Chatbooks Family Photo Albums Reviews

by Apple Tree Wanna Be

I’ve been meaning to print pictures for over a year and heard about how easy Chatbooks was to use. Downloaded it and with some monkeying are figured it out. Did a monthly subscription, after editing something like 8 volumes ordered my first volume. Then decided on bonus prints. The first book came and I was a bit disappointed with the pages not being glossy photo paper, but okay. I had taken some new photos and popped open ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums to add captions. The printed volume was completely messed up even though it was locked. The rest of the volumes were now screwed up too. The support people were able to somewhat fix the locked volume to push the pictures I had not printed back so I could have them in volume 2 but, I had to re-edit EVERYTHING. Ordered volume 2 after hours of re-editing. The prints from volume 1 arrived the other day and again, not on photo paper. Even worse....not the ones I picked! So, now a couple days later, I open ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums to once again find everything MESSED UP!! I refuse to continually re-edit my books it takes the joy out of looking at the photos of my precious babies photos. Sigh, I guess I’ll move on to another service/app. I doubt Chatbooks would refund my money either. 😡

by Jakemurray83

My order is a week late and the tracking info (provided by chatbooks), says it started in Miami and ended up in Utah. I’m in Fort Lauderdale, 30 mins north of Miami. I messaged support to ask and they said my item didn’t come with tracking. So obviously I asked how I’m being provided tracking info that says it’s in Utah, if it can’t be tracked. They’re response was that SOMETIMES it does come with tracking, but the tracking is incorrect on USPS part. I’ve asked several times to give me the tracking number so I can look into it myself, and they ignore everytime. They told me to wait until 12/31 to ask them to look into it for me. That’s 3 weeks after I ordered, 2 weeks after they said it’d be here, and a week after xmas (it was supposed to be a gift)…before they will even look into it! Wish I could add screenshots of the weird conversation. Anyways…. If you download ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums , definetly dont order any of the products. If you do, don’t believe the fake tracking. They will never provide an actual tracking number, and they won’t take 2 seconds to track it for you unless it’s already 2 weeks late! Bad biz.

by AK_LANY

I just received my 1st book I ordered last week. Quality’s not bad. There are definitely quite a few improvements that are needed on ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums . 1st as you allow access to your phone images, it selects the year you’d like to select images from and it goes to the beginning of the year without allowing you to select your most recent pictures, if you wanted. You literally have to scroll through an entire year to get to what you’re looking for. So annoying!!!! Also, now that I received the book, I’d like to request new copied for other family members with a few modifications. However I can’t find an option to copy the book and make the changes I want. I just emailed the support team. I truly hope they’ll help me make this easy...
lastly, I received an email from the CEO regarding security breach on May 5. I also received another email stating there was an issue with my credit card and I should use the link in that email to update my CC#. But when I go to ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums to view & update my CC, it’s not even showing me my payment method. I get a blank page. I’m already frustrated. It also takes a long time to view other pages under my profile, order history, etc. I feel like I’m in early 90s, using a dial-up service while I’m on ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums. (And I know it’s not my internet service because I just checked on a few of my other apps).

by ShaylaRae4

I’ve been using Chatbooks for 5 years now. The concept is very cool and simple. The books themselves are cute and are becoming better quality. At first I had wished the photos were better quality, but with the most recent book I received I was actually impressed with the improvement they’ve had. The text is small. They’ve made improvements but it still seems there’s plenty of room on the page to make the text bigger and/or allow more text. The But what I really want to review is ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums . ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums is the most frustrating app to use. I’ve never used an app that has as many bugs/glitches as this one does. And this has been constant over the last 5 years. You’d think they’d be able to get it together. Just weird things will happen like I can’t manually sort my pictures how I want, or new pictures are being added to a previous, locked, book. Or the captions say they’re within the allotted space, but then when I save it, it goes to a caption page. Their customer support is easy to contact and always try to help, but they often don’t know why it does it either. They’ll say things like ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums is “being glitchy right now” except it’s been 10 months with many app updates and ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums is STILL doing the same thing. They need new app developers or something.

