How many people can share an Amazon Kindle Unlimited subscription?

Best answer: Amazon Kindle Unlimited is linked to one Prime membership. Only the primary user can borrow free ebooks; however, that user can freely share borrowed e-books with other Amazon Household members. 

What is Amazon Kindle Unlimited?

Amazon Kindle Unlimited is a subscription service that grants you access to over four million ebooks, as well as thousands of magazines and audiobooks, all for $12 per month. You can read or listen to this content on Amazon's Kindle Fire tablets or e-ink tablets, as well as any device with a Kindle app. 

I've been a subscriber for several years and have found many of my favorite books and titles on the service. For example, both the Harry Potter and Hunger Games series are available on Amazon Kindle Unlimited, and reading them via subscription is way cheaper than purchasing the titles individually. 

Amazon often runs promotions where you can sign up for multiple months of Kindle Unlimited at a time (two, six, or even 12) for a discounted rate per month. Most recently, Amazon promised three free months of Kindle Unlimited during Prime Day. If you're an avid reader, it's a great deal.

Once you're subscribed, you can borrow up to 20 eligible Kindle Unlimited titles at a time, as well as any number of magazines that don't count against your limit. You can browse the dedicated Kindle Unlimited library, or you'll see eligible books with the Kindle Unlimited badge in standard search results. If you've run out of space, you can just return some titles and re-borrow them later.

Kindle Unlimited is currently available in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, UK, Brazil, Japan, India, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and Australia. The total number of e-books has climbed by one million since last year, which hopefully means you'll find more titles that strike your interest.

How many people can share an Amazon Kindle Unlimited subscription?

A Kindle Unlimited subscription is associated with one Amazon Prime account. If your family all uses the same Prime login, you can all access borrowed e-books on separate Kindles or computers. But if you have separate Amazon accounts, you'll need to set up an Amazon Household first before you can share Kindle Unlimited e-books.

With a Household, you can link two "adult" accounts, up to four "teen" accounts, and up to four "child" accounts under a single paid Prime membership. This allows two adults to have separate order histories and payment information, but to share their purchased e-books and audiobooks with one another. 

Amazon Household also lets the adults monitor teens' purchases, rather than give them free access to the main account. Kids won't be able to make payments, but they can see parent-approved e-books on their Amazon Fire Kids tablets. 

While Amazon Household gives everyone access to Prime shipping, discounted grocery delivery, Amazon Photos storage, and other perks, it doesn't share Kindle Unlimited or Amazon Music Unlimited by default. You can subscribe to a family plan for music, but Kindle Unlimited doesn't have a family option. 

How to share Amazon Kindle Unlimited ebook access

We have a guide on how to create an Amazon Household you can follow. The quick summary is that you must go to this Manage Your Household page and send an invitation for another adult or teen to log into their separate Amazon account, then approve your invite so the two accounts merge into one Household.

Then, on that same page, you must Manage Your Family Library and confirm whether you want to share all ebooks, audiobooks, and games by default or have to share them individually.

Even if you enable automatic sharing, the primary Kindle Unlimited user must initiate all borrows. So teen or linked adult accounts will only be able to access Unlimited e-books if they ask the main user to borrow and share them first. Otherwise, the store page will only show the option to buy the e-book or subscribe to Kindle Unlimited yourself. 

Once the primary user borrows a Kindle Unlimited book on the main account, the secondary user will see it in their shared library. Otherwise, they can go to the Digital Content page, search for the ebook in question, and send it to a linked Kindle device.

So that's how different people can access one Kindle Unlimited account! If one person borrowing for everyone sounds like too much work, multiple users can subscribe to Unlimited; otherwise, you'll just have to take advantage of the many ways to get low-cost (or free) e-books and content on your Kindle e-readers.