Comparison
These are not the same kind of product, and most “alternative” lists pretend otherwise. Letterboxd is a social network built around films. Kinolog is a private diary that reads what you log and recommends from it. The right answer depends entirely on which of those you actually opened the app for.
| What you want | Kinolog | Letterboxd |
|---|---|---|
| Log films with ratings and notes | Yes, free, unlimited | Yes, free, unlimited |
| Friends, followers, a social feed | No, by design | Yes, its whole point |
| Public profile and shareable lists | No public pages | Yes |
| Recommendations from your diary | Yes, with the reason and the films it cited | No recommendation engine |
| Import a Letterboxd export | Full export accepted; your first history comes in full on Free, repeat bulk imports are limited on Free, Plus has no repeat-import ceiling | n/a |
| Export your data | JSON or Letterboxd-compatible CSV, any time | CSV export |
| Watch dates, rewatches, tags | Yes, imported and native | Yes |
| Stats and a yearly recap | Free | Pro (~$19/yr) |
| Ads | None, ever | Removed with Pro |
| Price | Free; Plus $2.99/mo or $24/yr | Free; Pro ~$19/yr; Patron ~$49/yr |
Reading a friend’s four-line review of something you both saw, following critics whose taste you trust, building lists other people actually browse, Kinolog does none of that and is not trying to. Letterboxd’s community is a decade deep and cannot be cloned by a feature list. If that is the part you would miss, the honest advice is to stay.
Plenty of people log hundreds of films a year and get nothing back but a list. Kinolog reads the diary: what you rate highest versus what you watch most, the decade you keep returning to, the word you reach for when a film lands, and what to watch tonight given two hours and no energy. Every claim shows the films it was counted from, so you can check it rather than trust it.
You are also not locked in either direction. Kinolog accepts the whole Letterboxd export. Your first Letterboxd history comes in full. Repeat bulk imports are limited on Free; Plus removes the repeat-import ceiling. Your export gives you a Letterboxd-compatible CSV back, so you can run both for a month and decide with real data. Longer version: Letterboxd alternatives in 2026, an honest guide, and the mechanics of moving are in how to import your Letterboxd history.
Upload the ZIP from Letterboxd’s export and Kinolog parses the history inside it: ratings to the half-star, the date you actually watched each film, your review text, your own tags, rewatches, likes, your favourite four, and your watchlist. Your first history comes in full on Free. Repeat imports on Free stop once an account holds 500 imported films, the first import included. Anything past that waits, saved, for Plus rather than being thrown away. Titles the film database cannot identify wait in a review queue rather than being guessed at.