A Complete Guide To Develop Ebook Reader Mobile App

From traditional print books to digital modes, the shifting reading trends are making the ground for the expansion of the global ebook market. Besides, the devices gaining traction in this segment, such as Nook and Kindle, along with ebook reading apps, facilitate ebook reading on varied devices and smartphones.

Per research, by 2025, the global ebook market is anticipated to generate a revenue of about $15.6 billion.

The rising number of users in the eBooks segment is also contributing to increasing market valuation.

In the upcoming years, the number of users in the eBook segments is likely to increase and reach 92.9 million users between 2024 and 2027.

Don’t you think this is the right moment to acknowledge this surge as an opportunity and choose ebook app development as your next project? But how to create an ebook app? 

Not to fret! You have landed on the right page, and we will assist you as best we can. 

This comprehensive guide will help you with all relevant information essential for the seamless development process, like reasons to invest, types of ebook reader apps to build, steps to develop a successful app, ways to monetize, and more. By the end of this post, we can ensure you will have all the details for a profitable eBook reader app development. 

Let’s get started!

What are Ebook Reader Apps? 

The ebook Reader app lets the users enjoy reading their favorite books anytime and anywhere, converting devices into versatile books. 

Usually known as ebooks, such apps allow users to read digital books on their smartphones and tablets. They can even download such ebooks from various free and paid online sources and store them for later reading within the app. 

The best part about these apps is the features they incorporate that improve the users’ reading experience. Besides, you can adjust the brightness, font size, and color scheme to suit your reading specifications. With some apps, you can highlight text, bookmark pages, and make notes. 

In whatever format you download your ebook in PDF, MOBI2, and EPUB formats, you can run them using such apps. Such apps ease the handling of ebooks in every format with the aim of enhancing your reading experience.

Why You Should Develop a Mobile eReader App?

Are ebook mobile applications still sought-after in the ebook segment? Well, we need to check top market stats to understand this clearly. 

• The US holds a vast customer base and a robust digital infrastructure in the global eBooks market. 
• By 2029, user penetration will likely beat 9.6% and is expected to hit only 7.5% in 2024. 
• In the US, romance fiction is the top-selling ebook genre, responsible for around 39% of ebook sales.
• According to Statista, by the end of 2024, the eBook market revenue is expected to hit $236.4 m. 
• The projected market volume in 2029 is anticipated to reach $297.40 million with an annual CAGR of about 4.7%. 
• In 2027, the eBooks segment will reach a new peak with 1.1 billion users. 

Besides these facts and figures, the increasing adoption of digital reading devices is fueling this market segment. So, when every possible edge favors developing eBook apps, why shouldn’t you reap this advantage and grab a considerable market chunk? Mobile reader app development can be a promising venture. 

Types of eBook Reader Apps

Only building an app will not make any sense. You should know about every corner of the ebook segment to rule the market ahead. First, you should know what types of eBook reader apps you can create, aiming at your target audience and their interest. 

1. eBook Marketplace Apps

The digital platforms eBook marketplace apps drive a pathway for easy buying, selling, and renting digital books. By providing a space to the publishers, such apps allow them to list the ebooks they want to rent or sell and earn profits. Alternatively, buyers can rent or buy these books at their own convenience and interest. 

eBook Marketplace apps incorporate various features that provide an enhanced reading experience to the users, such as easy transactions with multiple payment gateways, the potential to download ebooks offline in PDF format, and audiobooks for a seamless hands-free reading experience. 

While removing the language barrier, these apps usually provide region-wise translation features that help users read and understand content from distinctive linguistic backgrounds. 

This way, eBook marketplace apps are showcased as a complete solution for meeting all-book-relevant requirements. 

Features:

• User Registration
• Search and filter
• Ebook catalog with publisher name, review, and more.
• Ebook preview with sample data
• Purchase and rent options
• Multiple payment gateways
• Offline access
• Reading tools
• Audiobooks
• Customer support

2. Dedicated Reading Apps

Some ebook platforms specifically designed for brands and companies are dedicated reading apps. For publishers, such apps appear as a digital storefront where they can list their publications and sell or rent them directly to their target audience or readers. 

