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If you’ve created two different accounts for your kindle books by mistake, like me, you’ll want to consolidate your books into one account. i accidentally created different accounts for my computer and kindle, and my books got split. so i contacted amazon customer service and this is what i found out.
You are reading: Transfer kindle books to another account
You cannot transfer Kindle books from one Kindle account to another. You can download and transfer books from your Amazon library to a Kindle device via USB using a PC. but, if you are not using the same kindle account that you used to purchase the books, you will not be able to open the books.
However, there are ways to mitigate this problem. In this article, I’ll share with you some tips on what you can do if you want to read all the books you buy on a single Kindle device.
then, let’s get started!
why can’t you transfer kindle books from one account to another?
Sharing and transferring “physical” books was easy if you moved or just gave the book to a loved one! you’d think technology would make things easier, but sometimes it can also make things more complicated!
You cannot transfer kindle books from one account to another, as the books are protected using digital rights management (drm) technology. DRM protection allows you to control the use, modification, and distribution of copyrighted works. it is used to prevent the theft or exchange of intellectual property.
While there are several different ways to transfer kindle books in general, transferring kindle books from one kindle account to another violates the licenses created by amazon with the owner of the intellectual property (in this case, the kindle books).
IP rights, especially for digital licenses, are surprisingly quite complicated! in fact, even distribution rights and the price of the same book vary from country to country! that’s one of the main reasons why you may have noticed a difference in the price of a particular book for different countries.
On a side note: You can take advantage of the difference in price of a book from one country to another by visiting the amazon store in that country. I have written a detailed article on how to change kindle account country and make use of this loophole. be sure to check it out!
In short, there is no easy way to transfer kindle books from one amazon account to another. even if amazon allows you to transfer the book files, you just won’t be able to read the books when you use another account!
what to do when you can’t transfer kindle books to another account?
something that makes me wonder is why won’t amazon tell you that you won’t be able to transfer books to another amazon account right when you buy your first book with them. It’s pretty annoying to find this out after you’ve amassed a huge library of kindle books!
As annoying as it is, you’re not left with too many options at this point. but there are a couple of things you can do:
1. consolidate books on your kindle device
While you can’t transfer books from one kindle account to another, interestingly enough, if you’ve downloaded a book to your kindle device, you can continue to access and read it even when you change the kindle account on your device.
Basically, you need to consolidate the books on the device instead of transferring them to a different account. once you’re done with this process, simply stop using one of the two kindle accounts to purchase books in the future.
This is what you need to do to make this work:
- identify which kindle account, between the two, you want to cancel.
- on your kindle, sign in to the amazon account you want to cancel.
- if your kindle is registered with the account you want to continue, so switch accounts on kindle and sign in to your other account.
- download all the books from your amazon library to your device .
- turn off airplane mode and make sure you can access them offline.
- now go back to the original kindle account or the account you want to retain (click the link in step 3 for how).
that’s it! You will notice that you now have all the books from your other amazon account on your kindle device while logged in to your main amazon account! If you can’t register your kindle device when you switch accounts, check out my troubleshooting guide on how to fix problems when you can’t register your kindle.
once everything is set up, remember to purchase books using the account you have held on your kindle device!
The main drawback of this method is that you will not be able to sync the kindle books that are present on your device (only the ones that were purchased with another kindle account) with the kindle cloud.
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therefore, you will not be able to read or take advantage of the different ways to access your kindle account. you will always have to carry your kindle with you (which is not a big deal).
The other drawback is that if your kindle device is too old, this may not work for you as you may be limited by space on the device. In addition, it has been reported that some of the older kindles (generation 3 or lower) were unable to log back in when you deregister an account on your kindle device.
2. use drm removal tools
another thing you can do is use any drm protection removal tool to remove drm from kindle books. then convert them to another file format like a pdf file and transfer the books to a kindle device registered to another account.
There are various free and paid drm protection tools available on the internet. a simple google search will return several results.
one thing to remember is that drm protection decryption is not exactly considered legal. so use this method at your own discretion. Personally, I wouldn’t recommend you use this method. but, if you’re really desperate and there’s no other way out, then use your own discretion.
3. create an amazon home and allow family sharing
Another way to overcome the problem of transferring books from one kindle account to another is to create an amazon home and enable the kindle family library.
Doing so will allow you to add another Amazon account to a household. usually the other account is that of a spouse. however, if you don’t expect to associate your kindle account with your spouse’s, this method will work just fine for you!
once enabled, you can share, access and read all books on both kindle accounts. It’s a completely free and legal way to access books on both kindle accounts at the same time!
Be sure to click the links above to see my detailed articles on how to enable this. Also, check out my other article if you have any issues sharing books to your kindle library.
transfer unlicensed books to another account
Licensed books are restricted by drm which makes it difficult for people to download them without conditions like scheduled expiration, copy paste cancellation, sharing limitations, etc.
However, there is a vast majority of books that are not licensed to be controlled in this way. once you have a copy, you have a copy even if you don’t have permission for resale or redistribution. obviously, you’ll have to look outside of amazon to get these books.
