Free E-books

Read E-books Online

If you prefer to read on a computer screen or you want to use the browser built into your e-reader for reading, the books at these websites are right for you.

  • Safari Tech Books Online
    Free to Berkeley Public Library cardholders! Technical e-books to search, browse and read. Subject areas include operating systems, programming languages, database technologies, and more.
  • Open Library
    Over a million public domain titles, plus many current items with Creative Commons licenses. Many e-books are available for download in multiple formats, or available to read online in their BookReader.
  • Great Books Online
    Bartleby.com is known for its great reference titles that are accessed and read online. In addition, they have poems, novels, classics, and more.
  • The Free Library
  • The Free Library compiles an enormous amount of published material - journals, magazines, blog postings, and classic literary texts. Materials are organized by subject, author, or title.
  • DailyLit
    Get great stories and knowledge in under 5 minutes a day. DailyLit will send you short installments by daily e-mail or RSS feed.

Download E-books to a Device

If you prefer to download books onto an e-reader the books at these websites come in a variety of formats suitable for different devices.

  • Open Library
    Over a million public domain titles, plus many current items with Creative Commons licenses. Many e-books are available for download in multiple formats, or available to read online in their BookReader.
  • Project Gutenberg
    The oldest Digital Library providing free access to out-of-copyright e-books suitable for any reading platform. Due to a huge volunteer effort, Project Gutenberg has almost 30,000 titles in over 50 languages, though most are in English.
  • ManyBooks
    There are more than 29,000 e-books available here and they're all free! Books are in many publishing formats and are available for iPad, e-readers, & other mobile devices.
  • Free from the Google eBookstore
    Use this link to find the free e-books in the Google eBookstore.
  • Feedbooks
    Feedbooks is a cloud publishing and distribution service, connected to many reading systems and social networks. You can find free fiction from new authors as well as classics and low-cost bestsellers at this site.
  • Books on the Knob
    In addition to rounding up free books for Kindle, Nook, and other e-readers, this site also includes bargain books and reviews.
  • Ebooks@Adelaide
    The University of Adelaide provides access to classic works of literature, philosophy, science, history/exploration, and travel.
  • Baen Books
    This science fiction and fantasy publisher is making some of its titles available digitally and includes some well known authors. About 120 titles are currently available but new titles are being added regularly. These books can be saved to a PC or sent directly to a Kindle.
  • Munseys
  • Munseys offers 20,000 rare or hard to find titles in 12 formats. The proper choice for Kindles, Nooks and Sony Readers are explicitly identified. Titles can be found by searching author, title or tags. You can also browse by 39 different categories. The “pulp fiction” and “orient express” seem unique. Users must register.
  • The National Academies Press
    All of the National Academies reports and books about science, engineering and medicine that are available as .pdfs can now be downloaded for free from their website.

E-book Directories

The world of eBooks is enormous! We have put together some of our favorite resources to get you started. If you want even more, these directories will give you plenty to explore.

  • Online Texts from IPL
    The Internet Public Library's list of online book sources.
  • U Penn's Online Books Resources Page
    The Online Books Page is built and maintained by the University of Pennsylvania and facilitates access to books that are freely readable over the Internet.
  • Free Books Page
    The Utopia Now Organization has collected links to thousands of free books online, as well as other literary resources.
  • Just Free Books
    This is a custom search engine for finding e-books and summaries of works in the public domain.
  • DigitalBookIndex
    Digital Book Index provides links to more than 165,000 full-text digital books from more than 1800 commercial and non-commercial publishers, universities, and various private sites, including Gutenberg, NetLibrary, Google, and many, many universities worldwide. More than 140,000 of these books, texts, and documents are available free. A device with Internet access is necessary for use. Download may involve a fee.
  • Inkmesh Ebook Search Engine
    Inkmesh is an e-book search engine that makes it easier to find free e-books and compare e-book prices for the Kindle, iPhone, Sony Reader, Nook and more. Searching only free e-books is possible; limiting to just Sony, Kobo, Kindle, Smashwords, Nook, and Baen books is also an option. Each record indicates the devices that are compatible. Searching by subject allows for narrowing by free or price and device as well. There are over 3,500 ‘promotional e-books’ that appear to be lesser known.

Free E-books From The Library

Interface for Overdrive

Patrons can download e-books and e-audiobooks for free with their library card. The collection includes books for adults, young adults and children in popular genres like thrillers, historical fiction, biography, literary fiction, romance and history. 

There is a whole page of this research guide dedicated to Overdrive. It includes information about the collection, where to get help and other support.