Can I open a book in Apple Books (formerly iBooks)?

Apple users can read Bookshare books in the EPUB format on their computers and mobile devices using Apple's Books app (formerly called iBooks).

Books on macOS

Download EPUB

  1. Log in to your Bookshare account.
  2. Search for a book using the search box at the top of the page.
  3. After finding the book in the search results, select EPUB from the download format drop-down menu, then select the Download button.
  4. You’ll then be taken to your My History page. Select the Available or Downloaded link next to the status of the book to save it to your computer.

Open Books

    1. Locate the EPUB file on your computer. Unless you’ve changed your browser settings, books should save to your Downloads folder by default.
    2. Double-click the file, or select the file and press Command + O, to open it in Books.
    3. To listen to the audio, highlight the text that you’d like to hear. Next, right-click and select More < Start Speaking. To stop the audio, right-click the text and select More < Stop Speaking. You can also start the audio by selecting the Edit menu at the top of the screen, then Speech < Start Speaking.

A screenshot of a book opened in Books. One paragraph of the text is highlighted, with the two menus open on the right side of the screen. The Start Speaking button is highlighted on the second menu.

If you have an iOS device that is registered with the same Apple ID, you can use iCloud to sync books between your devices. For more information about syncing Books across devices, please visit https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202759.

Books on iOS

Download EPUB

  1. On the iPad, launch an internet browser and navigate to Bookshare, and log in to your account.
  2. Search for a book using the search box at the top of the page.
  3. After finding the book in the search results, select EPUB from the download format drop-down menu, then select the Download button.
  4. You’ll then be taken to your My History page. Select the Available or Downloaded link next to the status of the book to save it to your device.
  5. Select the Open in Books button to save the EPUB file to Books.

Open Books

Once you’ve opened the book in Books, you can use Apple’s built in Text to Speech feature to listen to the book. Before you can use this feature, you’ll need to enable Text to Speech and word-highlighting:

  1. Go to Settings on your iOS device.
  2. Select General, then Accessibility.
  3. Under Accessibility settings, select Speech.
  4. Under Speech settings, enable Speak Selection, Speak Screen, and Highlight Content. 

Once Text to Speech is enabled:

    1. Open your book in Books. For best results, please disable Scrolling View in Books settings.
    2. Swipe down with two fingers from the top of the screen to start listening from the top of the page.
    3. To listen to a particular paragraph, tap and hold on the text to highlight it, then select the Speak button to start the audio. To stop the Text to Speech, select the Pause button.

A screenshot of an open book in the mobile Books app. A paragraph of the text is highlighted below a black toolbar. The Speak button, on the far left side of the toolbar, is highlighted with a red border.

For more help using Books, please review the Books Support page.