by Rachi H

Working with customer service on an issues with selecting a filter, undoing the filter and selecting a different filter. It either lets you have no filter or the original filter selected. Customer service first tried to say “unfortunately there is no ‘undo’ button with the photos edits. So within ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums once a selection is made it sticks unless the photo is re-added.” I am editing 100 photos in the book that were manually selected from 400 wedding photos, so I will not be deleting photos to then find and re-add. Then I also pointed out to them that “there is an option that says ‘undo last edits’. It goes back to normal at that point. Then when you go back in to select a different filter the old one sticks. So there is a button, it’s just not working.” They responded with “yes I’m seeing that option as well, can I get back to you via email?” So, it is very time consuming adjusting filters. If only one can ever be selected then there should be the ability to select all photos and edit with the same filter. Instead you have to go in each photo one by one to change the filter. It makes no sense that you can’t try out a filter to see if it goes well. Waiting for their response to see how they will be fixing this issue. Will update rating when there is a fix!

by Wifiepoo

I was given a coupon for a "free book" and worked on making it for hours. Then when it was time to order, I found out the coupon wasn't good for just one book, I had to start a subscription. I just want one to see if I like it first! Then when trying to make my free subscription book, I'm trying to add just one more picture and instead of adding that picture, it is adding multiples of other pictures I already have in the book. I have done everything I can think of. I restarted ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums , I resigned in, I updated ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums ... I cannot get it to add that ONE picture from ANY of my means of getting pictures (instagram, Facebook, my photos...). I've been working on trying to get these photos added that I want for almost an hour now. I thought this was supposed to be EASY!!! It's NOT!!! I have 2 young kids. If I wanted to spend this much time on a photo book, I'd order one through Shutterfly, at least I already KNOW they have good quality. I'm so upset about this.

Edit: I finally got my book. The quality is good.

by Tempglitter

I love the product and affordability of the books. I love that ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums reminds me to make them and shipping is typically very quick. However, making my last 3 month books has been quite a trial. I often have ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums select photos for me, but do make some edits. This process has been a nightmare. I will go though and select my photos and go to put the final touches on the book and it hasn’t saved. After several attempts, I finally deleted the pictures I didn’t want, made sure it saved, and then closed ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums and reopened to add the photos I did want. I have also had problems with 2-photo displays where the second photo does not load. I have tried both on WiFi and on data. I have deleted ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums and reinstalled. I have ensured I have the most current version. These glitches have taken what used to be a couple minute process once a month and made it take several hours at times to edit my month books. Pretty disappointed.

by HJB41292787

I love ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums! My oldest is now 5 and I hadn’t printed a single picture since before her birth. I’ve been meaning to take some time and make photo albums to get pictures off of my phone. I initially tried Shutterfly but it was tedious, my pictures uploaded completely out of order, and it was taking too much time to put together. Chatbooks has made accessing 5+ years worth of pictures simple. I made my first album for my oldest daughter’s 1st year. I was super impressed with the quality of the hardback book and the photos! I ordered the same for my son immediately and started working on one for my youngest. Now I need to make “yearbooks”! My only “complaint” is that I wish there were more collage configurations! Please, please, please add more options! For example, I wish I could do 3 photos in a row and also the set up where it’s 1 vertical on the left and 2 squares on the right- I wish there was a reversed option! I had so many photos that I used a lot of collages and more options would have been nice. Because of the collages, I also lost the ability to add captions. I didn’t want to waste an entire page on one caption so I wish I could add text to the same page as a collage.

by 11112337443115674211

I really loved my first chatbook, so I decided to go with it for a long time. But I’m extremely disappointed in my 2nd experience. I completed 2 volumes and ordered them, they were locked after that. Then I worked on my 3rd and 4th volumes, I used the drag and drop function, I accidentally dropped the photos into my locked volume, but I can't move them out, because it was locked(if it is locked, I’m not supposed be able to drop photos in there). I thought the finished volumes were messed up, so I decided to delete the volume, but ended up the whole series were deleted, and I got an email said that my order was canceled. But they still charged my credit card, so I contacted the customer service, they told me that my canceled orders are still printing. I’d rather they whole thing be canceled than having a messed up series. The books were shipped anyway before the problems are solved, I will not know if the prints are right until I get them next week.

