What is Open eBooks?

The Open eBooks app will give kids from low-income families access to a digital library of thousands of popular and award-winning children’s and YA eBooks for free! Never before have educators and librarians had the ability to actively teach digital literacy, encourage family engagement, and share the love of reading through millions of mobile devices already in the hands of young people and their families. Open eBooks makes this possible.

The free app allows kids of all ages and their caregivers to instantly download up to 10 eBooks at a time to their mobile digital devices. Each eBook will be available for 56 days before it must be renewed. Students and their families can choose eBooks based on the topics that get them excited about reading and learning, and search for eBooks by title or author.

The Open eBooks app is intended for children to use at home for pleasure reading (independently or with their families), but it can also be used in your school, library or program. Each student will need one code and PIN combination to use on his or her family’s device at home. If you wish to use the Open eBooks app in your program or classroom on a shared device, we recommend that you still assign one code and PIN combination per child.

Let's Get Started!

To request access codes and learn more, click on the product below that corresponds to the grades of the children you serve.

Due to a high volume of requests, it may take up to 48 hours for your Open eBooks confirmation email to arrive. This message will include your free codes and PINs, and a letter to share with families.

Please Note: Limit 500 Access Codes per order. When using the app, standard data rates apply.

Open eBooks is made possible thanks to a coalition of partners, including the Digital Public Library of America (DPLA), the New York Public Library (NYPL), and the White House ConnectED Initiative, and with support from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), Baker and Taylor and the generous commitments of publishers.

Selected from hundreds of applicants from across the country, nine members of a DPLA Curation Corps crafted the Open eBooks collections to ensure a diverse, compelling, and appropriately targeted set of thousands of titles— generously donated by their publishers for every child to read, learn from, and enjoy.