A monthly subscription for Amazon’s Kindle Unlimited program, which grants unlimited access to a library of ebooks, audiobooks, magazines and comics, normally costs $9.99 per month. But if you are savvy it is entirely possible to go long stretches, even a full year, without paying anything.
I’ve had a Kindle Unlimited membership since November 2018 and have not paid for a single month. Granted I buy each new Kindle that comes out, but with all the promotions and free offers it’s easy to get access to the full Kindle Unlimited catalog for free most of the time.
Since 2018 there have been a few weeks here and there, but no longer than a month, where I did not have an active subscription, but if you keep up with the free offers the lapses are minimal.
This year Amazon has been offering 2 months free since at least February, and the promotion is still active through June 30th.
All you have to do is claim the free 2 months of Kindle Unlimited offer and then cancel before the two months is up.
In fact you can cancel the auto-renew setting immediately after claiming the 2 months free offer and you’ll still get access for the full 2 months without being charged afterward.
Then when the term has ended, you can claim another free offer. I’ve started a new 2 months free promotion the day after a previous free offer has ended.
The only catch with these free offers is they don’t work if you have an active subscription, so you have to wait until the term has ended before claiming another free offer, and the way it’s setup Amazon will automatically start charging you $9.99 per month after the free trial if you don’t cancel.
Another way to get Kindle Unlimited for free is to buy a new Kindle. Each Kindle has the option to add 3 months of Kindle Unlimited for free when purchasing from Amazon directly, and the free months will get added to an active subscription if you have one.
Sometimes Amazon offers 6 months free when purchasing a Kindle, like with the new Kindle Paperwhite Hunger Games bundle. Amazon offers 3 months for $1 sometimes too.
Even if there comes a time when you completely run out of free offers, you can almost always get Kindle Unlimited at a discounted price. Like right now Kindle Unlimited gift subscriptions are 20%-40% off the regular price, depending on the length of term you choose.
Either way you should never pay the full price of $9.99 per month for Kindle Unlimited. Between all the sales and free offers you never have to pay the full amount. The only hassle is Amazon often doesn’t advertise the free offers and sales, but you can keep track of current deals on the Kindle Unlimited section of this website.
I was only able to take advantage of the 2 free months offer once. My subscription ended a couple weeks ago, but I still get “this promotion has already been redeemed” when I click the link now. Not that I’m really complaining. Like you, I’ve had it more on than off over the past couple years and never at full price.
I’ve been able to get Kindle Unlimited for free multiple times–but it was a different offer each time. So, after June 30th, the next time they have an offer, you should be able to re-enroll.
Interesting. I wonder why it works for some and not others? I would expect them to cap the free trials eventually but so far I haven’t had any issues claiming them. But I’ve also had other free offers when buying new Kindles so maybe I haven’t claimed enough of the 2 month offers yet. My current subscription ends June 12th so I guess I’ll soon find out.
I had a sub and it was due to end I made sure to borrow 10 books and turn off wifi on my kindle. Now I can read the books at my leisure
What a great idea!
Ooooh that’s an excellent idea!!
Heh heh – might not be such a good idea to draw attention to the *apparent loophole* in Amazon’s KU subscription…
I’ve been doing mostly the same thing myself since sometime in 2017. I do take advantage of every *free* offer they hand out, but also pony up the exorbitant fee of 99 cents or $1.99 for two- or three-month subscriptions a couple or three times during the year.
I find that I usually have to wait anywhere from four to seven days after one subscription ends before it will let me resubscribe for a freebie period.
How do you find out when they do the 99¢ or $1.99 deals? I ran across one once, afew years ago, but haven’t seen one since.
What kills me is the wait time it takes to send in your old kindle to get a new one. I have over 100 books on it and am always reading from it. I’ve been waiting over a year to buy another because it would take so much time to get the new kindle with all my books on it included. How do you deal with that?
I don’t understand what long wait you’re talking about. You can initiate a trade during checkout.
I didn’t know you could do this!!! I was looking at trade-in, I sent in my device and it’s been two weeks waiting to get the gift card back and a 20% off coupon for my next Kindle. I didn’t realize you could get all of this during check out =(
I’ve been a kindle unlimited e-reader member for at least five years I pay kindle unlimited the £7:99 per month all of a sudden all I get up on my e-reader is join kindle it’s impossible to read now on it yet the moneys still going out of my monthly account