Update: The prints turned out to be right, customer service is following up with me. I have to admit that I love the style and print quality.

by 287kimberly

Edit 2: Instagram glitch has been fixed. Ordered and received a new book. It is fantastic! I will definitely be using Chatbooks again.

Ease of use is fantastic. Finished product is also very well done. I was very happy until I saw that several pics were duplicated and others not printed at all. There is a glitch with Instagram Slideshow. I contacted Chatbooks. Customer service is very nice, and seemingly helpful. I was instructed to delete the duplicated pics, and add them again from a different source. I was assured this would fix the problem. I did as instructed. Book was re-printed and sent to me, only to discover the SAME thing happened again. This time they want me to email the pics to them as well as tell them where they are supposed to be placed in the book. This process takes the EASE, out of this whole APP. I would have had less trouble making a photo book on another site, and those are pains to deal with as well.
So, I’ve asked for a refund, and when they fix their glitch I’ll try them again.

Edit 1- I have received a message from Yvonne @ Chatbooks. Not only have I been refunded for my 2 incorrect printings, I have been given a credit so that my next Chatbooks will be free.
I’m raising to 3 stars as their customer service really is good. They have all been very friendly and tried to help. When they have the Instagram glitch fixed, I will definitely be ordering again.

by #Nirvana

When I first learned about chatbooks I thought, “What a perfect and easy option (so long as you have a phone to do it with)! Oh the technology & options we have these days 😊”.
Being a parent and childcare provider, I’m always taking photos. But specifically finding the time to go through and organize & turn into a viewing option (instead of them getting lost through the years...), you can throw them-labeled or not, your preference-in a book that is easy to detail, affordable & quick to receive. Even being able to send to family & friends far away. BONUS!!! (You’re welcome Gramma & Mother-in-Law 😘).
I’m glad I know about Chatbooks...because I USE IT 😁 & recommend it! Thanks for being available and keep doing what you do & keep improving where you learn you need it. Oh, and their customer service is prompt, reliable & awesome. Ok, I think I’m done....
Happy Chatbooking!

by Mmvmmvmmvmmvmmv

I discovered Chatbooks through Tiny Beans, was a little skeptical of the referral but the online reviews were great. I do monthly picture books for our son and it has been the best experience. I feel like we really are capturing his life in a way we can easily store and share. I also used ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums for photobook gifts for grandparents- huge hit. The simplicity of the offering makes it. Other photo apps have too many options and are used for so many purposes- it makes it hard to edit or just make the memory books. Less is definitely more on this. The interface is great, quality of items is great, the shipping is very quick. Customer service is also outstanding for any issues. I highly highly recommend this for families looking to take photos out of phones in an easy and thoughtful way.

by Kiltan

I decided to try out Chatbooks after hearing that they now can import from Tinybeans. Tinybeans has limitations with their photo books, specifically their caption lengths. I love that Chatbooks allows the whole caption to be there. The only issue is that the photos are imported as squares and aren’t always cropped how I would want them. But since the photos are still on my camera roll, I can just replace the image with the original.
Tinybeans has been great for getting pictures out to my family and friends. However, my grandma is not tech savvy and email frustrates her. She has a friend that is good with facebook, but I don’t post much there. She has been asking for us to send her more photos, but with an infant, who has time for that? I like that you can have a subscription with manual input. Chatbooks keeps tracks of which photos on your camera roll are new and makes it really easy to add these to your subscription photo book. This way I know when I fill a book and don’t need to edit since I already picked which photos to include. My grandma just got her first set of books and she loves them. Now she will keep getting pictures, without the frustration of technology, and I don’t need to put much effort in to send them.

by NaNa Whip

I did so much research trying to figure out which company to go with for photo books. I finally decided on chatbooks after trying out several other apps that were difficult to use. Chatbooks has made their app easy to use. You can make collages and move pages around quickly. I also love that you can copy pages or the whole book into another one!! Perfect when creating specialized books for different family members.

