How Does Audible Work Your Guide To Amazon Audiobooks

What Is Audible?

Audible is perhaps the most popular audiobook subscription service known today. It offers access to thousands of titles, but the service differs slightly from others. You get access to a number of audiobooks per month with your subscription instead of purchasing each book, which will be discussed in detail below. The service stands out because it also offers original content exclusively to its members. Try it now

What’s An Audiobook?

As the name suggests, an audiobook is a book in audio format. The text is narrated by a voice actor, and you can listen to it on your computer or mobile devices. In some cases, the author themselves do the reading. An example of this is Stephen King’s On Writing, which is available on Audible as well. You may be wondering why you need a subscription to listen to audiobooks. Can’t you listen to them on YouTube or other audio streaming services? You may sometimes find titles available on those platforms, but the experience is not as seamless as compared to an audiobook app. With an official subscription, you get features like the ability to bookmark pages, digitally highlight passages, and sync your titles with your Goodreads account. Listening on YouTube may also be unpleasant because you get the infamously annoying ads. Moreover, you cannot play it in the background unless you have a premium subscription. Moreover, most books found on those channels are almost always pirated so you may not get high-quality audio.

How Does Audible Work?

We mentioned that Audible works differently than most services. It’s different because you don’t necessarily get unlimited access to all the titles. You get to purchase—others say borrow—them using the “credits” that you get with your service. Fortunately, you can keep them in your library for as long as you want after the purchase. The Audible app is free to download, but you pay for the service to access the books. This begs the question if the service is even worth it. Take a look at the features and Audible mechanics listed on this Audible review below to figure it out yourself.

What Do I Need to Use Audible?

To use Audible, you would need to download and install the Audible app—it is compatible with PC, Mac, iPhone, iPad, and Android phones and tablets. You would have to download the titles that you want and store them on your device. Audible will use your device’s sound system to play the audiobook.

Audible Membership Plans

How much will Audible cost your wallet? You may choose from two membership plans that might fit your reading habits.

Plus

You get access to Audible originals including podcasts. The subscription also gives you discounts on prime audiobooks found on the Audible library. You do not get free audiobook credits. $7.95/month

Premium

This subscription gives you one monthly credit. It means you can download one title per month regardless of the book’s price and all the benefits of the Plus membership. $14.95/month Start trial

What Are Credits?

What if you want to download more titles than your credits allow per month? In that case, you can purchase more credits or you can pay for each additional audiobook at 30% off.

How Long Can I Keep My Audiobooks?

Where Can I Listen to Audible Books?

How Can I Download Audible Audiobooks?

You can access the vast array of titles including Audible originals in the Audible library.

Returning Audiobooks

You can return audiobooks that you have downloaded by mistake. It could also be that you’re just not happy with it after listening for a bit. You will get your credits back as long as you haven’t listened to the whole book and have only recently downloaded it.

Using the Audible App

So how does Audible work on computers and mobile devices? The app is very intuitive and easy to use. It has a clean interface and all functions are pretty straightforward.

Library

You can access all your titles by clicking or tapping on the Library icon. You will also see a number of tabs categorizing your books to the ones you’re currently listening to, the ones you’ve started, and titles you’ve finished.

Discover

Here, you will see recommendations of books you might like based on your reading history. This includes genres you haven’t yet explored which Audible thinks might be a good match for you.

Adjusting Playback Speed

Click on any title you’ve downloaded to begin playing the audio. You can adjust the playback speed and make it faster or slower by tapping on the Speed option on the lower left.

Chapters and Bookmarks

You can see the table of contents by clicking on the Chapters option. Click on any chapter to jump to that section at any time. To bookmark any location in the audiobook, simply tap on the plus (+) icon on the Bookmark button.

Adding Notes to Bookmarks

Another cool thing about the app is how you can add your personal notes on the locations you’ve bookmarked. Tap on Bookmarks from the dropdown menu of the upper right icon on the player screen then tap on Enter Notes.

Whispersync

This feature syncs your audiobooks across all your devices where you have the Audible app installed. This is how Audible works in terms of syncing your content. It’s called Whispersync because it automatically does it in the background. However, you can always manually sync your devices, too.

Sleep Timer

If you’re reading at bedtime, you can set a timer for your audiobook to stop playing. It’s the perfect way to relax listening to your favorite stories before going to sleep. You can set the timer from a few minutes to an hour or you can set it to sleep after the chapter you’re on.

Can I Listen to Audible on Alexa?

How does Audible work on the Alexa app? Here’s how you can do so: The next time you tell Alexa to read a book for you, it will automatically search your Audible library. By default, she will play the book you last listened to. However, you can ask her to read any book in your collection just by saying the title. You can command Alexa to change any Audible settings such as playback speed. You can also purchase titles directly using voice commands. While you cannot bookmark pages through Alexa, you can ask her to pause her reading so you can go to your app and bookmark the location.

Can I Lend My Audiobooks to Friends and Family?

You can lend your Audible books to your friends and family using the Send This Book feature. It allows them to listen to your audiobooks for free. However, they can only receive one “free listen” once. They don’t even need to have an Audible membership to borrow your audiobook!

Why Use Audible? Is It Worth It?

One of the things that discourage people from subscribing to Audible is the fact that it does not give unlimited access to audiobooks, unlike Scribd, its biggest competitor. Both require a monthly subscription, and Scribd comes at a much lower price by far. This begs the question of whether Audible worth it. One thing we will mention right off the bat is that Audible has an incredibly larger selection of books than Scribd and most any other audiobook subscription service, for that matter.

What Titles Are Available on Audible?

You will find an extensive, nearly complete collection of fiction and non-fiction books. Some categories worth mentioning that you won’t usually find in other libraries are biographies and memoirs, LGBTQ+ literature, politics, sports, and even some textbooks.

Kindle Bundles

Audio Quality

Audible’s sound quality also far exceeds its competitors. Most audiobook subscription services only feature 32kbps in audio quality while Audible features 64kbps. That is a huge difference which you will undoubtedly notice whether you are wearing headphones or listening from a Bluetooth speaker.

Lifetime Access

You may not have unlimited credits per month, but you do own your audiobooks once you’ve purchased them. As mentioned, you will have access to your books even after you’ve canceled your subscription. You will still need to use the Audible app but you don’t have to pay again to listen to the titles you’ve already purchased.

You Can Return Books You Don’t Like for a Refund

You’ve learned how Audible works when it comes to returning titles above. It doesn’t matter the reason you want to return a book. Whether it was an accidental purchase or you just don’t like the book, you can return it for a refund. You can also swap it for another title. This is applicable as long as you haven’t finished the entire book, which is only fair. You have up to a year to return a book for a refund after purchasing it.

Membership Perks

Here are some other benefits you will get with an Audible subscription.

Audible Originals Are Free

Free News Subscription

You can subscribe to almost any news publication from all around the country for free! Get the latest stories right from your Audible app.

Meditation and Fitness

You can also listen to guided meditation and fitness classes at no extra cost. Some classes are available weekly and some span a few months. You can listen to them as you please or commit to the program from start to finish.

Audible Escape and Latino

Romance book lovers will enjoy this add-on for a small extra monthly fee. Members can access up to 10 titles in addition to their purchased books. Audible Latino features audiobooks narrated in Spanish.

Canceling Your Audible Subscription

How do you cancel your Audible subscription? If you would like to cancel your membership, you can easily do so by either going to the app or the Audible website.