Amazon rebrands Kindle Unlimited as Kindle+ and expands access to audiobooks, including titles narrated by AI (Maria Diaz/ZDNET)
Unlike narrated audiobooks from Audible and other providers, the audiobooks created with Virtual Voice in Kindle+ will instead be narrated by AI. — ZDNET's key takeaways
Amazon has renamed its Kindle Unlimited subscription to Kindle+, maintaining the same $12 monthly fee for unlimited reading. The upgrade expands the audiobook category to include more titles, such as those narrated by AI. This change grants authors the option to include more audiobooks in Kindle+, including those read by virtual voices.
Amazon offers the Virtual Voice service to authors in the Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) program at no cost. Authors enrolled in KDP can earn money based on pages read, not per download. While some may argue that AI-narrated books lack the human touch, the service provides authors the opportunity to expand their reach and earn additional income.
However, for readers who prefer human-narrated audiobooks, Audible and library platforms like Libby remain excellent alternatives. The main difference with Kindle+ is the expanded selection of audiobooks for subscribers, with no price increase.
Written by urgent.news from Techmeme's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
