If you’re looking for ebooks for your family, there’s no need to spend a bunch of money. There are so many places where you can download free ebooks or read them online. We’ve found books for the entire family. There’s everything from picture books for beginning readers to novels for adults. You can find both classics and recent books in every genre for free in ebook format.

Where to Find Free Ebooks

The websites below offer a wide selection of free ebooks. Several of these websites include books for adults, and even the ones that only offer children’s books may include some that aren’t appropriate for every family. So, I recommend that you supervise your children when they are picking out books and screen their choices before allowing them to read the books.

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American Literature

American Literature has a large collection of short stories, poems, and novels for children and adults of all ages. Convenient categories help readers find the type of literature they are seeking. All of the materials can be read online, rather than by downloading.

Baldwin Library of Historical Children’s Literature

The Baldwin Library of Historical Children’s Literature, which was created by the University of Florida, offers over 6,000 children’s books from the mid to late 19th century. The collection can be sorted by publisher, topic, or genre.

Clarkness.com

Clarkness.com has a collection of stories and ebooks for beginning readers. These materials can be read online or downloaded and printed. They also offer many ebooks written in the OpenDyslexic font, making them more accessible for children with dyslexia.

Freechildrenstories.com

Freechildrenstories.com provides original stories for preschool and elementary aged children to read online. The stories are sortable by age range.

Free Kids Books

Free Kids Books has an extensive collection of ebooks for children and teens. The books are sortable by category and recommended age. They also offer many downloadable textbooks and workbooks.

Free-eBooks.net

Free-eBooks.net offers thousands of books for all ages, including over 100 classics for children. With a free membership, you can read five free books a month. To read an unlimited number of books and have access to additional features, you’ll need to upgrade to a paid membership.

Gateway to the Classics

Gateway to the Classics provides a large collection of classic literature for children and the young at heart. They offer hundreds of titles across a wide variety of genres, with an emphasis on history, literature, and natural history. They also have approximately 2,500 poems and a small number of audio recordings.

Get Free Books

At Get Free Books you’ll find an extensive directory of ebooks for adults and children of all ages. You can sort the directory by category. Some of the books can be downloaded, while others can be read online.

Lit2Go

Lit2Go provides a collection of classic books in ebook format that may be read online or downloaded. There is also an audiobook available for each book.

Loving2Read

Loving2Read is a library of ebooks for elementary aged children. The books are sortable by grade level and topic. Also, parents can track their child’s progress on the website’s dashboard.

ManyBooks

ManyBooks has a library of over 50,000 ebooks for all ages, including many for children. You may download the books or read them online.

Open Library

Open Library, which is part of the nonprofit Internet Archive, hosts over a million ebooks for all ages. More than 30,000 of these are children’s books. The library includes both classics and newer titles. You’ll need to create a free account to check out books. Some books have a waitlist.

Oxford Owl

Oxford Owl, an award-winning website from Oxford University Press, offers 150 free ebooks for children ages 3 to 12. You will need to create a free parent account to view the books. The website also provides educational videos, games, and other learning materials.

Project Gutenberg

Project Gutenberg offers over 60,000 free ebooks for all ages. Most of these books are classics that are now available in the public domain. This page lists their children’s books.

Free Vintage Graded Readers

Freedom Homeschooling’s Free Vintage Graded Readers page provides links to a collection of vintage readers. These vintage school readers, published in the late 1800s and early 1900s, are now in the public domain and free online as ebooks. You’ll find well-known classics like McGuffey, Elson, Treadwell, and others. The 25+ reader series are organized by grade level for kindergarten through 8th grade.

Amazon

Amazon doesn’t just sell books. They also offer free ebooks for all ages. What’s available changes often, but here’s their current list of Top 100 Free Children’s ebooks. If you don’t have an Amazon Kindle, you can download the Kindle App for free to read Amazon’s ebooks on your tablet, phone, or computer. If you can’t find the free ebooks you’re looking for, Amazon’s Kindle Unlimited subscription is very affordable. With the subscription, you can borrow an unlimited number of books. The books are all available instantly, unlike with library apps, where there is often a waitlist for popular ebooks.

Your Public Library

Contact your local public library to find out if they offer ebooks. Many libraries now allow patrons to check out ebooks online using services like Overdrive or Hoopla.

Free Audiobooks

If you prefer audiobooks to ebooks, our Free Audiobooks post lists several places to download those.

Note: This post was originally published on March 15, 2020 and has been updated for accuracy and comprehensiveness.