Google has announced on Tuesday, that its audiobooks are now available and are being rolled out in 45 countries and nine languages.
The PlayBooks are accessible on Android (Google Play Store), iOS, the web and with Google Assistant-enabled devices like Google Home smart speakers.
Google's audiobooks which require no subscription can also be accessed across multiple devices from the company. For example, you could listen on your Google Home smart speaker, and then pick up where you left off on your Pixel smartphone later.
Audiobooks can also be shared with family members for no extra fee via the Family Library feature.
The company is currently offering discounts on popular titles like Michael Wolff's "Fire and Fury" and Stephen King's "It." Google is also giving out 50% off at first purchase.
Meanwhile, Audible is already a well-established player in the audiobooks space, with over 400,000 audio titles. The company was founded in 1995 and acquired by Amazon (AMZN) in 2008 for $300 million. In 2016, Audible members downloaded nearly 2 billion hours of content.
While Amazon dominates the U.S. audiobooks market, Google's major advantage is that its service is available in 45 countries, according to James McQuivey, VP at research firm Forrester.
"Google is making its voice assistant available in other countries faster than Amazon, and it will be able to use Android devices around the world as a platform for distributing audiobooks," he added.
