All of the modern Kindle e-readers have the ability to purchase and listen to Audible audiobooks, in select markets, such as the UK and US. In order to listen to digital content, you need to connect up wireless headphones or an external speaker. If you ever wondered how you go about browsing for audiobooks on your Kindle and listening to them, we have a great video tutorial.
If you have never used Audible before, you can just buy them directly from Amazon. If you already have an Audible account and you wish to merge your existing collection into your Amazon Audible library for use on your Kindle, you can link the two accounts from the accounts merge page on the Audible website. Once completed, you’ll then login to your Audible account with your Amazon credentials and your existing Audible audio book collection will be available in your Amazon Audible library ready to download from the cloud.
In order to browse for audiobooks, you need to click on the Store, on the main navigation bar and there are two options, Kindle and Audible. If you click on Audible, you can browse and search and it will just display audiobooks. You can search by genres, bestsellers and editors picks. Once you have purchased an audiobook, all of the content is housed in your library. Audiobooks will have a little headphone option on the top right corner, giving them a distinction between ebooks and audiobooks. If you have a large audiobook collection or if you have an existing audiobook account you can click on sort, and sort by audiobooks in your library.
Once you click on it the built in audiobook player will open and it is tremendously robust. You can skip forward or ahead fifteen seconds or change the pitch level from a number of preset options. While listening to an audiobook, the Paperwhite displays how much time is left in a chapter and has software driven volume button. There is a bluetooth notification on the bottom of the screen that tells you what device you have paired it with. If you have not connected a pair of headphones or wireless speakers with it yet, it will walk you through the setup process.
Michael Kozlowski is the editor-in-chief at Good e-Reader and has written about audiobooks and e-readers for the past fifteen years. Newspapers and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times have picked up his articles. He Lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.