I ordered my first two books and loved both of them! The quality of the pictures and pages is amazing. I really love all of the designer covers, especially when you can wrap them around the spine and back! Best of all though, is their customer service. I made a small mistake with one, and they were very gracious and had it reprinted even though it was totally my fault.

So in short, go with chatbooks. You won’t be disappointed with the quality and they have great customer service!

by Owen Video

UPDATED: Wish I could review it again and again. In this modern era of digital sharing we’re actively LOSING our memories by not printing them. Not anymore. Thanks Chatbooks! Fan for life.

ORIGINAL: Instagram pictures are so low resolution that they were never meant to be printed. However, many of us use it to capture cherished moments that we would like to keep. Aside from seeing them once a year on timehop, I wanted to see them printed. Chatbooks is the best option for that. The ease of use of ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums , coupled with the ability to get all your old pictures as well as current ones, makes it a great option. The only reason I gave it four and not five stars is because Instagram pictures were never meant to be printed, and the quality of each print is very bad. That being said, it is as good as you could get it, so if you, like me, are bound and determined to print your Instagram feed then ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums is the absolute best way to do it. And I will continue to use Chatbooks to preserve my memories in print. Thanks Chatbooks!

by Smcninja

I downloaded ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums because they advertised that they sell peel and stick canvases and their reviews were better than Mixtiles. When I tried to purchase it kept telling me I had an invalid shipping address. I double checked three times. I get things shipped to my house constantly and the address was entered correctly.

Prior to checkout, I also tried to create a photo book. I was promised this would be easy and only take about 5 minutes. I was prompted to pick out all the picture I wanted. It said I could choose over 300! I ended up at about 150 pictures. After automatically putting each picture on a separate page they wanted to charge me $90 for the book - I’m not paying that but no big deal, I want fewer pages with more pictures per page anyway. To add multiple pictures to one page I have to create a new page and then fish the pictures out of my camera roll again, then delete the separate pages I no longer want. What a slow and tedious process!

Tl;dr: This was way too much work and then it bugged out at the last minute and wouldn’t complete the purchase.

by Sarah From Colorado

I just want to say what a pleasure it has been to use Chatbooks. It is my first time using your service. I created a book for my parents as a Christmas gift, recording our vacation together this past fall. We live far apart and wish we could be together during the holidays.
I thought I didn't get it finished in time for Christmas. The original estimated date of delivery was Jan 3rd. Then I got an email letting me know it had shipped and they would get the book by December 31st. But I got a call from my parents today (Christmas Eve). They were so delighted and overcome with the beautiful book and the memories it held. Thank you for the beauty of the product. AND thank you for the folks that undoubtedly worked so hard to rush orders for Christmas. I was satisfied with the original date since I knew it was my own fault I had not gotten it finished and ordered in time. But you all pulled out all the stops for your customers for Christmas! My parents loved it so much it brought happy tears. Thank you for this Christmas gift. Please pass on my gratitude to those that worked so hard to accomplish this at such a busy time of year! Thank you! Thank you! Merry Christmas!

by Dd0986

I ordered a book for my wife for Christmas. I was so excited for her to see it. I quickly put it together and paid extra to ensure it made it on time. It originally was estimated to arrive on Dec 20 but did not come. I checked everyday and it kept getting pushed back further and further. Unfortunately it did not make it for Christmas. I was pretty bummed. Chatbooks sent me an email to rate my experience. Before even seeing the book, I gave them a low number and mentioned that I didn’t receive the book on time even though I had paid extra to have it here before Christmas.

Today, the day after Christmas, the book finally arrived and my wife cried. It’s an amazing product and I was impressed with the print quality. Soon after I received an email from Chatbooks apologizing that the book didn’t make it before Christmas. They took full responsibility and refunded my extra shipping cost and gave me a credit on my account. It’s no nice to see that they care for their customers and try to make it right.

