Australian technology news, reviews, and guides to help you
Australian technology news, reviews, and guides to help you

Amazon rolls out free book reading to Kindle Unlimited

If the all-you-can-read books aren’t enough, what about if they’re read to you instead? That’s about to roll out on Amazon Unlimited.

If you were elected to lead, not to read, a new feature coming to Kindle’s “Unlimited” program could help out. Simpsons’ references aside, the all-you-can-read Kindle Unlimited program now includes audiobooks, connecting with its Audible service to deliver both the written text and that spoken by professionals to the a supported device.

The connection of the two programs isn’t just about giving you a way of listening to the books, because you can sync the position of supported books.

If you’re reading Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice” and you get in the car and feel like you want to continue the book but obviously you have to drive, Kindle Unlimited can use its Whispersync technology to pick up your position and shift it over to the audio book version, playing a narration of the title by Gone Girl’s Rosamund Pike. When you’re done and you want to go back to reading, Whispersync will synchronise that position and send you to the right page for a return to reading.

The concept here is that no matter what you’re reading or listening to, the book will return your position accordingly, allowing you to get on with it in whichever form you prefer. And those titles are read by known actors as well as unknown readers, with both modern titles and classics, too.

“We think that Australian readers will love the convenience of switching from reading to listening on the go,” said David Naggar, Vice President of Kindle at Amazon.

“Kindle Unlimited means that readers can access over one million books and thousands of audiobooks for less than the cost of a best-selling paperback,” he said.

Amazon’s Kindle Unlimited service stays at $13.99 per month, though does come with a 30 day trial to see if the program has what you want since the inclusion of one million books may not satisfy every urge you have.

Kindle Unlimited is compatible with Amazon’s Kindle eReader devices, as well as iPhone, iPad, Android phones, Android tablets, and PC and Mac, too.

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