If you’re looking for some fantastic new books to read and you’re an Amazon Prime subscriber, you’ll probably want to learn how to borrow books from Prime.
Amazon offers a Prime Reading benefit to its members, and best of all it’s completely included in your Amazon Prime membership so you should be making the most of it.
What is Prime Reading?
Prime Reading allows you to read titles free. It offers over 1,000 books and magazines for you to enjoy.
If that sounds good to you, you’ll probably want to know more about Prime Reading. Here’s how to get started with it and return to your reading addiction.
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How Do You Set Up Prime Reading?
To get started with Prime Reading, you will need to log into your Amazon account.
Make sure you have an up-to-date Prime membership. Then, go to the Amazon Prime Reading page so you can start browsing book titles that are available.
When you find a book that you want to read, you must click the “Read for free” option and then the item will be downloaded to your device. You can also click “Read and listen for free” if the title you’re interested in has an audible option.
You will be spoiled for choice because there are tons of different reading materials you can access. These include popular fiction, nonfiction, children’s books, literary classics, magazines, comic books, and Kindle Singles.
If you’re completely new to Amazon Prime, you might not know how to go about searching for new books. There are two easy ways in which you can easily find new books to read.
- The first method involves going to the Prime Reading website or clicking on the Prime Reading tab at the top of the Amazon page. You’ll be able to view the catalog of books that’s on offer. Once you’ve found a book you want to explore, simply look for the Prime logo. You’ll also see that you have to pay $0 for the book, which confirms that it’s a Prime book.
- Your second option is to search in the Kindle store the way you usually would when you wanted something fresh to read. You’ll see the books marked with the Prime logo and, again, the $0 price tag on them. However, this method could be a bit time-consuming because you’ll have to search for the 1,000-odd books that are available on Prime.
What Device Do You Need For Prime Reading?
If you’ve signed up with Amazon Prime Reading, you will need to read the books you’ve purchased on a Kindle E-reader, Fire tablet, or you can download the Kindle app on your Android or iOS smartphone or tablet, so you have many options at your disposal.
Where Are Your Borrowed Books Stored?
When you purchase a book to read from Amazon Prime Reading, you’re essentially renting it.
You can only rent a maximum of 10 books at one time. If you reach your limit, you’ll need to return a book before you can download another one.
The good thing is that you can keep your books for as long as you want to, and there’s no deadline to meet or any late fees as what you’d experience with books you borrow from the library. That means you’ll have plenty of time to get through your reading list!
How to return a book that you’ve borrowed:
When you’re ready to return a book so that you can free up space in order to purchase a new one, you’ll have to follow these steps:
- Go to the main drop-down menu on your Amazon account.
- Choose “Your content and devices.”
- This will display a list of all the Kindle content you’ve downloaded.
- You will be able to filter the results so that only your Prime Reading books come up.
- On the list of Prime Reading books, you can scroll to find the book you want to return.
- Click the button that has an ellipsis next to the book title.
- Then choose “Return this book.”
How Much Does Prime Reading Cost?
Since Prime Reading is a service that falls within the umbrella of the Amazon Prime membership, you will need to pay for a Prime subscription in order to make use of Prime Reading.
An Amazon Prime subscription will cost $12.99 per month. The price of this subscription enables you to gain a lot of value, such as free two-day shipping on Amazon purchases, completely free access to Audible channels, and more, so you won’t just be able to enjoy your favorite novels and magazines.
Can You Use The Kindle Lending Library With Amazon Prime?
Amazon established the Kindle Lending Library in 2011, and this was a service that enabled Amazon Prime members to borrow a free book every month.
When the book was borrowed, it could be downloaded again for free at any time. Books that were eligible for lending had the “Prime” logo on them so they were immediately noticeable, and you could click on the “Borrow for free” option that came up.
The great thing about this was that there was absolutely no expiration date for the books. Then, in 2016, when Amazon Prime Reading was launched, it removed Kindle Lending Library from its list of services. Now, the Lending Library has completely been removed, which is quite unfortunate.
That said, you will have some nice benefits to make use of if you’re a book lover who has an Amazon Prime subscription. As mentioned earlier, you can borrow up to 10 books at a time and there’s no monthly cap for the service.
You just have to ensure you return a book before you can download another one. Most importantly, you won’t need to make use of a Kindle device because the Kindle app gives you access to the free library on both Android and iOS devices, so you’ll have greater convenience to read your favorite books on the go.
What About Kindle Unlimited?
If you enjoy Prime Reading, you might want to sign up to Kindle Unlimited. This comes with a charge of $9.99 per month and allows you to have your pick of over a million book titles.
So, right off the bat it’s clear to see that you’ll have many more books at your disposal than you will have by using Prime Reading. An important factor to consider if you’re trying to choose between the two services is their costs.
When it comes to how much you have to pay, the cost of your Amazon Prime Reading service is the same as what you pay for your Amazon Prime membership – $12.99 per month or $119 per year- because the reading benefits come at no extra cost to you. It’s like getting all your favorite books for free.
Kindle Unlimited is a subscription service that works independently from Amazon Prime. It can be purchased by people who aren’t Prime members, and it costs $9.99 per month.
How To Borrow Books On Amazon Prime
If you love the idea of borrowing and lending books, you can do that easily with your Amazon Prime membership.
How? By making use of Prime Household. This is when you set up an account with members of your household (but you don’t have to be living at the same address). Once you have your members set up, you can share content you’ve downloaded from Prime.
This is a great way to loan and borrow books. You can find out more about Amazon Prime Household by reading, “How Does Amazon Prime Household Work?”
Related Questions
What is Amazon First Reads?
This is another benefit that’s available to Prime members. How it works is that you can download a free book every month from what six books editors have chosen.
What devices do you need for Kindle Unlimited and Amazon Prime Reading?
For both of these services, you will need a Fire tablet and Kindle e-reader, or download a Kindle reading app for iOs, iPhone, iPad, and Android.
Conclusion
If you’re a book lover, you’ll want to activate Amazon Prime so you can make use of Prime Reading.
Here, a variety of books are updated monthly so you’ll never run out of eye-catching reading material to keep you occupied and entertained.
Although the Lending Library has been eliminated from Amazon’s benefits, the retail giant still offers a variety of ways in which to start enjoying reading again. After reading this article, you now know much more about Prime Reading and how to make the best of it.
