You Still Have Your Pocket Export. Here's What to Do With It

If you downloaded a Pocket export before the service closed, you are holding the only copy of years of saved links. The file does nothing on its own, though. This guide explains what happened to Pocket, how to check and protect your export, and how to import it into a new tool without losing tags or your unread pile.

What happened to Pocket

Pocket shut down on July 8, 2025, and exports were available until October 8, 2025 (TechCrunch). Both dates have passed as of this writing (October 2026). If you never downloaded your data, check Mozilla's Pocket support pages for anything still available. If you did download it, the rest of this guide applies to you. For a comparison of the apps people moved to, see Pocket alternatives.

Step 1: Find your Pocket export and back it up

1. Locate the export. Look in your Downloads folder, old email attachments and cloud drives.
2. Copy it to at least two places, such as a cloud drive and an external disk.
3. Do not rename the extension, and do not open and re-save it in a spreadsheet app. Saving over a CSV can change encoding and break non-English characters.

Work on a copy from now on. Keep the original untouched.

Step 2: Look inside before importing

What you have depends on what you downloaded. Different importers expect different Pocket files. For example, Raindrop.io's import documentation tells Pocket users to export as an HTML file (Raindrop.io Help). NestMarks imports Pocket's CSV export, not the Pocket HTML file.

Check what you have:

1. If the file ends in .csv, open a copy in a spreadsheet or text editor.
2. Look for columns holding the URL, the title, any tags, and a status that separates read items from unread ones. Column names can vary, so look for the meaning rather than the exact label.
3. Count the rows. That is roughly how many items you saved.
4. If you only have an HTML file, NestMarks cannot import it. Some other tools, such as Raindrop.io, take it, and you can also open the file in a browser to see all your links as a plain list.

Step 3: Pick where to put it

The right destination depends on what you used Pocket for. A reading app suits offline copies of articles (the alternatives guide above compares them). A bookmark manager suits tags, search and a place for the whole pile. A plain CSV in cloud storage suits a record you may never open.

Be realistic about the backlog. If your Pocket had thousands of unread items, the issue was never the app. The habits that stop a new queue filling up are in a read-later workflow that does not turn into a graveyard.

Step 4: Import the CSV into NestMarks

NestMarks is a hosted bookmark manager that imports the Pocket CSV. Unread items go to the Read later list, and your tags are kept.

1. Create a free account and sign in to the web app.
2. Open Import/Export in the app.
3. Choose the Pocket option and select your CSV file.
4. Review the import preview. It shows counts, duplicates skipped and invalid rows.
5. Confirm the import.
6. Open the Read later list and your tags to check what arrived.

Limits: up to 20,000 rows per file, and 50,000 bookmarks per account (fair use). If your file is larger than 20,000 rows, split the CSV into parts and import each separately. Keep the header row in every part.

What you can expect afterward

• Search covers titles, descriptions, URLs and your notes in one box.
• Filters let you narrow by tag, domain, type (article, video, image, PDF, other) or date range.
• A duplicate finder groups repeated links, and a broken-link check looks for dead pages. Old Pocket items are often dead links, so run it.
• The Read later list can have an optional cap, which helps keep it from growing without limit.

What you will not get: NestMarks on the free plan does not keep saved copies of pages or a reader view, and it has no iOS app. If offline reading of full articles is the point, a dedicated reader app may suit you better.

Step 5: Clean up the pile

After importing, spend one session on triage rather than trying to read everything.

1. Open Read later and sort newest first.
2. Delete anything you no longer care about. Deleting a single bookmark is permanent after a short Undo, so be sure.
3. Tag keepers by topic. Short, plain tags beat clever ones.
4. Put reference material in collections. NestMarks collections nest, and deleting a collection sends it and its contents to a 30-day trash.

For a structure that scales, read how to organize bookmarks. If you are moving other collections too, moving bookmarks between browsers and apps covers the general process.

If your export does not import

• Wrong file type. Make sure the importer you chose matches the file. A CSV will not load in an HTML-only importer, and the reverse is also true.
• Garbled characters. You may have re-saved the file. Go back to the original copy.
• Fewer items than expected. Importers skip duplicates and invalid URLs. A small gap is normal.
• Everything missing. Check that you picked the right file and that it is not empty.

If you want your old Pocket links somewhere searchable, you can start a free NestMarks library and import the CSV from Import/Export in the app.

How to avoid this problem next time

Pocket's closing is a reminder that any hosted tool can change or disappear. A few habits make the next move painless.

1. Pick tools with a real export. Check the export options before you commit your library, not after.
2. Export on a schedule. Every few months, download a file and store it with the date in the name.
3. Test the export. Import it into a throwaway account once, so you know it works.
4. Keep the file format boring. HTML and CSV open almost anywhere and will still open in ten years.

NestMarks follows the same rule for its own data: bookmarks export as browser-compatible HTML, for the whole library or a selection, and exports are not paywalled. Notes, highlights and links can be exported as JSON or Markdown.

Frequently asked questions

Can I still export from Pocket?

Pocket shut down on July 8, 2025, and exports were available until October 8, 2025. That date has passed, so only a file you downloaded earlier is useful now.

What format is a Pocket export?

It depends on the file you downloaded; Raindrop.io's documentation refers to an HTML file. NestMarks imports the Pocket CSV and does not import the Pocket HTML file.

Will my tags survive the import?

In NestMarks, yes: tags in the Pocket CSV are kept, and unread items go to the Read later list. Other tools handle tags differently, so check each importer's notes.

Is there a size limit?

NestMarks accepts up to 20,000 rows per file and 50,000 bookmarks per account under fair use. Split larger CSV files into parts.

Sources

• Read-later app Pocket is shutting down, here are the best alternatives, TechCrunch
• Import, Raindrop.io Help