Because of that, I will continue to use Chatbooks in the future and look forward to getting our next photo book down.

by MrsSullivan0819

I have loved ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums up until now. Never had any real issues. I just recently went on a trip to Disneyland and have 60+ photos that need to sync and have captions added. ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums hasn't been working properly for 4 days now. I like to add captions the same day so I remember what was happening in the picture and funny things that were said/happened. I now have to wait until they all sync and add the captions in all at once. Not looking forward to doing this for over 60 pictures when I could have been doing them each day to stay on top of it. REALLY frustrating.

*Update 9/2: was told ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums was up and running and mine still is not working and not syncing photos. Tried logging out and logging back in, deleting and reinstalling ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums and nothing. Going on 5 days now.

*Update 9/9: I updated my review to a 4 star, purely because of Jody in customer service. If ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums was working it would be 5 star. I have been dealing with this issue for almost 10 days, and Jody has been amazing the entire time. I LOVED ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums before the glitch happened and am bummed out that it's still not working but I'm at least extremely happy with their customer service.

by AGonsowski725

I have been using Chatbooks for my pregnancy journey and now for my son. I have printed a book for my baby shower, for my pregnancy, anemone for my sons 1st and 2nd month. It has been an amazing way to document everything and I simply take a few minutes in the evenings to upload new photos to a draft of a new book, add captions, and the book is ready at the end of that month. I also want to mention that customer service is amazing and get back to you very quickly. I wanted to change a photo after submitting my order and they got back to me quickly and unlocked the book for me. Unfortunately, we had an emergency and I wasn’t able to get the fixes completed, but that isn’t their fault and they kept reaching out to help me make the book perfect. I can’t say enough about this service! I will continue to use it for my monthly books and will probably change over from a different service for my yearly books! Highly recommend!

by Shaygotcha

1st I would like to say ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums is great easy to use and takes just moments to make a book. I loved the idea of ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums. So it took almost 3 weeks for the book to arrive. That’s ok I picked free snail mail. So today I open my mail box and there it is. So excited then I touch it.... oh gosh it is wet and muddy . But I think surely they mail it in something that is water proof. NOPE. I open it ... and the book wrinkled and wurped from being wet ..and pages wee discoloration red from being wet.. which I guess is the post mans fault but still if the package gets wet at all the book is ruined Bc the way they ship them. Love the size of the boook .. not to gig not to small. Now let’s talk about picture quality .... not so good. The pictures I choose were from a photographer we paid for while we were on vacation TOP QUALITY... but in the book they are grainy and dark colors... for 6 bucks I guess You get what u pay for.. I may try Shutterfly next and pay more and see if I get better shipping and print quality... sorry Chatbooks I wanted to love you soooo bad!

by Seggyrofl

I ordered a hardcover large book to cover the first 6 months of my daughter’s life. I wanted one to keep and one for my parents and one for my husband’s parents. I ordered one to start with as I hadn’t ordered before and wanted to make sure I liked the quality. I used ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums and found it pretty user friendly.

I received the book and really liked how it came out. I decided to go ahead and order 2 more but wanted to change the cite design on the cover. In ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums I had trouble. My book I had ordered wasn’t saved under my books and the only way I could see it was as a prior order. However, I couldn’t edit it at all. I texted support which it said usually responded with in minutes (it was during the day on a weekday.) After a few hours with no response I played with ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums more and figured out how to copy my book and then edit it. I did so and changed the cover design and ordered 2 more books. The next day customer service got back to me which is not an unreasonable response time except that it was supposed to be much sooner.