Alternatively, as a branded app, such apps provide a digital presence to publishers who are looking to create an online presence in this online-centric world. Besides promoting their books, publishers can use such platforms to sell soft or hard copies of their books. 

One who’s looking to promote their publications can opt for dedicated reading apps. Opting for these apps, publishers can maintain complete records of their buying and selling transactions. 

Basically, dedicated reading apps are the most productive and profitable solution for publishers seeking to expand their horizons and ease their operations in this digital era. 

Features: 

• User Registration
• Search and filter
• Publication catalog
• Publication preview
• Multiple payment gateways
• Purchase and rent options
• Offline access
• Brand promotion
• Reading tools
• Sales record management

3. eBook Reader Apps for Online Education

Crafted explicitly for online education, eBook reader apps are digital platforms that allow students and teachers to easily access and interact with lots of educational digital content. Like the above-mentioned apps, such apps also support varied file formats, are feature-packed, and let users witness engaging and convenient learning experiences. 

Being accessible from any device, ebook reader apps provide ease to users, allowing them to learn with their grasping power anytime, anywhere. By encouraging continuous learning and growth, such apps are emerging as an optimal academic solution that educational institutions and organizations are increasingly adopting. 

By transforming the education approach, such apps make education more inclusive, dynamic, and learner-friendly. Even if the students can’t afford the materials, they can rent cheaply. This way, education is becoming more accessible and showcasing a sustainable business model. This ebook app is a win-win situation for the business and learners. 

Features:

• Multi-Device Access
• Interactive Learning Tools
• Support for Various Formats
• Offline Access
• Search Functionality
• Text-to-Speech
• User-Friendly Interface
• Regular Updates
• Integration with Learning Management Systems
• Privacy and Security

4. E-Reading Apps for Kids

Such digital platforms are explicitly developed for kids up to 7 years to encourage a sense of reading and learning in them in their building days. E-reading apps provide various interactive and engaging children’s stories, books, and educational content. 

One of the newest and most useful features of this app, eye care, includes a yellow or blue light filter that reduces eye strain. Besides, it can incorporate a timer that reminds kids to take breaks and avoid long screen time. 

Features:

• Interactive and fun
• Learning tools
• Wide range of books
• Read-aloud option
• Offline access
• Safe and kid-friendly
• Customizable text size and fonts
• Progress tracking

5. Niche-Specific E-book Reader App

Catering to a particular e-book readers subset, this ebook reader app is usually customized to meet the unique requirements of specific reader groups.  Besides offering a platform for ebook reading, such apps arrive with exceptional features that improve the reading experience of the target audience. They support numerous e-book formats, such as PDF, FB2, MOBI, and EPUB, to ease readers in every way. 

Besides aiming at the reading functionality while building a niche-specific e-book reader app, developers need to focus on the content it offers. Such apps emerge as a platform for authors seeking reviews and feedback from researchers going perfectly with their book’s niche. 

Features:

• Support for Various Formats
• Adding Notes and Bookmarks
• Screen Brightness Adjustments
• Night Mode
• Customizable Fonts
• Text Translation
• Gamification Features
• Library Organization
• Customizable Reading Experience
• Dedicated Library Management

The above are a few ebook apps businesses can develop to expand their market and sell or rent their books to maximize profit. 

Step-By-Step Guide On How To Create An Ebook App

Now that you have decided which ebook app to build, it’s time to learn how to create one to give your business an online presence. 

Below are the steps that you can follow:

Step #1: Market Research & Ideation

While kickstarting ebook app development, first, you should conduct deep market research to know what’s buzzing around the globe in this segment, the ruling giants, and their weaknesses and strengths. 

Now, depending on your market research, it’s time to decide what features you want to include in your app and make it outstanding. 

Tip*: Consider weaknesses as an opportunity and incorporate the features that can beat them. 

