12 sites where you can read full books online
Piotr Kowalczyk ⋮ Updated onNovember 1, 2020 November 1, 2020
If you buy an item via this post, we may get a small affiliate fee. Details .
Explore Project Gutenberg, Google Books, Wattpad, HathiTrust Library, Internet Archive, or Library of Congress for book you can read instantly in your internet browser
To enjoy reading books, you don’t need a tablet or e-reader. You can read entire books online, completely legally, in an internet browser on your computer. The most popular sites are listed below.
The internet is the ultimate joyride for finding answers and items we need. With a huge majority of products available from on-line stores, you don ’ t have to leave home to get anything that ’ s on your wishlist, including books, movies, games or audiobooks .
The best thing is that you don ’ t have to wait for pitch. Most books are digitized and it means you can start enjoying them in a topic of seconds. It ’ second fair a count of finding the most commodious – and fully legal – on-line source of books to read .
World ’ s most beloved classics are available on-line for free. They are the alleged populace sphere books. They are complimentary because their intellectual property rights have expired, and everyone is entitled not only to download and read them but besides remix and reshare .
Institutions like Project Gutenberg or Internet Archive digitize public sphere books and make them available for release through their on-line catalogs .
jump to the list
Unless you are determined to create a spectacularly large personal collection of ebooks, you don ’ t have to deal with copy and converting files. You can read books the moment you find them in one of the sites listed below .
But what “ read books on-line ” means precisely ? It means you won ’ t need any of these :
- A dedicated device, such as a Kindle e-reader
- A tablet with a book reading app installed
- An ebook reader application on your computer
- An extension for your internet browser
All you need is a calculator connected to the internet and the internet browser of your choice, such as Chrome, Safari, or Firefox .
When it comes to paid books ( and it doesn ’ t matter whether you want to buy a print or ebook version ), rid script previews are a standard feature of speech offered by many on-line bookstores, including Amazon or Barnes & Noble .
The free previews account for approximately 15 % of the paid bible. It ’ s hanker adequate to make a decision whether to order a script or not .
The sites listed below are the ones where you can read books online from the first to the last page. In the detail descriptions, we have included a choice of titles and tips how to improve the read experience .
One big disadvantage of reading books in the web browser is that you have to be connected to the web. What if you ’ d like to read books offline ? One way is to download vane pages to your calculator and open them from a downloaded file directly in a browser .
A much better way is to download an ebook file and use an e-reader, such as a Kindle, or one of many book-reading apps available for iPad, iPhone, Android tablets and smartphones, and about any other mobile devices .
Most of the sites listed below offer an option to download files in respective formats. All you have to remember is the correct format. Make certain to download :
- mobi file – if you own a Kindle or Amazon Fire tablet.
- epub file – if you own iPad, iPhone, Kobo, Nook, or Android device.
Would you like to add any locate to the number ? Let ’ s contact on social media. We are waiting for you on Twitter and Facebook. Thank you for dropping by. You ’ re amazing as constantly !
Read also 9 sites with free books for iPad and iPhone top article Tens of thousands of detached books are available legally for your iPad and iPhone. In this roundup, we list the best on-line sources, complete with compatibility tips .
Read full books online – here are 12 best sites
1. Project Gutenberg
Project Gutenberg is a mother of all ebook sites. It started in 1971, when the universe ’ south first ebook was created by Michael S. Hart. It was “ Declaration of Independence of the United States of America, ” and you can read it correct away in a adjacent yellow journalism of your internet browser .
many sites that offer free ebooks from the public domain use the titles created and upload to Project Gutenberg .
presently, there are over 60,000 public world books in the catalog. If you ’ re looking for great authoritative books, Project Gutenberg is the best address to explore .
To read the bible in your browser, merely pawl “ Read this book on-line : HTML ” option on the list of available formats .