Fast forward to receiving my books today which were supposed to be gifts. The title on the outside literally says “Copy of *the book’s title”

Upon going into ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums I accept that this is my fault for not noticing but I do think this is a design flaw. The working name of a book is one thing but then changing the text of what’s to be printed to that same name is stupid. I’ve now wasted well over $100.

by Michael's Fancy New Imac

Chatbooks has been amazing for the past two years that I have been using ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums . I love each and every book that I have been able to create using Chatbooks, and have loved my subscription books that I linked to my Instagram account. I was very excited about the new update and being able to use the new Roxy Technology to automatically build my albums from my camera roll. I couldn't get the update to work though. None of the messages I was sending to customer service through ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums or being answered either. I finally love chatted with someone on their website to try to solve the problem, and discovered that I need to have the latest iOS update to make it work. I have been avoiding iOS updates due to the battery problems they cause. When I went to update my Chatbooks app, the details state that only iOS 10 is required, so I thought it would be fine. I'm pretty bummed that it won't work unless I update to the latest iOS. I'm trying to decide right now if it's worth it or not. I love Chatbooks, but I might need to find another option now. 😭 Once I was able to connect with Chatbooks customer service, they were extremely helpful. ** Chatbooks should update their information to note that the latest iOS update as necessary to make ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums work properly. **

by S-titti

I almost feel bad taking a star off, because I cannot day enough wonderful things about how wonderful ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums is.. however, some of the parts of making the book I feel could be made easier.
I always forget where to find the edit function to put a title on the cover. And every time I need to add pictures from Instagram (if I don’t do it all in one go)it has to load all of them, which it does quickly, but still it seems like they should stay loaded somehow.
That being said I have made custom books for each of my kids birthdays and in 6month increments for my baby.. and I literally make them while I am nursing her to sleep. My one year old is OBSESSED with these books and I even made her a little flip book that she looks at over and over with pictures of relatives and herself!
What a great system this is. I am so happy to be a chatbooks customer!

by Mrsscott54

I LOVE ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums!! It's the best app ever! Just finished another Chatbook! I can't thank Chatbooks enough for what you all have done by creating such a cool app! I'm a caregiver for my mom who has Alzheimer's. I truly enjoy storing all of our good times together in our own Memory Books! Sadly, due to this ugly disease, each precious memory we make together is stolen from my mom as she forgets after only 10 seconds. 🙁. Now, because of how easily you have made it for me to store all of our beautiful memories in each Chatbook I create, mom is able to retrieve them anytime! Thank you for making this possible!! I will continue to make these beautiful books for my mom, so that she will be able to keep all of her lovely memories, close to her heart! Thank you, I will treasure these books of mom's memories for a lifetime! ❤️❌⭕️❌⭕️❤️

by Kymy12

Let me just start by saying ChatbooksFamilyPhotoAlbums is very straight forward and user friendly. It’s not hard to navigate and I’m able to add or take away pictures from my books easily. And I say this because good customer service is hard to find, but amazing customer service is rare. I’ve used Chatbooks for awhile now and my first encounter with their staff was because a picture had been put in my book twice. They allowed me to change it prior to sending no problem. And my last two encounters were because I had ordered a book and changed my address too late on accident. The book had been sent to my old address, and never sent back. They sent me one (after waiting the proper amount of time for the first to possibly find its way to me) for no charge! I 🧡 Chatbooks!!

by Dolly972

Chatbooks meets a need in a wonderful way. My mom is 92 and is no longer using technology. I live 1700 miles from her and was sad I could’t email her pics. I have a crazy busy work and fam life and never seemed to get pics printed and snail-mailed. Then I tried Chatbooks and it has been such a joy for both of us! I have done 4 now - some with family pics, one an album of a special trip she and I went on years ago. I have them mailed directly to her. I talk to her on the phone every night and the joy she gets when a green envelope arrives is amazing. I look at the album on my phone as she pages through and we discuss the pics. She shares them with visiting family which is nice.

I wouldn’t say the pics are super high quality but they certainly meet the need. And the price is fantastic. I absolutely LOVE Chatbooks.

by J. Grimm

I’m still in the process of creating my first book, so my experience is based on this. I choose to use my Instagram acct and it pulls the pics, text, and dates then lays them out for editing and removing any you choose. It also allows adding another contributor which is great for creating collaborations.

I was also looking to create a gift book of pet pics for a friend and used the contact button in-app to ask if it was possible to import a friend’s instagram account. It is not possible as is is a privacy issue. You can only use your own Instagram acct. but you can import any pics from your device to create a book. The CS response was nearly instantaneous, and down to earth, even offering condolences for my friend’s pet passing away.