How to Get Free Audio Books for the Blind and Visually Impaired

If you search online for “free audio books,” you will find that there are seemingly many sources available. Sites like Audible and All You Can Books offer their services with a free trial period to entice people to try them out. One thing you will find, though, is that few audio book services are truly 100% free. Once the trial period ends, you will have to pay a subscription fee to continue the service. Additionally, you may have to invest in a proprietary player or try to use a smartphone to listen to the books. Find out how you can get free audio books and qualify for a free device through the Braille Institute.

Many of the sites that do have free content, like Librivox, tend to offer recordings of public domain titles. You can download the books for free and listen to them on your own devices that will play their files. Overdrive, which operates through the public library system, has free content as well. With Overdrive, you can download a book and keep it until the loan period ends and the file expires. Sometimes, you have to wait for others to finish the book before you can check it out. All of these services are great. If, however, you are looking for user-friendly, free audio books, there is an even better alternative. Through the National Library Service (NLS), every state provides audio, large format and braille books for those who are blind, visually impaired or print disabled such as dyslexia. Users can download books, but you do not need a computer to use this service. Libraries provide physical braille books and audio books on cartridges that you receive and return by mail, free of charge. The library will also loan you a free audio book reader to play your books.