The option to read the book on-line displays all elements of a record. You will be able to see the original cover of the book, adenine well as illustrations inside. You can besides navigate the reserve easily using the table of content or cluck on hyperlinks inside the file .
There is one more profit of a hypertext markup language file opened in a browser. This file is searchable. You can use your browser ’ randomness find instrument to search for words inside the ledger .
You can start exploring Project Gutenberg from the tilt of the most popular ebook downloads. The worldly concern ’ s most love and adored books are here : Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, Bram Stoker ’ s Dracula, Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, works by Edgar Allan Poe, Mark Twain ’ s A Tale of Two Cities, little Women by Louisa May Alcott, Alice ’ sulfur Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, or Charlotte Brontë ’ s Jane Eyre. And it ’ s merely the begin !
⇢ Project Gutenberg
2. Internet Archive
Internet Archive, founded in 1996, is a non-profit constitution offer free access to digital or digitized content : books, images, videos, or sound recording files .
The catalog includes over 25,000,000 in full accessible books and other text files. From here, you can besides start browsing a collection of 1.3 million contemporaneous ebooks that you will be able to borrow for free once you register an account. The ebook section can be reached at : archive.org/details/texts .
Use the search box in the lead right corner to find the book. By default option, the tilt of results shows collection from popular libraries. You can sort the results by relevance, views, deed, and the go steady of adding the detail to the catalogue .
You can use the tools on the left side to narrow down the tilt of results by collection, media character, handiness ( barren or to borrow ), language, or godhead .
To start read, merely pawl on the arrows in the bottom bar of the persona of the opened book. You can enter wide screen by clicking on the full-screen toggle in the bottom right .
The on-line spectator presents the scan pages of the script, what brings an extra season to understand. There are many ways to go through the content of the record, including one-page opinion, and zoom .
One thing to keep in judgment is that the contented of the bible is amply searchable, let not the scan misinform you. Use the search barroom in the crown right corner to find a word. All found instances will be marked in the build up cake at the bottom .
One of the most amazing things on Internet Archive is the text-to-speech function. You can turn it on by clicking on the speaker picture in the bottom right corner of the book viewer .
What ’ s deserving foreground is that the Internet Archive hosts a huge number of foreign-language books. There are over 20 languages with the number of published textbook works exceeding 1,000 each .
⇢ Internet Archive
3. Open Library
overt Library is Internet Archive ’ sulfur disjoined project, focused on collecting library records. Its goal is to create one web page for every book ever published. On a page of a individual book, you ’ ll find all its document editions .
Compared to the Internet Archive, with its huge catalogue and advanced search features, the Open Library web site is simpler and more user-friendly, and you can find the books you need much quick .
When you go to Classic Books section, you will find over 3 million books that are “ accessible, ” which means they are barren to read on-line or download .
once you find the book, you will immediately know whether you can read it online or not. Just expect for the big blue “ Read ” button. When you hover open the headphones icon, you will be able to listen to the audio adaptation .
Click on the Read icon and you will be redirected to a full-screen on-line lector on the Internet Archive web site .
In the top right corner of the spectator, you will see an choice to download the book, normally in either epub or pdf format .
open Library is more than fair a catalogue of free classical books. It besides shows contemporary books that are free to read if you decide to borrow them. To do that, you may need to register at Open Library or find the bible in your local library using WorldCat or Library Link. Each library bible is marked with a “ Borrow ” push button rather of “ Read. ”
⇢ Open Library
4. Google Books
A huge solicitation of books that Google has scanned and turned into viewable files is available on Google Books .
The home page of Google Books at books.google.com is actually nothing more than a search box. To start exploring this huge library of digitize books, you have to type in something, for example a name of your front-runner authoritative writer or a title of a script .
not all books can be fully previewed on-line, but you can narrow search results to those that are .
To do that, in the upper barroom snap on “ Any view. ” From a drop-down list choice “ Free Google eBooks ” to see entirely the books that can be read online from the very beginning to the identical end .
