How to download free e-books legally
A number of websites offer downloads of thousands of books that can be read on any device.
A good book is one of the best companions to have for moments of leisure during the holidays. When packing your bags it is best to leave some room for a few of them depending on how much time you are going to be away. Nowadays, weight and space is not a concern for those that own an e-reader, with some models weighing little more than 200 grams and which can store up to 3,000 books, according to the technical specifications of some Amazon offers. And that is not the only advantage of digital books. You can also download books for free and legally from a number of websites. Here are some of them.
Amazon
Those who own a Kindle, Amazon’s e-reader, know that the company makes available some books free which can be found by simply going to its website and keying in “free books” in the search engine. To access them you have to be registered with Amazon and once downloaded can be read in Kindle or any other device in the Kindle Cloud Reader platform.
To make things even easier, there is a website called Hundred Zeros that brings together and updates daily all the books that are free in Amazon.
Google Books
One of the other tech giants, Google, could not fail to be a member of this club. It has a large catalogue of paid-for and free books. To access the free ones, go to Google Play and follow the path Books>Most popular>Top e-books free and once there click on the More button or click on direct link.
To read them you need to have an account with Google. You can read directly from a browser, although with a phone or Android Tablet the user experience is better with the Google Play Books app.
Gutenberg
Although the design of the web is a little bit out of date, this is a treasure trove for those who love to read. It’s not for nothing that Gutenberg has 50,000 books in different languages, including Spanish, and in different formats that can be read on any device. What’s more, you don’t need to register to download them.
PlanetaLibro
PlanetaLibro has over 9,000 books free in different formats. It should be pointed out that although it has an Audiobook option in its menu, what it is really offering is text-to-speech, available in some e-readers, tablets and phones. An audiobook is usually dubbed by an actor while text-to-speech is delivered by a computer program and sounds flatter. Books can be downloaded without registering, with favorites linked to the Facebook profile of the user.
Bajaebooks
Bajaebooks has over 33,000 free books under three categories: Author, Genre and Series. You have to register to download or read these books online and the web has a copyright clause under which a book can be requested to be withdrawn if it is believed the copyright is being infringed by being available free on the website.
Ebiblioteca
This is another web whose appearance - more akin to the previous century - should not put you off. It has a catalogue of close to 105,000 books which can be accessed without needing to register.
Free-Ebooks
Free-Ebooks offers six categories of free books ranging from classics to modern authors, academic texts on different subjects (Medicine, Law, Philosophy, History, Politics…) and all sorts of manuals. The web is available in Spanish, English and Portuguese. You need to register to download books.