To transfer unlicensed books from another account, you must download the books to your computer’s hard drive, then convert the book to a universal format and use a USB cable to copy it to your new device. Since cloud storage is on, the book will sync to the cloud on your new device.
When you buy a new kindle or create a new amazon account, you should expect that most of the books you’ve bought are unlicensed so you can transfer them whenever you want and share them with whomever you want.
You can easily transfer non-drm books to a kindle device using the ship to kindle email address or transfer such books from one kindle device to another. so with those books, it doesn’t matter what kindle account you are using, as you can easily move these kind of books.
That said, you should be aware that amazon doesn’t sync all books like it does with kindle books. This means that you must give Amazon permission to store your offline books (including the unlicensed ones you just transferred) in your Kindle account.
To sync non-amazon books to kindle, you must first enable whisper device sync by following the steps below.
- open your preferences page from your amazon account
- navigate to the content and devices section
- turn on whisper device sync.
then you need to turn on personal document archiving, which will ensure that all the files on your kindle, even outside of the kindle ebook library, end up syncing with your kindle cloud. for that, you will follow the steps below.
- In the “content and devices” section, click the “preferences” tab at the top.
- scroll down and find “personal document settings”.
- enable personal document archiving in the personal document settings section.
Since you’ve turned on these two sync modes, any unlicensed, non-Kindle eBooks that you copy to your Kindle device’s hard drive via USB will be synced to your Kindle Cloud.
can you change the kindle account on the device without losing the books on the device?
Switching a kindle account is a good option if you got your device from a friend or just want to use your newer amazon account.
Because the kindle asks you to sign in or register when you first turn it on, some people end up creating a new account, which is inconvenient when they want to consolidate their library.
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You can change your kindle account on your device without losing the books if the books are located on the device’s hard drive and are not associated with the kindle cloud reader. books in the kindle cloud can only be accessed with the respective kindle cloud account.
This is what it means for you when you unregister the device from one account and log in from another.
- ebooks you downloaded from web browsers like chrome and opera are safe.
- ebooks you transferred from usb, wi-fi transfer and gdrive are safe.
- E-books you purchased on an amazon account previously associated with your kindle are at risk of losing all stats and syncing, but typically remain on your device for further access and reading.
- ebooks you access in kindle cloud reader will not be available if they are not in the library of your new account.
alternative options to access kindle books on another account
However, you are not destined to lose all your kindle books if you sign in with a new account. There are alternatives to help you navigate this migration by turning the books in your Kindle Cloud into books that are secure at the time of migration. As mentioned above, these books are primarily those that are downloaded via the web (not through an Amazon store) or transferred via USB or other non-Amazon methods.
option 1: share a kindle book you own
This method can be used to share a book you own with someone you know, or to get the book from your amazon account online to your kindle hard drive, so you don’t lose it when you leave your account on Amazon. the book appears. be trapped
related article: how to share kindle books with family using kindle family sharing?
Either way, the process is the same, starting with getting the book out of the Amazon ecosystem.
step 1: get the e-book out of the amazon ecosystem
To do this, you’ll first download the book from your Kindle content library to your Kindle hard drive. Because books don’t use a lot of internet bandwidth, most people rely on the cloud reader and don’t actually download their books.
but if you’re sharing your entire library with one of your newer accounts, you’ll need to download all the books to your hard drive.
then you will need to connect the reader to your computer and browse your hard drive for .azw files.
you can open the documents folder and open the “my kindle” folder nested within it to copy all available .azw and other kindle ebook files or you can simply search for the following extensions and copy the files shown on your kindle disk.
- .azw
- .azw3
- .kfx
step 2: convert kindle ebooks to universal reading format
This step is optional in the context of sharing books from one kindle to another. however, to be safe and out of the prying eyes of amazon, it is still recommended to convert the books using a kindle converter, so that the books appear as if they came from a source other than the kindle store.
This step will avoid possible penalties that Amazon could impose on libraries that appear to have books in Kindle format without a trace of purchase showing the source.
Currently, there are no such penalties, and if you can get a kindle book from the documents/my kindle folder from one kindle to another, the books will be readable.
step 3: send the book to another account
here, the mode of delivery will vary depending on where the new account is primarily used.
If you want to transfer books to a new kindle, you need to connect the second kindle while signed in to the new amazon account; and transfer the kindle books to your computer and then to your new kindle’s hard drive.
If you scroll up and follow the instructions to sync personal documents, these books will be added to your new kindle account as personal documents. alternatively, you could be planning to use the new account on the same kindle.
For that, you simply need to unregister your kindle device once the data has been copied to a computer, sign in to the new account and copy the files (converted or not) to your kindle hard drive.
again, turn on personal document sync and your books will be in the kindle cloud for your new account.
option 2: lend a kindle book to another account
If you feel overwhelmed reading the above because you didn’t mean to copy your entire library to a new account and just wanted to send an interesting book to a sibling or friend, you can legally lend most kindle books.
To borrow a kindle book, you must open your amazon account and click the “manage your content and devices” button to view your library. Click the actions button next to an eligible title and click “Lend this title.” enter the recipient’s account email and the book will be sent to you temporarily
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