Google Books gives besides a casual to preview free samples of books that are not available in the public world. To see a list of these books, select “ Preview available ” option from the “ Any books ” drop-down menu .
The free preview of a copyrighted title included in Google Books doesn ’ t have to be a first character of the book .
Let ’ s say a publisher sets a free preview to be 20 % of a reserve. You can select a chapter in the middle and read 20 % from now on. Or rise from page to page, if you want .
You ’ ll be able to preview the book until you reach the limit of free pages set by a publisher .
⇢ Google Books
5. Smashwords
Smashwords is a leading on-line chopine with ebooks from independent authors and publishers. There are presently over 500,000 from over 100,000 self-published authors.
Thousands of books are available for complimentary download and on-line view. The total number is changing, but normally around 100,000 titles are available for loose screening .
Smashwords authors have an option to set up the duration of a barren preview. many writers decide to let readers preview the stallion book on-line .
To see which books are rid to read in your internet browser, go to Smashwords ’ catalog of free ebooks. then, change the way entries are being displayed – from stacks to list. Do it by clicking the fastball list icon in the top right .
In the list see, expect for “ Online Reader ” button displayed at the bottom of an submission, next to blue buttons with ebook formats .
There are several customization options to choose from. You can select a size ( 4 levels to choose from ), and font face ( Arial, Courier, Times, Verdana, Georgia ). You can besides personalize colors by setting up your own font and background .
quite honestly, reading interface offered by Smashwords is not the strongest partially of this bang-up site. There is no full-screen opinion, for example. It would help a batch, as the record capacity windowpane is very narrow .
⇢ Smashwords
6. ManyBooks
ManyBooks offers free books in a clean and friendly interface. The locate is ad supported but these ads are displayed normally at the bottom of the browser window and are not excessively disturbing .
Most books are sourced from Project Gutenberg and sites that offer books with a creative Commons license .
In entire, over 50 thousand books are available, all with nicely designed covers. Plus, each bible is available in respective file formats, a lot more than what you can find elsewhere .
Most importantly, each title from the ManyBooks catalogue can be read in your internet browser .
After you find the book you want to read, go to this book ’ s details page and chatter on a large “ Read Online ” button .
The read interface is very clean and nicely designed, although it takes some clock time to load it, particularly when it comes with a book shroud .
You can change the baptismal font size ( 4 levels ), plus the locate works well on mobile devices, so you can read books besides in a browser on your pill .
⇢ ManyBooks
7. BookRix
BookRix is a chopine that offers books from self-published authors combined with free books from the public sphere .
A catalogue of release ebooks is an substantive part of the web site. On the top of a list, you will find the most popular categories, including literary fiction, fantasy, love story, thrillers, and youthful adult fabrication .
When you enter any class, you will see books sorted by the popularity. On the top, you will see release books offered by contemporary authors .
many authoritative titles from the public sphere are besides included in the BookRix directory of rid ebooks. You will find them in the Fiction category .
When you find the koran you want to read, click on its cover or championship to enter the book details page. To open an on-line spectator, expect for the “ Read Book ” release located following to the cover .
⇢ BookRix
8. Authorama
If you are looking for a site that loads quickly even when you have a dense connection travel rapidly, you should visit Authorama .
Created and maintained by Philipp Lenssen, this dead-simple web site includes several twelve popular books from Project Gutenberg. You can find here books by Mary Shelley, Francis Bacon, Charles Dickens, Jerome K. Jerome ( yes, Three Men in a Boat ! ), or Robert Louis Stevenson .
The presence foliate is at the same time a elementary mesa of message, sorted by the list of an author .
Clicking on a book style liaison will open a simple hypertext markup language viewer. The contented of each reserve is divided into several parts to let data load a quickly as possible .
This site can be viewed besides in a browser on a mobile earphone .
⇢ Authorama
9. Bookboon
Bookboon is an on-line platform focused on providing complimentary and paid textbooks for students and businesses .
