What is Library Extension, and why is it a Must-Have for Audiobook fans?

If you ever use a computer to browse for new audiobooks to listen to, Library Extension is a must-have and the most useful little thing you can get!

It’s simply a free browser add-on (plug-in) that will tell you whether an audiobook is available on Hoopla, Libby, or other audiobook services, so you can easily decide where you want to purchase or borrow a title.

What is Library Extension?

You can install Library Extension for Firefox, Chrome, and Edge browsers. It’s free!

It’s not particularly pretty, but it’s absolutely fantastic for anyone using several audiobook apps and will save you so much money!

To use it, follow your browser’s instructions for installing plug-ins. Search for “Library Extension” and set it up. Or go to the Library Extension website.

Once it’s up and running, you can have Library Extension show any subscriptions and services you use, e.g., Hoopla, Libby, Anyplay, Everand (formerly Scribd), Kobo, or stores like Libro.fm.

Whenever you look up a book on Audible, Amazon, or GoodReads, Library Extension will show you if the audiobook is available in one of the services you have set it up for.

You can see whether you can borrow it in Hoopla, Anyplay, Kobo Plus, or Everand. And you can also log into your Libby account, so it will show how many copies are available or how long the wait list is.

I even had it happen once that I looked up an ebook on Amazon that didn’t have an audiobook on Audible (yet), but had one in Everand!

Indie-published audiobooks sometimes take a while to go through Audible’s quality control, especially when they are also added to Whispersync.

How to use Library Extension (and why it’s a Must-Have)

To get more out of Hoopla and Everand

If you listen to a lot of audiobooks every month and use several digital audiobook services, Library Extension can help you get more out of your subscriptions with limited downloads, e.g., by letting you plan whether you want to listen to a book in Everand or Hoopla.

Related article: What is Everand?

Hoopla doesn’t differentiate between “premium” content and other audiobooks, but Everand does. If you have both audiobook apps, I highly recommend that you get “premium” audiobooks, e.g. the newest traditionally published titles or BookTok bestsellers, in Hoopla.

That way, you can get more “midlist” or “backlist” audiobooks on Everand without being throttled.

Everand only lets you download about two or three very new and popular audiobooks per billing period. Hoopla has a flat number of downloads (usually 5 to 10 depending on your library).

But Everand doesn’t limit by number of books or length. You can download many, many more backlist and indie-published audiobooks.

Library Extension helps you to use this excellent strategy to get the most out of both subscriptions and get much more listening out of Everand, while still being able to borrow all those newest bestsellers.

To Shop Wide

Audible is an excellent audiobook subscription, it really is. And I love using it. But Amazon is problematic. And every time you can buy or download a book elsewhere, it helps to erode Audible’s immense power over audiobook creators (which they sadly don’t use for good).

With Library Extension, you can quickly see if you can buy or borrow an audiobook on another website or if it’s Audible-exclusive.

Related article: Are Audible Exclusives Bad?

Audible pays audiobook creators comparatively low royalties. When authors and publishers decide to offer their audiobook wide, they only receive 20% royalties from Audible sales. Other stores pay much more!

So, your favorite author simply earns more from your purchase if you buy the audiobook anywhere but on Audible, e.g. on Libro.fm or Audiobooks.com.

To find more Audiobooks

Not every audiobook service has a good recommendations feature. Everand, for example, doesn’t have useful recommendations and their catalog isn’t easy to browse. You can’t sort by release date or filter by length.

Libro.fm has truly excellent recommendations and they are also a fantastic and ethical audiobook store that I cannot recommend enough to you. But it is also a bit more expensive than others and, if you listen to more than 3 or 4 audiobooks a month, it’s likely that you can’t afford to get them all from Libro.

But Library Extension also shows on Libro.fm. So, you can use their website or the convenient filters on Audible to browse for new books, and then decide where to get the audiobook based on the browser add-on.

Is Library Extension perfect?

Unfortunately, in my experience, Library Extension is not always 100% reliable. I’ve had books show up as available on Hoopla that had a Hoopla page but were not downloadable.

And sometimes, the plug-in claims a book is not available anywhere other than on Audible, when, in fact, it is offered in other stores. In my experience, this happens regularly when a book title has an apostrophe!

It can help to check out the publisher of an audiobook. Tantor, HarperAudio, and Macmillan add most of their audiobooks to libraries and Everand.

PenguinAudio, however, only sells their audiobooks on Audible, Libro.fm, Audiobooks.com, and other stores, and only rarely adds titles to Libby.

I hope these pointers will help you to use Library Extension to get more out of your library card and audiobook subscriptions.

Happy listening!

Eline

Eline Blackman (pronouns: she/they) fell in love with books as a child – with being read to and reading herself. 10 years ago, she bought her first Audible book. It was love at first listen! An average of 250 audiobooks per year has become the new normal and you will rarely see Eline without a wireless earbud. Romance and Fantasy are the go-to genres for this audiobook fan.