List of sites to download free ebooks legally

With this compilation we intend to offer an updated list of sites to download ebooks for free and legally. Our idea is to update the list periodically by adding new sites or removing those that are no longer in operation. Remember that they will always be projects that offer content legally. 

We try to classify the sites so that they are as comfortable as possible for you to use. In parentheses we indicate the languages ​​of the ebooks that you can find on each platform.  (SPOUSE) español (EN) English and (IS IN) In Spanish and English. The news since the last update appear with green background.

Our list has 63 sources with millions of books available in all languages.

Non-profit sites to download ebooks

In this section we will show non-profit sites where download books of all kinds from classics, to essays, through novels or children's books.

The big projects

Very generalist projects and classic works that are in the public domain. Gutenberg stands out above all, for being the most extensive and because it offers us ebooks in .epub and .mobi.

• Gutenberg Project (IS IN) A classic among classics when it comes to projects offering royalty-free works. The largest archive of public domain books in the world. To know more about him or how to collaborate, you can read this article.
• Archive.org (IS IN) Another archive of millions of digitized public domain books. Offers pdf.
  • - Open Library (IS IN) An Internet Archive project that aims to create a web page for every book that exists. Although it does not allow downloads from the tabs or pages of the books, it links to Gutenberg, Archive or the source where it is available if it is in the public domain.
• Wikisource in Spanish and if you want books in another language Wikisource. It is an online library of original texts in the public domain or under license. GFDL is a Wikimedia project that allows download in pdf.
• Wikibooks (SPOUSE) Another Wikimedia project that aims to make textbooks, manuals, tutorials or other educational texts with free content and free access available to anyone.
• iBiblio (EN) Huge library and digital archive.
• Hispanic digital library (SPOUSE) Free and free portal of the digitized books of the national library.
• Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes (SPOUSE) It is a virtual collection of classic works in Hispanic languages.
• Municipal network of libraries of Seville (SPOUSE) Digital catalog of the municipal library network of Seville.
• Europeana (IS IN) It is the access point to thousands of digital resources in Europe.
• University of Adelaide (EN) Online library of the University of Adelaide in Australia, allows us to read online, or download the works in various formats.

Related article:

Kobo Clara HD review

Access the Kindle library for free and get millions of titles now

Personal projects

Small non-profit projects.

• Goose and Octopus (SPOUSE) One of the non-profit initiatives with the highest quality in its publications. Ganso y Pulpo is an independent non-profit publishing project that seeks to reissue text that is difficult to access or forgotten and that are already free of rights.
• Tales for Algernon (SPOUSE) Excellent initiative that publishes unpublished fantasy, science fiction and horror stories in Spanish. Another personal non-profit project that brings us stories from top authors that are never published in Spanish. Winner of an Ignotus 2013, if you like science fiction it is a must.
• Cruciform Editions (SPOUSE) A small independent non-profit publishing house, winner of an Ignotus in 2013, offers us free ebooks along with others with limited editions that, once finished, become public domain.
• Book Camping (SPOUSE) They are defined as a collaborative digital library. They are dedicated to linking works with open licenses. It links a lot to resources on political, social and communication issues.
• qomun (IS IN) Directory and free culture distribution platform.
• 1 book 1 € (SPOUSE) The only project on the entire list that doesn't offer free books, but the cause is worth it. In exchange for a donation to Save the Children you can download all the books you want, although they suggest that you pay € 1 per book to help the children.
• Digital books (ES / EN / FR) Compilation of works made by Ignacio Fernández Galván.

Related article:

Kindle formats, what eBooks can you open in the Amazon reader?

Other sites to download eBooks

In this section we see resources that offer us ebooks on specific topics.

• The Metropolitan Museum of Art (EN) The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York offers us a large number of publications in PDF format that revolve around the world of art.
• Digital Comic Museum (EN) A collection of classic comics from the golden age with over 15.000 public domain comics for free download.
• Online Library of Educational Technology (SPOUSE) It is a compilation of digital books and magazines in PDF made by Professor Diego F. Craig, around the field of Educational Technology, and all being documents in the public domain or with licenses that allow them to be shared.
• Boe - Legislation (SPOUSE) Compilations of the main regulations in force in the legal system are constantly updated and in pfd and epub formats. They are presented by branches of law.

Commercial projects that have free ebooks

Is commercial-oriented projects that offer some free books. Here we find large companies such as Amazon, Google or the book house, small publishers that offer free ebooks and other websites and search engines that are based on projects such as Gutenberg.

