How To Share Audible Books When Your Family Shares One Audible Account

But my parents were slower to jump on the audiobook bandwagon. My dad doesn’t get motion sick so he was still reading print or ebooks on his nook. And until recently my mom was driving into the city and listening to the news on the radio. But in the last few months a switch flipped and they both have jumped with two feet into the audiobook deep end. They’re tearing through books faster than I can recommend them, and now giving me suggestions for books to add to my own library.

Recently, we started comparing Audible account libraries and discovered a lot of duplicates. A LOT. My parents had recently each binged on an Audible sale and had a ton of brand new books that overlapped not only with my library but with each other’s.

It begged the question, why are we each spending 15 bucks a month on an Audible membership when we’re all listening to the same stuff? Why don’t we share an Audible account?

As easy as that sounds, it turns out sharing Audible books is a bit harder in reality than in theory. Taking advantage of Audible’s return policy, we all returned some unlistened-to duplicates, and my dad and I each canceled our Audible account, with my mom’s becoming our sole active membership. The canceled accounts still contain all the books we’d previous purchased on them; we just have to sign back in to them to access the books and we shared everyone’s log-ins so we all have access to each other’s libraries.

How TO Share Audible Books: Your beginner’s guide

With three people on one Audible account, we’ve had to establish some rules and guidelines. A shared Google doc helps, as does using the same kind of devices. Here’s what we’ve learned about sharing an Audible account in our family.

*Note that since this post came out, Audible accounts now allows you to share your Amazon and Audible books with members in your Amazon Household through Family Library Sharing. That may be a good option for you, but it still doesn’t allow you to share your Audible membership benefits with your Amazon Household.

1. Don’t buy something on Audible without asking permission first

There’s a reason this is rule number 1. Despite the fact that we’re, ya know, family, I’m not going to go buying books willy nilly on my mom’s credit card.

Recently a daily deal popped up that I really wanted to take advantage of, so I bought it on my closed account (which you can still do). It was only a buck more without having a membership and I didn’t have to spend my mom’s money.

2. But if there’s something you want, check with the rest of the group – maybe they’ll want it too

The beauty of a shared account with people who share your taste is that, if you want a book, they probably will too and may want to shill out the money themselves if you can’t.

3. Stay organized If You Share Audible Books

The first thing we did before canceling two of the three Audible accounts was to make a shared Google doc of all of the books in each person’s library.

We also jump into that document when we’ve finished a book and have moved onto another one, and make note that someone is listening to a particular book and on which Audible account, so two people aren’t trying to listen to the same thing at the same time and messing up each other’s book marks.

4. Decide in advance who gets to use the credits

We switched to the 2 credits/month plan since it was still cheaper than 3 individual memberships, and since I almost never bought books outside of credits, I’m mostly going to just use those.

But before the credits appear, make some kind of agreement about who gets them.

5. If you’re all using the same kind of device, deactivate other devices

Audible allows you to have three mobile apps activated at the same time on the same account. Both of my parents and I have iPhones and are all using the iOS mobile app for our listening.

That meant that my mom had to deactivate her iPad for us to be able to share. Sacrifice, people. Its for the good of all.

6. Don’t be a plot ruiner

Sometimes in a shared Audible account, its hard to keep track of who has read which books yet.

Don’t assume that the people you’re sharing with have gotten to the end of whatever John Grisham book you’re listening too yet and blurt out the ending. Not cool, friends. (Ahem, MOM).

7. Don’t fill A Shared Audible account with just your weird shit

This rule and how you interpret it totally depends on the people you’re sharing your Audible account with, and the terms should be agreed upon from the beginning.

Even if you have similar tastes in books, your purchases will diverge slightly. That’s fine, but try to be conscientious of the other people’s tastes too, especially if you’re using credits to buy your weird pop psychology or obscure horror titles. Its not to say you can’t buy those books, just maybe give everyone plenty of warning. And put them on your own credit card.

8. Be adventurous

The flip side to the previous guideline is that sharing an account is an opportunity to listen to books you might otherwise have skipped right on by.

I probably won’t be salivating to read the next Bourne book after my dad is done listening to it, but I might give it a shot down the road. After all, he likes it, and we have similar tastes in other genres, so maybe I’ll like it too. Don’t automatically turn up your nose at the weird shit that pops up in the account – you never know what you’ll discover.

Can you share Audible books? 

Yes, but as these tips show, there are some tips for sharing an Audible account and not killing each other in the process. Start with communication, and go from there.

Do you share Audible books with someone? Do you have any suggestions to add to my list? Have other questions about how to use and listen to audiobooks? We put together a full list of the most FAQs about audiobooks here and how to download audiobooks here.