With over one million titles, Scribd is a popular e-book subscription platform that offers you a wide variety of e-books, audiobooks, magazines, sheet music, and other types of documents. Scribd is also convenient for college students.
However, if you prefer to read books or go through documents on your device rather than on Scribd’s website, don’t worry. Scribd allows you to download TXT and PDF files on your device in a couple of quick steps. Knowing how to download PDF files from Scribd can be extremely useful and practical, saving you a lot of time.
In this guide, we will show you how to download PDF files from Scribd across different devices. We will also answer some common questions regarding Scribd’s downloading options.
Download Scribd PDFs From the Website
To use many of Scribd’s services, you need to create an account. By signing up for an account, you will get the first 30 days for free. After the 30-day trial ends, you have to pay $8.99 a month for a Premium account, which offers you an unlimited number of books and documents.
Apart from the option to access various content, Scribd allows you to download PDF and TXT files to your device. Keep in mind that you won’t be able to download specific files during your 30-day free trial. Those files will only be available to you once you become a Premium user.
To download PDF files from Scribd on your computer, follow the steps below:
- Open Scribd.
- Log into your account if you haven’t already.
- Find the document you want to download. You can either search for it in the community document library or by typing in the name of the file, the author’s name, or any keyword, in the search bar.
- When you find the document that you want to download, click on it.
- You will be taken to a new page where you can see all the details of the file.
- Click on the Download button.
- Set your file type to PDF – You can also download a TXT file.
- Select Download document.
That’s all there is to it. The file will automatically be downloaded to your computer, and you can view it immediately.
You’ll only find out that a particular file isn’t available for download when you reach the last step. At that point, Scribd will notify you that that particular document is only available for Premium users. If you open the file preview page and you don’t see the download button, this means that the author of that document doesn’t allow their file to be downloaded, even with a Premium account.
Download Scribd PDFs From the Android App
When it comes to the mobile version of Scribd, you can’t actually download files straight to your device. Instead, Scribd gives you the option to download files and store them in your Script library. You can access and read the downloaded documents, even when you are offline (which is an option that isn’t available on the web version).
To download files on an Android device, follow the steps below:
- Open the Scribd app on your phone.
- Log in to the app if you haven’t already.
- Find the book or document you want to download.
Note: There are a couple of ways you can find a document on Scribd. Firstly, you can tap on the magnifying glass at the bottom of your screen and type in the author’s name, the title of the document, or a keyword. If you have previously saved a document, you can find it by accessing the Saved icon that’s right next to the Search option. Lastly, you can search for a document by going to “Books” at the top of your screen or “Top Charts” at the bottom of the screen.
- When you find the document you want to download, tap on it.
- Tap Download.
The document you downloaded will be in the “Saved” tab. The difference between the items you saved and the items you downloaded is that you will be able to access the downloaded items even when you’re offline.
Download Scribd PDFs From the iOS App
The same rule applies to iOS devices, whether it’s an iPhone or an iPad. You can’t download any type of file from Scribd on your device; you can only download it to your saved list and read it offline. Here’s how it’s done on the iOS App:
- Open Scribd on your iOS device.
- Log in to your account if you haven’t already.
- Locate the document that you want to download.
- Tap on the file.
- Go to the Download button.
Note: Don’t forget to toggle the “Downloaded” switch in the upper-right corner of your Saved page. If you ignore this step, you won’t be able to access your files when you’re offline.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is There a Way to Download Premium Content for Free?
As we mentioned before, there are certain files you can only download if you have a Premium account. However, there are a couple of ways to go around it, and we’ll show you how.
The first method of downloading premium content for free is by uploading a file. This is what you should do:
1. Open Scribd on your computer
.
2. Log in to your account if you haven’t already.
3. Go to the Upload option near the upper-right corner of your screen.
4. Click on the Select Documents to Upload button.
5. Type in the name of your file and the description.
6. Tick the Make this document private box if you want to.
7. Click Done.
You’ve successfully uploaded a file to Scribd. Make sure to refresh the page, and you’re good to go. Now there are no limitations to the amount and type of files you can download. This hidden feature is very convenient if you don’t want to pay for a Premium account.
There are a few things you should take into consideration when uploading a document to Scribd:
· Scribd supports the following file formats: PDF, TXT, DOC, PPT, XLS, DOCX, and more.
· You can’t upload an empty document. It has to contain some type of text.
· Make sure to submit your own work – It can be a presentation, a research paper, a project, etc. Just make sure you’re not submitting someone else’s work.
If you don’t want to publish anything, there is another option. You can use a Free Online Scribd Downloader that can download Premium content for free. All you need is the document’s URL. You don’t even need to log into your Scribd account for this option.
Here are some websites that you can use to download Premium content without having to pay for it:
· DocDownloader
· ScrDownloader
· DLSCRIB
All you have to do is copy the document’s URL from the Scribd page and paste it into one of these websites. Your books will be downloaded in a matter of moments.
Can I Download Books That Have No Download Option?
The download option is disabled for particular files on Scribd. You will know that this option doesn’t exist if you can’t see the “Download” button or if you get this message “This document is not available for download.”
However, it is still possible to download these types of files, even without the download button.
The first option is to use a third-party website to download the Scribd file for free. All you need to do is copy the file’s URL from the address bar and paste it into one of the Scribd download websites we listed in the previous question.
There is another way to download files that don’t have the download button on Scribd. You can do this by using a Chrome plugin to save web pages as PDF files. One of the most reliable options for this is PDF Mage.
However, this option only allows you to convert a web page such as Scribd to a PDF file. It doesn’t allow you to download the file as a whole.
Once you add the plugin to your Chrome, all you need to do is go to your Scribd document and click on the plugin icon in the upper-right corner of your screen. You can choose if you want your PDF file to be saved as one page or more.
Enjoy All Your Scribd Books for Free
Now you know how to download PDF files and books from Scribd on all your devices. You also know how to add files to Scribd, download Premium files for free, and download files that aren’t available on the Scribd page. Downloading PDF files on your device gives you much more options than just accessing files on the web.
Have you ever downloaded a PDF file from Scribd to your device? Did you use any of the methods outlined in this article? Let us know in the comments section below.