By Feran, Founder of Digible·Reviewed May 2026

Digital Bible Journaling Report 2026

We analysed more than 24,000 handwritten Bible annotations created in Digible to see how people actually journal Scripture on iPad. Three findings stood out: the Gospel of Matthew is the most widely journaled book of the Bible, the New Living Translation is the most popular translation despite being a paid option, and the Sermon on the Mount is the most-journaled passage outside the opening chapters of Genesis.

This is original data — not a survey or an estimate. It comes from anonymised, aggregated annotation records of Bible journalers using Digible, the digital Bible journaling app for iPad. Snapshot taken 14 May 2026.

The most-journaled books of the Bible

Among engaged journalers, the Gospel of Matthew is the most widely journaled book — narrowly ahead of Genesis, Psalms, and John. The top four are tightly clustered, and four of the ten most-journaled books are Gospels.

The pattern blends the Gospels — Matthew, John, Luke, and Mark all rank in the top ten — with the foundational and practical books: Genesis for the story of beginnings, Psalms for prayer and worship, and Proverbs for daily wisdom.

The most popular Bible translation

The clearest single finding in the data: the New Living Translation (NLT) is the most popular translation among Digible users, set up by 35% of everyone who has created a Bible in the app. It outranks every free translation — even though the NLT is a premium option. When readers are free to choose, readability wins over price.

The Sermon on the Mount stands out

Most chapter-level journaling follows a reading pattern that begins in Genesis, so raw chapter counts are dominated by the opening of the Bible. But one passage breaks through on its own merit: the Sermon on the Mount. Matthew 5 and Matthew 6 — the Beatitudes, the Lord's Prayer, and the heart of Jesus' teaching — are the most-journaled chapters that people navigate to deliberately, ranking above even Genesis 1 among engaged journalers. It is the clearest sign in the data of intentional, destination study rather than sequential reading.

How many people journal Scripture?

Reading the Bible and journaling the Bible are different habits. Across the data set, more than 24,000 handwritten annotations have been created. This report focuses on the 1,198 engaged journalers — people who have created at least five annotations across at least three different chapters — and the 498 committed journalers who have gone well beyond that. Digital Bible journaling, the data suggests, is a real and growing discipline, not a novelty.

Methodology

This report is based on anonymised, aggregated annotation records from Digible, snapshotted on 14 May 2026. No personal data, account details, or annotation content was used — only counts of which books and chapters were journaled, which translations were set up, and how often.

To keep the findings honest, we made three corrections:

• Test and internal accounts were removed before any analysis.
• The onboarding default was stripped. Digible opens new users to the first chapter of Genesis, so every user's very first annotation was excluded from the book and chapter rankings — otherwise the data would measure where the app opens, not what people choose to study.
• Stray marks were filtered out. Book and chapter rankings count only engaged journalers — users with at least five annotations across at least three distinct chapters — and chapter-level figures additionally exclude very small annotations that represent test strokes rather than real journaling.

Digible is an iPad-only app, so this data reflects the habits of people who journal Scripture digitally with Apple Pencil. It is not a claim about all Bible readers everywhere — it is a clear, honest picture of how a dedicated community of digital Bible journalers engages with Scripture.