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Building a Second Brain is much more than just another productivity method—it's a survival guide to managing the complexities of modern life.

Chris Guillebeau

Author of The $100 Startup and The Happiness of Pursuit

Building a Second Brain was one of my favorite books of the year. It completely reshaped how I think about information and how and why I take notes.

DANIEL PINK

Bestselling author of Drive

Join the Second Brain Movement

What if you made use of the ideas, wisdom, and resources available to you online instead of stockpiling and hoarding information with no end in sight? 

What if you knew with total confidence that you could find the information you need when you need it instead of wasting time looking for notes you swore you’d saved? 

What if you could leverage technology to think better, clear your mind, and get more done instead of letting it disrupt you with constant notifications and demands? 

All this and more is possible with a Second Brain – a trusted place outside your head where you can collect and organize your most important ideas and insights and use them to do your best work.

Start Building Your Own Second Brain

And receive a FREE bonus!

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Praise From Smart People for Building a Second Brain

“Tiago has put a magnifying lens on the best practice of external capturing to keep our heads open for effective thinking and creativity. This is a well-written, cogent, and useful manual for staying clear in the knowledge-worker world.

David Allen

Author of Getting Things Done

A must-read for doing difficult, creative work. We all struggle with having too many ideas, but no system for taking action on them. Tiago creates a structure for staying on top of information in an age of overload.”

Scott H. Young

Author of Ultralearning

“Building a Second Brain will make you rethink your relationship with knowledge. Tiago's method offers a paradigm shift from the tiring quest for self-improvement to the freedom of self-expression. After reading the book, you will finally be able to focus on what matters: connecting ideas and generating insights.”

Anne-Laure Le Cunff

Founder of Ness Labs and Phd candidate

​​The Building a Second Brain system will teach you how to:

  • Find anything you’ve learned, touched, or thought about in the past within seconds
  • Organize your knowledge and use it to move your projects and goals forward consistently
  • Save your best thinking, so you don’t have to do it again
  • Spend less time looking for things and more time doing the best, most creative work you are capable of
  • Create a digital environment that promotes clarity and peace of mind
  • Turn work “off” and relax, knowing you have a trusted system keeping track of all the details

Order Building a Second Brain Here

Step 1

Order your copy of Building a Second Brain at the retailer of your choice.

US Readers

Step 2

Snap a picture of yourself with the book and share it using #BASB so I can thank you!

Step 3

Secure your bonus: The BASB Masterclass

Tiago walks you through the 12 steps to building your own Second Brain and answers the most common questions people have when they're getting started.

All you have to do is forward your receipt or proof of purchase to basbbook@fortelabs.com and we’ll send you your bonus right away.

What Readers Are Saying

Meet the Author

Hi, I’m Tiago Forte

I’ve spent more than 10 years researching and experimenting with a new way of organizing our digital lives and improving our productivity using technology.

What started as a quest to deal with a chronic illness eventually turned into a life-long mission to help you harness the full potential of your ideas and turn them into reality. I firmly believe this is a crucial part of creating a better future for all of us.

Over the years, I’ve taught thousands of people around the world how to clear the mental clutter, organize their knowledge, and capitalize on the full potential of their thinking through my popular online course Building a Second Brain.

Teaching my methodology live in 16 cohorts with over 6,000 students allowed me to rapidly improve every part of it and make sure it works for a wide range of people.

Now, you can access the Building a Second Brain system in its most succinct and distilled form: a bestselling book available everywhere books are sold.

I can’t wait to share it with you!

Based on Tiago’s work with the following organizations and over 25,000 online learners

“Tiago is a master organizer. His book, Building a Second Brain, is the ultimate guide for anybody who wants to succeed in the Internet age. It’s the single best system I can recommend to any writer. You’ll leave feeling calmer, more creative, and much more productive.”

David Perell

Founder of Write of Passage

“Reading this book feels like being let in on a secret. Tiago offers powerful, elegant, and deeply human solutions to some of the most stubborn challenges we face trying to make sense of the digital age. An absolute must read for anyone interested in personal knowledge management.”

Ryder Caroll

Author of The Bullet Journal Method

“Getting more out of our digital tools is something we should all care about. Tiago offers an excellent guide – this book will help anyone organize information in more useful ways, and ultimately do better work.

Simon Last

Co-Founder of Notion

International Editions

Other Languages

Building a Second Brain is or will be available in the following languages. If there’s no purchasing link listed yet, the translation is still in progress. 

