Kindle Users to Be Able to Borrow Library E-Books

Amazon said on Wednesday that it would allow Kindle users to read e-books from more than 11,000 public libraries on the devices beginning later this year, a reversal of the company’s previous policy.

“We’re excited that millions of Kindle customers will be able to borrow Kindle books from their local libraries,” Jay Marine, director of Kindle at Amazon, said in a statement.

Until now, library users who borrowed e-books could read them on Barnes & Noble’s Nook, the Sony Reader, the Kobo reader, and on laptops and smartphones.

Librarians, who have grown accustomed to telling disappointed Kindle owners that they cannot be used for free library e-books, said they were relieved that Amazon was opening its device and its Kindle app to libraries.

“That’s always the question we get — you lend out e-books? How can I get them on my Kindle?” said Ingvild Herfindahl, the children’s librarian at the Kasson Public Library in Kasson, Minn. “People will be thrilled.”

Bobbi L. Newman, who writes the blog Librarian by Day and is a manager at the Richland County Public Library in Columbia, S.C., said Amazon’s decision proved that libraries were “a key player” in the e-book business.

“We’ve been waiting for Amazon to play ball with libraries since they came out with the Kindle,” Ms. Newman said. “Even Amazon can’t overlook us anymore.”

E-book use in libraries has been growing at a rapid pace, particularly in the last year as more consumers have bought e-readers. The New York Public Library said last month that e-book use in its system was 36 percent higher than it was one year ago.

Some publishers have remained uneasy about allowing their e-books to be borrowed from libraries at all. Borrowers can download the books easily from home, so there is less incentive to buy. Two major publishers, Simon & Schuster and Macmillan, have still not allowed their e-books to be available in libraries.

HarperCollins, which has allowed its e-books to be lent by libraries, angered librarians last month when it announced a new policy requiring that e-books be checked out only 26 times before they expire, forcing libraries to buy them again.

Roberta A. Stevens, the president of the American Library Association, said that considering the growth of e-books in libraries, Amazon’s decision was all but inevitable.

“I can’t say that I’m surprised,” she said. “They were just shutting off a whole part of the market place. It’s just logical that this would happen.”

Amazon said it would work with OverDrive, a large provider of e-books to public libraries and schools.

Barnes & Noble introduced its first e-reader, the Nook, in 2009 and opened it up to library e-books.

“This is not news for Nook customers who have always had access to library services on their Nook Color, Nook and Nook Wi-Fi devices given Barnes & Noble’s open platform and Adobe technology partnership,” Mary Ellen Keating, a spokeswoman for Barnes & Noble, said in an e-mail.