Sometimes reading can be hard on your wallet. Perhaps you’ve wondered, what websites give free books (legally), how do you find a book giveaway, what is a book giveaway, etc.?
Luckily, there are many different ways you can read books without spending any money at all! So, if you’re on a budget and love to read, then this post will help you read for free all year long!
Read unlimited free books from your Library
I love the Library, and it’s honestly the best way to read for free!
I have a few different libraries that are all within proximity to my house. Still, I absolutely love that I can borrow free books directly from my Kobo via Overdrive with one click of a button. If I want to read something new, it’s as easy as turning on my Kobo and browsing the latest added or lucky day books that are popular and available. I can even pick up my phone and borrow an audiobook on Libby to listen to while doing housework.
The selection of available books varies from place to place, but there is a range of genres available at many libraries. Another bonus is that you can request that they add books to their collection for borrowing, and these are usually available within a couple of weeks or months.
If you’re looking for more of an adventure, then you can visit your nearest Library and peruse their shelves in person. The librarians are always happy to help you find the perfect book for your mood or occasion. Plus, free books? Who doesn’t love those?
The Library will always be my number one favorite place to read for free!
All you can read free classic books from Project Gutenberg
Project Gutenberg has over 60,,000 free books that anyone can read.. These books are in the public domain, and due to copyright laws, you can copy them, give them away or even sell them. These books are accessible so people worldwide can read them online through Project Gutenberg’s website.
While they won’t be the popular trendy books of today, they will be great classics that can teach you something about life and how people thought at a different time in our civilization. Project Gutenberg has hundreds of Shakespeare plays with all the books and monologues you could ever want. You can also find the writings of Edgar Allan Poe, Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, and other classic authors.
You can even download them to your computer for reading offline or upload them to your tablet/eReader for a better reading experience.
Not only can you read for free, but you can feel great about supporting a non-profit organization whose mission is to preserve literature.
Read free books in exchange for an honest review
If you’re a book lover like me and have a hard time finding the budget to buy every new release that piques your interest, then I’ve got some excellent news for you!
ARCs (Advanced Reader Copies) are another option to read for free. You can download ebooks and audiobooks to read in exchange for an honest review. Your job as a reviewer is to write reviews as unbiasedly as possible while keeping in mind that it is just your opinion/experience with the book, and no one has to agree with you.
Most times these books have not yet been released to the public, so you’re the first to read them, or you may notice they’ve already been released and people are raving over them, but ARC readers usually get access to them for free anywhere from one week to a month before they hit the shelves or other download sites.
You’ll see a lot of popular titles that need advanced readers. This year I saw the latest Murderbot books, and I read and reviewed The Nature of Witches a few months before it was released.
While there are many others, the site I like best for accessing ARCs is NetGalley, but there are others like Edelweiss+, for example. You may have to request an invite on each site before you can sign up (and they do get flooded with requests) so if any of them work for you, let me know!
Win free books in online Giveaways
New book giveaways are popping up daily on Bookstagram and Goodreads.
On Bookstagram, I typically find Giveaways when someone tags me (I appreciate you for tagging me). Bookstagram has so many fantastic bookish giveaways for individual books, gift certificates, bookish merch, and more. For example, in the past, I gave away $150 for a shopping spree at Book Outlet on my Instagram @novelfables.
To enter a giveaway on Bookstagram, sometimes it’s as simple as following and tagging a friend in a comment; other times, it can be to follow the Instagrammer on Twitter or Facebook, so you have more chances of winning. The instructions will vary, so be sure to read them carefully instructions to enter for a chance to win.
As for Goodreads, when you log in and click on Browse you will find a link to the Giveaways page. You can filter by genre, featured, most popular, and more, and you can enter as many giveaways that your big heart desires.
You can also enter giveaways on sites like freshfiction.com, bookloons.com, and rivetedlit.com.
While giveaways won’t always get you a book in your hand, you can at least have some excitement by knowing that there’s a chance. And maybe, just maybe, you can get lucky enough to win!
Get free books from the author
For example, Brandon Sanderson gives away the Warbreaker which I loved if you read my review ebook on his website. That’s how I was introduced to him, and I loved the book so much I purchased it for my collection. You can read Warbreaker for free on Brandon Sanderson’s website still.
A lot of times, when an author releases a new book first in a trilogy or series, they’ll give the first away for free in an eBook form. You can check out a site like BookBub, Amazon, or Kobo to see if any catch your eye.
Reading is a great hobby and it’s even better when you can read for free. Those are some of the best ways to read books without paying anything, from reading classic novels from Project Gutenberg all the way up to getting ARCs in exchange for an honest review on Amazon, and my favorite borrowing books straight from the library to my Kobo. What’s your favorite way to get more reading done? Tell us in the comments below!