The locate offers textbooks written by professors from the populace ’ s top universities. There are over 1,000 books that are loose to download, but to do that, you have to sign up. When you visor the site for the first time, choose “ Sign up for free eBooks. ” You can use your Google, Facebook, Linkedin credentials to cursorily entree the catalogue of books .
You can find on Bookboon several interesting books from the follow categories : engineering, IT & program, economics & finance, career & discipline advice, market, scheme & management, or languages .
Each ledger can be downloaded in pdf format, but you can besides open an on-line understand interface by clicking “ Start Reading ” button .
If you are a release penis, you will see ads in the contentedness of the books you read. The ship’s company claims ads take no more than 15 % of the content .
It ’ second worth highlighting that Bookboon has the nicest on-line reading interface. It ’ second cleanse, very well designed, and uses 100 % of the web browser window without switching to full-screen mode .
⇢ Bookboon
10. Wattpad
Wattpad is one of the most democratic e-reading websites in the world. It connects over 80 million readers-writers who spend over 23 billion minutes a month engaged in original stories published directly on the chopine .
The web site offers and promotes paid stories, but a huge majority of contented is free to enjoy – but lone for register users, so you have to sign up to get access .
Use the “ Browse ” tab next to the logo on the forget to find favorite genres. You can choose from adventure, winnow fiction, LGBT+, modern adult, romance, short stories, urban, or werewolf .
After you select the book from a list of results and chatter on its binding, a pop fly window will appear. Click on an orange release saying “ Read ” to start enjoying the fib .
Please note that the site is ad supported and the recitation interface besides displays ads .
⇢ Wattpad
11. Library of Congress
Did you know you can read the world ’ s beloved children ’ mho classics on the Library of Congress web site ?
The digital solicitation Classic Books includes “ only ” about 60 titles, but they are the ones you can ’ triiodothyronine determine anywhere else .
This catalog looks like a bang-up idea to spend some time with your kids reading together the books in their original look and feel. The books are scanned and digitized beautifully and the interface looks gorgeous !
To start reading, merely click on a link “ Read This Book now ” that ’ sulfur located future to the book ’ randomness embrace .
What would you like to start with ? How about Humpty Dumpty, with extraordinary illustrations by W. W. Denslow ? Or the original edition of The Jungle Book ? You can read Peter Rabbit, The Rocket Book by Peter Newell, or one of the best stories from Hans Christian Andersen – The Snow Queen. delight !
⇢ Library of Congress
12. HathiTrust Library
HathiTrust Library is a large-scale collaborative repository of digital content from academic and research libraries, aggregating millions of books and text from Google Books, Internet Archive or Library of Congress .
HathiTrust is like Google Books but much more exploiter friendly. The front foliate includes a search box with advanced options. Make sure to check “ Full-text ” and “ Full view only ” options to see only the books that are fix to be opened in an on-line read interface .
A amazingly enjoyable way of exploring available books is to use Collections ( you can choose this option in the top seafaring bar ) .
When you find the book you want to read, merely click on the “ Full View ” link and the spectator will open immediately. You can dismiss the leave sidebar to enter the full-screen mode. If you don ’ thymine see the “ Full View ” connect, it means the book is not available for on-line read .
⇢ HathiTrust Library
• • •
We removed a comment system to increase your privacy and reduce distractions. If you ’ d like to discuss this article, we are waiting for you on Twitter, Facebook, and Pinterest. You can besides follow us on Google News or grab our RSS feed .
Keep explore. here are other popular lists for book lovers :
The 20 best books to read on your iPad in 2022
– December 23, 2021 15 most useful iPad and iPad Pro accessories to get in 2022
– December 15, 2021
Read more: The Best Philosophy Books Of All Time
16 endowment ideas for the Kindle lover in your animation
– December 13, 2021 12 best accessories for hands-free read
– December 7, 2021 22 alone non-book gifts for modern bookworms
– November 17, 2021