMPLATE

The TEMPLATE to control the filename and folder structure of the saved files. Default is {author_sort}/{title}/{title} - {authors} which will save books into a per-author subfolder with filenames containing title and author.

Available controls are: author_sort, authors, id, isbn, languages, last_modified, pubdate, publisher, rating, series, series_index, tags, timestamp, title.

--to-dir

Export books to the specified folder. Default is .

--to-lowercase

Convert paths to lowercase.

list

List the books available in the Calibre database.

--ascending

Sort results in ascending order.

-f FIELDS, --fields FIELDS

The FIELDS to display when listing books in the database. Should be a comma separated list of fields.

Available fields: author_sort, authors, comments, cover, formats, id, identifiers, isbn, languages, last_modified, pubdate, publisher, rating, series, series_index, size, tags, timestamp, title, uuid. Default: title,authors. The special field all can be used to select all fields.

--for-machine

Generate output in JSON format, which is more suitable for machine parsing. Causes the line width and separator options to be ignored.

-s QUERY, --search QUERY

Filter the results by the search QUERY. For the format of the search query, please see the search related documentation in the User Manual.

--separator

The string used to separate fields. Default is a space.

--sort-by FIELDS

The FIELDS by which to sort the results.

Available fields: author_sort, authors, comments, cover, formats, id, identifiers, isbn, languages, last_modified, pubdate, publisher, rating, series, series_index, size, tags, timestamp, title, uuid. Default: id.

Examples

Export ebooks by command line

calibredb list --ascending --fields 'id' --for-machine \
  --search 'tags:"=Manual" and tags:"=Diving"' \
  --sort-by 'author_sort,title' \
| jq --raw-output '. | map(.id) | join(",")' \
| xargs calibredb export --dont-save-cover --dont-save-extra-files \
    --dont-update-metadata --dont-write-opf --formats 'pdf' --single-dir \
    --template '{authors} - {title}' --to-dir="${HOME}/tmp"

Import an ebook by command line

calibre --shutdown-running-calibre
calibredb add --one-book-per-directory '.'