Step #2: Planning and Design

In this phase, you must outline the project plan, highlighting the features, functionalities, and development timeline. You can define the development platform you choose, your target audience, and your technical needs. 

Also, design a visually appealing and intuitive UI/UX for your ebook app in which you create fully-fledged wireframes and prototypes. By making them undergo testing, you can locate and erect the issues before moving on to the development phase. 

Tip*: Design your app accordingly to entice the target audience and make them return repeatedly. 

Step #3: Development

In the development stage, you choose the right tech stack, including the appropriate programming languages and frameworks for your ebook app. 

Tip*: Choose responsive frontend elements and useful backend functionalities to make your app interactive and engaging. 

Step #4: Testing & Quality Assurance

Time to test the ebook app you develop, allowing it to undergo rigorous testing. This way, errors will be addressed and rectified to ensure smooth performance. 

Step #5: Deployment and Launch

Now, as your app is set to launch with no errors and seamless performance, you can deploy its code on the app stores and wait for approval. After receiving it, your app will be available publicly for end users. 

Only building and launching an app doesn’t drive profit. For that, you need to promote it through varied options, like loyalty programs, running campaigns, connecting influencers, etc. 

Step #6: Post-Launch Support and Updates

After launching your app, there comes the need for consistent maintenance and support. Preferring to release frequent updates, new features, and functionalities, you can make your app stay competitive, matching the steps of advanced trends and technologies. 

Following these steps, you can ensure the development of a valuable and fully functional ebook app for your business. 

How To Make Money with eBook Mobile Apps?

Obviously, app owners roll out their apps in the market to make money. 

You can also monetize your eBook reading app to earn money and generate revenue without funding. 

1. In-app Advertisement Space

You can rent your app’s space to related advertisers to let them publish their advertisements and earn from there. 

In this revenue model, you can make your eBooks available to readers totally free. 

2. Paid App/Paid Content

Also known as premium apps, the paid apps cost users a one-time fee to download from the app stores.

In a mobile reading app, you can witness income coming from users’ upfront payments. They will pay you for the app download from the app stores or individual book downloads. 

You can choose any of these ways to earn money, but be sure you make the process streamlined. 

3. Freemium

In such a business model, users are not charged any app downloading cost. But, they are offered an in-app purchase option to access premium features, digital goods, or additional content. 

Considering the online book reading app, you can follow the “try before your buy” option to the users, where you can provide some basic services and books for free. But, ahead of that, you can offer them a premium subscription they need to buy to get exclusive features. 

4. Subscription

App subscriptions are recurring payments users need to pay in exchange for access to premium features, content, or services. 

In on-demand book reading apps, you can follow this monetization model by offering monthly or annual subscriptions despite charging for separate books or providing anything free. 

5. Additional Services for Authors

You can provide cover design, marketing, and editing services to your app’s book authors to improve their books. It will ensure top-quality content while you control your eBooks’ quality. 

6. Sponsors & Partner

You can make money from your app by partnering with the same client base. You can just add partner advertisements to your app and ask them to place your ads in their apps. Later, you can provide an integrated experience and bring a 3rd-party app’s features into yours’. 

Popular Ebook Apps Available

1. NOOK by Barnes & Noble

Available for: iOS, Android

Price: Free

You can get this app for free and enjoy your top-fav digital content. It offers a vast online library holding 4+ million eBooks, comics, graphic novels, magazines, and more. Besides, you will get 300,000 audiobooks. Multiple fonts, page styles, social sharing tools, and bookshelves will offer you a customized experience. 

Top Features

• Purchased content will automatically appear in the app. 
• 75,000+ free eBooks
• 10,000+ free audiobooks
• Customizable listening and reading.
• Add bookmarks, notes, and highlights.
• Sleep timer option to coordinate audiobooks listening to schedule. 
• Store content in the cloud or on the device. 

2. Scribd: Audiobooks & ebooks

Available for: iOS, Android

Price: Free; Offers In-App Purchases

You may download Scribd to access its digital library and access magazine articles, audiobooks, sheet music, podcasts, and more. Its ad-free experience will let you access some best audiobooks and ebooks free of cost for new members. 