• Amazon Kindle (IS IN) The ebook giant offers us a large number of free ebooks in all languages.
  • - Public Domain at Amazon (IS IN) Search for books from Amazon with Public Domain license.
  • - Free Book Sifter (IS IN)  Search engine based on Amazon books to make it easier for us to hunt for free ebooks for our Kindle, there are books in Spanish although what is most abundant are books in English.
  • - Hundred zeros (SPOUSE) Another search engine based on Amazon. He shows us books in Spanish.
  • - freebooksy  (EN) This project is based on offering free books from Amazon, Barnes and Nobles and Kobo and presents them to us in a blog format.

• House of the book (IS IN) One of the great bookstores in Spain, its extensive commercial catalog includes free or zero-cost works.
• Google Books (IS IN) It works as an index of books where we can find a large number of books available to read online although not to download.
• Play Store (IS IN) The Google online store, where we can find many free books to read from our Smartphone or Tablet.
• Public domain (SPOUSE) Project similar to a directory where they are responsible for disseminating and compiling works that have become public domain.
• library (SPOUSE) Initiative that allows you to download free ebooks and pay after having read them what you consider fair, a new way of monetizing works. Requires registration.
• Virtual Book (SPOUSE) Portal where classical authors with works in the public domain join new writers who upload their works for distribution.
• BQ Readers (SPOUSE) Selection of classics with which the BQ company loads the books of its ereaders. They leave us a zip file to download.
• Library (IS IN) Portal that offers a large number of ebooks.
• Feedbooks  (SPOUSE) Electronic library that offers us a selection of works in the public domain.
• Manybooks (EN) Project that draws on Gutenbeberg and Genome project there are audiobooks.
• eBooksgo (EN) Gutenberg-based book directory.
• Planet Book(SPOUSE) Offers public domain books.
• Open Culture Free ebooks (EN) List with more than 700 books for various devices, ereaders, iphones, iphdss, smartphones, etc.
• Dyskolo editions (SPOUSE) Editorial in which all the works it publishes are under Creative Commons license
• Bubok (SPOUSE) The great desktop publishing platform has a large number of free books.
• 24 symbols (SPOUSE) It is an online reading platform, a flat rate to read books online, but it leaves us different volumes to read them for free.
• Kobo (EN) The giant Kobo, has free ebooks in its catalog like Amazon.
• Barnes & Noble (EN / ES) The third in contention along with Kobo and Amazon, has free volumes for download.
• smashwords (EN / ES) Indie book distributor, with a large number of free ebooks.
• Ebook mall (EN) Digital ebooks for ereaders, iphones, smartphones, tablets, ipads, pc and mac
• sportula (SPOUSE) Genre publisher that delights us with some of his works for free
• Lektu (SPOUSE) the great Spanish cultural platform, where we can find ebooks, audiobooks and podcasts whether they are paid, free, downloaded through social payment or with the payment method if you like.
• Book (SPOUSE) More than 10.000 books available for download. Although it is free, we need to register on the web to download them.
• Dream mongers (SPOUSE) This essay-focused publisher focuses its business selling paper books but leaves us several works under Creative Commons license ( CC BY-NC ,  CC BY-NC-SA ,  CC BY-NC-ND  )
• Books on my phone (EN) Ebooks edited so that they can be read on any phone or device that has Java installed
• Junkie ebook (EN) Platform for new and independent authors
• bibliotastic (EN) Another publisher of independent authors

Sites to download technical ebooks

Websites specialized in offering free and legal technical and scientific books.

• open pound (IS IN) The great online library of technical ebooks. Without a doubt, a very interesting project that compiles and offers us a large number of free technical ebooks. Ready to download.
• Microsoft Technet (EN) Microsofot leaves us some free technology and software ebooks to download in pdf format or to read online.
• NASA ebooks (EN) NASA technology books on aeronautical topics. Very interesting.
• CSIC books (SPOUSE) A large number of free publications from the Higher Council for Scientific Research. It touches all branches of science.
• in-tech (EN) Very interesting catalog of technological and scientific topics that works with Open Access.
• Free Tech Books (EN) Free and royalty-free engineering and programming books.
• O'Really OpenBooks (EN) The O'Really publishing house leaves us its Open Books. They cannot be downloaded but you can read online, some very interesting resources.
• Free Programming Books (EN) Possibly the best listing I have come across, a superb, brutal compilation, kept up to date via Github. With this link the rest of the technical links almost stop making sense. In addition to Github we find it in  reSRC in a more friendly web format
• Online Programming Books (EN) Compilation of works on programming, computer science, software engineering, web development, app development, databases, networks, etc.

And this is it for now 🙂

Moment we have not added publishers that offer free books but do not allow them to be easily filtered or searched, but we are thinking about how to add them to the list because surely many people are interested.

Access the Kindle library for free

If you know of more sites with free and legal content that we have not included, please let us know and we will add them to the list of pages to download free ebooks online.