How to Find Free Audio Book Downloads Online

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By eHow Arts & Entertainment Editor

Whether you are looking for audio book files for a long commute, road trip or to spice up a workout, you can find free downloads online. Audio books can be expensive to purchase, particularly if you do it regularly. Finding free audio book downloads online gives you entertainment and more money in your pocket.

1. Read the classics. Books in the public domain occur frequently as free downloads. Several websites have public domain works available. In some cases, volunteers do the audio so the quality of reading may be less than in commercial works, but the catalogs are broad and the price is right—free.

2. Sign up for a free trial. With the growth of the audio book industry, websites offering subscriptions or audio books for sale are growing too, and many offer free trials or free audio books. Sign up and try out the service; you may find it works for you and at the least, you get a free book or subscription time. Audio books from these sources tend to be current works and read more professionally than many volunteer produced ones.

3. Look for promotional materials. Some publishing companies give away audio books in order to attract new customers to a particular author or genre. The works are likely to be non-mainstream and the authors unknown but sometimes, you can find a gem.

4. Contact your local library. Your library may have a subscription to sources like Over Drive or netLibrary. If you have a free account with your local library, you can download audio books from the site your library has an account with. Audio book choices tend to be similar to those you'd find on a commercial site so if your library has access, this is a great way to get books to listen to.

5. Search through available podcasts. Again, many of the podcast audio books produced are those in the public domain, but some authors are doing installments of their own books.

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