Top Features

• Audiobooks and ebooks across various genres.
• Articles from various magazines. 
• Narration speed customization
• A sleep timer
• Download eBooks for offline reading. 
• Customize background color, font size, and type

3. Apple Books

Available for: iOS

Price: Free

Apple Books is the only destination for bookworms, allowing users to browse the Book store and access the best book to read. They can track their reading and choices and even set their Reading Goals, all in a single app and across various Apple devices.

Top Features

• Library organization into collections.
• Find and add books.
• Automatically turn to auto-night when reading in the dark. 
• Help authors in publishing books. 
• Reading goals
• Search for books you want to read.

4. Google Play Books

Available for: iOS, Android

Price: Free

Using this on-demand book reading app, you can buy and enjoy audiobooks, ebooks, manga, and comics. 

You can pick from various best-selling books, textbooks, comics, audiobooks, and manga. You just need to download books you want to read and listen to them. After completing listening, you can pick the next recommendation personalized exclusively for you. With a subscription, you can buy ebooks and audiobooks. 

Top Features

• Preview samples of millions of books for free
• Offline access to books
• Personalized recommendations
• Automatic night mode setting
• Allow adding notes that sync with Google Drive with easy sharing

5. Kobo Books – eBooks Audiobooks

Available for: iOS, Android

Price: Free

With 5+ million titles to pick from, you can use Kobo Books to meet almost all your reading and listening requirements. 

This eBook reading app allows users to browse the latest collection of the globe’s best audiobooks, eBooks, graphic novels, and more. 

Top Features:

• Customized experience of reading and listening to eBooks
• Easy-to-use player 
• Recommendations for users
• Allow the usage of different devices for accessing current tasks
• Offers books with reviews and ratings
• Read in different languages

6. Amazon Kindle

Downloads: 100M+

Whether you are on the bus, lounging on your couch, or on a break, you can read your books, comics, magazines, etc., with just a click on Amazon Kindle. On this app, you can find millions of Kindle books, explore new releases and titles across varied genres, unlimited reading and listening, and a lot more. 

Top Features:

• Reading progress tracker
• Built-in X-Ray, Wikipedia, dictionary, etc.
• Bookmark, highlight, and take notes
• Sync your book across varied devices

7. Wattpad – Read & Write Stories

Downloads: 100M+

Now, you can read and write stories in any language you want. Wattpad is a social storytelling app that connects a global community of around 90+ million readers and writers. You can find millions of novels, books, stories, poetry, and fanfiction on this platform in 50+ languages from worldwide writers. 

Top Features:

• Millions of free stories to read.
• Browse popular genres
• Offline download
• Build your free library
• Save your favorite stories
• Get notified of the addition of new chapters
• Connect with other fanfiction and story lovers

These were the top ebook apps that are increasingly downloaded, offering the required reading experience to the readers. You can review them, their features, and every aspect, and keep them in mind while you build an ebook app to make it stay ahead of the curve. 

Technology Required To Develop An Ebook Mobile App

Building an ebook app like Kindle demands using the latest tools and technologies. We have listed the major ones below. Let’s check them out. 

You can consider the above-mentioned tools and technologies to make your ebook app development process smooth and meet your objectives.

Advanced Technology Trends for Building Ebook Mobile App

The mobile app development market is constantly changing and is affected by varied factors, such as consumer demands, technology advancements, and a broad range of other factors. 

So, your ebook app should also stay prepared to stay competitive, and for that, consider the advanced technology trends below and make your apps richer to offer improved reading experiences.

1. Apps for Foldable Devices

In this ongoing era, foldable tablets and phones are gaining traction. You can optimize your ebook apps for such devices to provide readers with comfortable reading. A digital book that can adjust its formatting and layout when the users unfold their devices will give them an immersive experience, the same as a paper book. 

