It’s time to begin backing up your bought Kindle ebooks for those who haven’t already. It seems like Amazon intends to take away the Obtain & Switch by way of USB choice from their web site for Kindle ebooks as of February twenty sixth.
Over on reddit, some individuals are saying they’ve been greeted by a brand new immediate when attempting to obtain Kindle ebooks from Amazon’s web site that claims the next:
Beginning February 26, 2025, the “Obtain & Switch by way of USB” choice will not be obtainable. You possibly can nonetheless ship Kindle books to your Wi-Fi enabled units by deciding on the “Ship or Take away from Machine” choice.
Thus far all of the experiences appear to be for US accounts, however I’m nonetheless not seeing that message when I attempt to obtain ebooks from the Digital Content material web page at Amazon, however it didn’t cease me from downloading a number of dozen of my bought ebooks to have on my pc simply in case.
At this level it’s nonetheless unclear if that is solely going to use to sure Kindle fashions, or if Amazon is eliminating D&T throughout the board for all Kindles and all accounts. They already did away with D&T on the newer Kindles that have been launched in 2024, so I assume we must always’ve seen this coming.
Even when D&T goes away totally, you need to nonetheless be capable to get your bought ebooks off of older Kindles for backup and DRM elimination, supplied the Kindle is sufficiently old to have ebooks downloaded within the older AZW3 format as a substitute of the newer KFX format (it’s more durable to take away DRM from KFX).
Most individuals don’t use D&T or care about backing up their ebooks and eradicating the DRM, so this isn’t going to be an issue for everybody. Basically, it’s a good suggestion to backup e-book purchases, as many e-book shops have gone underneath over time, however Amazon definitely isn’t going be closing store anytime quickly. Nonetheless, it’s a good suggestion to have backups in case you ever wish to transfer away from Amazon/Kindles sooner or later.
That is going to be extra of a problem for those that purchase Kindle ebooks to learn on different manufacturers of units like Kobos. It should make eradicating e-book DRM more durable except you could have an older Kindle laying round you could pull the ebooks off of.
It’s shocking how many individuals are utterly clueless about what obtain and switch even means. On reddit, individuals are asking every kind of irrelevant questions that don’t have something to do with D&T in anyway. Sure, Calibre will nonetheless work. No, it’s not going to have an effect on facet loading. Sure, you’ll nonetheless be capable to use Ship to Kindle. Sure, you’ll nonetheless be capable to obtain your ebooks over WiFi to Kindles and Kindle apps.
D&T was initially put in place for those that didn’t have WiFi to obtain ebooks and wanted to sideload them by way of USB, and now it’s largely utilized by those that wish to take away the DRM from bought Kindle ebooks so that they aren’t locked into Amazon’s ecosystem. That is going to outrage some individuals, however it’s actually not going have an effect on the overwhelming majority of Kindle customers that don’t care about DRM elimination and with the ability to learn Kindle ebooks on non-Kindle units.
