Transferring PDFs from iBooks to your laptop/desktop

Question

There are a lot of tutorials on how to load PDFs into iBooks, but none say how to backup or transfer them back to your computer. I understand there is a button to email them, but I probably have accumulated 100 or so useful pdfs on my iPhone. Is there any safe reliable (hopefully native) way to do this. I do not want to risk losing them. I'm using iCloud, does that back them up as well? Either way I would like to have an extra copy of them on my hard drive.

EDIT: I think if I click sync books, it will erase everything I have on my iPhone and only use what's on my computer the first time I do it right? I have never synced it before loading the books.

EDIT: I have never had them on my laptop, I got the into iBook by downloading them directly from safari into the app.

Thanks :-)

Answer 1

Grab a copy of iExplorer (freeware), connect your phone, open iExplorer, select your device, and navigate to Media > Books. All your PDFs should be there.
However they all have cryptic names and there's no QuickLook in iExplorer, so you need to copy them all and then look which ones you need.

Answer 2

Even though you've already solved it, I transfer in between my iPad/iPhone with Dropbox. I usually buy a lot of books on my iMac that are epub or pdf that aren't in iBooks, so the quickest way to transfer them and keep them backed up is in my dropbox. When you install the app on your phone, you can navigate to a book and select "Open in iBooks". It's a really handy way to transfer things in between the devices.

Answer 3

I'm using Adobe Reader as a way to store and transfer PDFs through iTunes.

Answer 4

Why not select share from the document in iBooks, then send it to yourself by email, then the attachment can be downloaded onto any computer from your email?

Answer 5

The way Apple support told me to transfer PDF's to my iPad is to transfer them into iBooks. Click on Books menu in the library section of iTunes then select the File, Add File to Library, navigate to the PDF file you want to sync to your iPad, then after selecting the file , click on your iPad device menu bar command and finally click on the sync botton. This has been working fine except for a couple of the most recent PDF files which are showing up as blank pages in iTunes on the PC.
Related Guides:
How to transfer iBooks from iPhone to Computer
How to transfer ePub/PDF books to iPhone on Mac

Hope that help you a big favor.

Answer 6

None of the suggestions help if you downloaded a file directly from the internet (say ORielly Books, or Safari Books), directly into iBooks. You can't get anything out of iBooks into Dropbox, or your computer, without shelling out additional $$$$.