2. AR/VR & Vision OS

You can transform your ebook reading with augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR), making it more influential. AR features can overlay interactive elements, like 3D models or historical timelines, on the top of the text. On the contrary, VR is best at creating immersive reading environments that will take the users to the story’s setting. 

Vision Os, crafted explicitly for AR glasses, can add to the enhancement of the ebook experience as it arrives with varied features that are well-optimized for hands-free reading. 

3. Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML)

With AI and ML, you can personalize a user’s reading experience. AI-powered apps recommend ebooks depending on users’ reading history and adjust font style and size based on their preferences. Some apps even narrate text in different accents and voices, leveraging AI-enabled text-to-speech. ML also comes forth to analyze users’ reading patterns and accordingly suggests similar content that they may enjoy and find interesting to read. 

4. Cloud-Based Mobile Applications

Cloud-based ebook mobile apps store ebooks and user data on remote servers that provide varied benefits. Users can easily access their library from any device and enjoy automatic syncing that ensures the availability of the latest version across all devices. Cloud storage avoids the need for large downloads, facilitating ebook accessibility on devices even with limited storage space. 

5. Cross-Platform Mobile Development

A single app development that can perform smoothly on different OS (Android, iOS) can save resources and time. Using React Native or Flutter, developers can craft a unified codebase and deploy it on both platforms. This offers a flawless user experience irrespective of their device, making their ebook app more accessible to a broader audience. 

These were the advanced technology trends you could consider while developing an ebook mobile app to make it more avant-garde and let it match the steps of transforming the app development market. 

How Much Does It Cost To Make An Ebook App?

The average cost to develop on-demand e-reading apps like Kindle can range between $15,000 to $20,000 with web services, web admin, and mobile apps (Android and iOS). The figure may fluctuate depending on factors affecting the cost (will be discussed later in this section). 

The exact cost of ebook app development may be challenging to reveal. You can connect with a mobile app development company with all your project requirements and objectives, and they will guide you in building a successful app. 

Factors Affecting App Development Cost

1. App’s Complexity

From simple medium to complex apps, you can finalize and build at any app level. Only the number of features will create a difference. With complexity, the number of features also increases. 

2. Region of Development Team (you hire)

While hiring a team of app developers, you should check their region; the cost per hour varies with the location of the developers. So, decide accordingly. 

3. Number of Features

Well, it entirely depends on what features you want to include in your app. With the number of features, the cost of the app also increases. 

4. App’s Design

The type of app, the layout, typography, and color scheme impact the app development cost. The more advanced design you choose, the more it affects the price. 

While building a budget for ebook app development, you should consider the above-mentioned factors to avoid the issues that may emerge ahead in the development phase. 

How Can EmizenTech Help You?

An ebook reader app development needs the knowledge and expertise of tech-savvies for a smooth app development process. You can start your ebook app development project if you’re the one. But don’t you think you have other valuable jobs to conduct as you are responsible for a seamless run of your business? 

In that case, you can connect with a company that provides custom ebook app development services. So, hiring an app development company can assist you even if you are from a non-technical background. The company provides hassle-free services where you can aim to run your business and relax. 

You don’t have to invest your time and efforts looking for a firm, as EmizenTech is the best option. Having a decade of experience and teams of professional and experienced developers will give the required push to your project. The teams have a proven track record that proves they are just the right choice. Still not convinced?

Key Highlights of EmizenTech

• Since 2013, in mobile development
• Specialized in providing services across 30+ industries
• Hand-on-Experience in advanced technologies
• Clear communication
• Agile development methodology
• Collaborative and open approach
• Competitive Pricing
• In-house team of specialists
• Proficiency across multiple platforms

Conclusion

The growing eBook app segment is constantly improving the reading experience, as well as encouraging writers to emerge with their publications to meet the reading choices of every generation. This way, besides offering convenience to the readers, such apps help publishers earn revenue and expand their business in the offline and online markets. 

You may find it challenging to start with an e-book app development, but hiring a team of dedicated developers can help you. They will provide consultation and assist you in developing ebook reader applications. 

Connect with a leading mobile app development company today and kickstart your project!