Reading ebooks: online or download?
There are usually two options when it comes to how you can read ebooks – Read Online or Download. For a small number of titles there will only be a ‘Read Online’ option. This may be due to publisher restrictions, or it may be because it is a very popular ebook that a lot of people need access to.
Read Online
This is the one we recommend you use if possible. There are usually built in features which allow you to interact with the ebook such as adding your own notes, highlighting, and searching the full text. Some platforms such as VLeBooks use pop-ups so if you find that you cannot read the ebook online you may need to enable pop-ups on your device.
Download
Many ebook providers allow you to download a copy of the book to read offline – this is useful when you will not have access to the internet for example if you like to read during your commute. When you download an ebook you may be asked to download Adobe Digital Editions (or another app depending on your device). The app enables you to read ebooks that are protected by Digital Rights Management. Features such as note-taking, printing etc. will not usually be available when you download an ebook.
Below are two examples of screenshots from two of our ebook providers at the point of downloading an ebook.
Why can I only read an ebook for a few minutes?
You may come across and be able to access to ebooks that we don’t have in our collections for a few minutes as a preview. This usually happens if you’ve used the search box on a specific ebook platform and found a book we have not bought. Searching on a specific platform will only find titles on that platform. The Library buys titles from a range of platforms.
The best way to avoid this is to start your search for all titles on Library Search as it searches our whole collection across all ebook platforms.
Ebook help & support
Got a question about ebooks? Send the Library an email or start a LiveChat using LibraryTalk.
For a more detailed explanation of ebook availability, licensing, and pricing read our Ebooks Landscape guide.