Print
Ebook
Audio

Arabic

Chinese
(Traditional)

Chinese
(Simplified)

Estonian

French

German

Indonesian

Mongolian

Portuguese (Brazil)

Portuguese (Portugal)

Thai

Turkish

Vietnamese

Who Should Read Building a Second Brain?

The answer is: Anyone who wants to succeed in our modern, hyper-connected world.

Our digital lives are expanding exponentially. Your profession and even your side projects and hobbies require you to consume and understand more information than ever. 

The bad news is: It’s only going to get more demanding. 

The most important factors for success are no longer how many hours you work, how much effort you exert, or where you are located. What matters now is what you know, how well you document and organize that knowledge, and your ability to share it with others.

The good news is: You can leverage technology to capitalize on the full value of your ideas and knowledge

Personal Knowledge Management has become an essential survival skill for everyone navigating the modern world.

You can’t afford to burden your biological brain with trivial details that don’t ultimately give you the life you want. It’s time to build a Second Brain and take hold of the potential you know you are capable of.

“The passion economy is one of the next great waves of entrepreneurship in the world, and the ability to cultivate and leverage your personal knowledge is key to being part of it. Tiago’s book is an excellent introduction to how to succeed in the new landscape of creativity online.”

Li Jin

Co-Founder and General Partner at Variant

"Tiago's changed the game with this book. Building a Second Brain completely changed my life and the book is a great distillation of the key ideas."

Ali Abdaal

YouTuber and Entrepreneur

“Relying on your brain alone will be a thing of the past! Tiago presents a new way of thinking in this new age productivity classic.”

Francesco D'Alessio

Host of Keep Productive

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FAQs

Is Building a Second Brain available in other languages?

Yes! You can find all translations as well as links to purchase them here.

How can I buy multiple copies of the book for my book club/organization/school?

We recommend Porchlight for bulk orders, since they offer discounts starting at 20% off on all orders.

Also, Porchlight offers a variety of individual fulfillment services to help teams and organizations distribute multiple books without having to handle or ship them. For example:

• Custom landing pages with a unique URL you can share with your employees or event attendees, where they can submit their shipping information privately and securely
• Domestic and international shipping options (which you can pre-pay, or ask recipients to pay)
• Customized deliveries (stickers, bookmarks, personalized messages, etc.) with your own company or event branding
• Invoicing and Purchase Orders if needed by purchasing departments

If you’d like to order multiple copies of the hardcover but don’t want the physical books, please email us at support@fortelabs.com for suggestions on how to donate them to a school, library, or other worthy cause.

Why should you consider buying multiple copies of this book?

If you’re wondering what you’re going to do with multiple copies of a book, here are some ideas for how you can use them:

• As gifts for people you care about, such as on birthdays and holidays
• Host a book club with your friends, neighbors, or coworkers
• Give them to your team or department for their professional development
• Give them to the attendees of a conference, summit, or retreat you’re organizing
• Provide them as giveaways to your community, event, or social media followers
• Gift them to your clients and customers as a thank you for their support
• Donate to a library, youth center, church, or non-profit (with a potential tax deduction)

As you can see, there are countless ways you can use multiple copies of a book like this one. It will train you in new ways of learning, working, and creating, but those changes are most powerful and sustainable when you bring others along on your journey.

Can I make bulk orders of the ebook edition?

Yes, Amazon US now offers the option to buy multiple ebooks as a gift or purchase them for a team or group. Look for the option “Buy for others” on the right side of this page (affiliate link).

What should I do if I have other questions?

Please email support@fortelabs.com with any questions not answered here.

"Our lives are getting busier and busier, and what we really need is a simple system that works to organize it. Thankfully, Building a Second Brain is exactly that, and with it, you'll be able to unlock more in your life: more time, and more creativity!"

Pat Flynn

Founder of Smart Passive Income and host of the SPI Podcast

“In a world of so much information and more coming – we need a process for organizing and accessing that information. Luckily, Tiago has done all the hard work and gives tactical ways to make it happen.

Noah Kagan

Founder of AppSumo

“I've already begun adopting his system and it is the one I plan to recommend to anyone -- student, writer, digital marketer, business owner, etc. -- who needs their own personal "knowledge vault" to track and synthesize lots of disparate pieces of information.”

Jill Hendrix

Fiction Addiction

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