There a number of excellent places to find audiobooks for kids online. Here, we’ve collected the best websites to help you introduce your child to the magic of audiobooks. Enjoy!
Benefits of Audiobooks for Kids
Are you wanting to help your child become a better reader? Or, perhaps you have a long road trip coming up with the kids?
Listening to audiobooks provides kids with a number of benefits, including:
- Helping children develop their imagination.
- Introducing kids to books above their reading level.
- Introducing new vocabulary or difficult proper names or locales.
- Improving listening and comprehension skills.
- Learning the proper pronunciation of words.
From a practical perspective, audiobooks may also help kids to:
- Cope better with long car rides.
- Fall asleep on their own.
Best Websites With Audiobooks for Kids
Alvie, The Little Brown Burro – a fun and entertaining collection of free children’s audio stories about a small, brown, toy burro named Alvie. There are 7 audiobooks designed for preschoolers available for download in MP3.
Audible Kids – Audible is the biggest name in audiobooks, which makes sense since they’re owned by Amazon.com. There are more than 7,000 audiobooks for kids available and you can browse by age group or genre.
Audible Stories – collection of stories for kids of all ages currently available to stream for free while school is on pause due to COVID-19.
Audiobooks.com Kids Audiobook Club – offers an affordable way to get unlimited access to thousands of bestselling and classic kids audiobooks in the Audiobooks.com library.
Audioobook.com – makes it easy to browse highly rated audiobooks for kids available on Spotify.
BookBox – publisher of ‘AniBooks’, animated stories for children, with the narration appearing on-screen as Same Language Subtitles (SLS). Every word is highlighted in perfect timing with the audio narration, thus strengthening reading skills, automatically and subconsciously. You can try AniBooks for free by signing up for an account.
Epic – a digital library for kids 12 and under with 40,000+ books, audiobooks, videos, and more. You can try free for 30 days.
Loyal Books – listen to classics such as The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, The Swiss Family Robinson, and Treasure Island. You can view the original book cover, read an excerpt or listen to a short audio preview. Audiobooks are available in MP3 or you can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes.
Kiddie Records Weekly – a collection of children’s stories from the mid-1940s to the early 1950s. Many of these recordings are extravagant Hollywood productions featuring big-time celebrities and composers.
Kindersite – this site has a number of stories in flash for reading and listening online, as well as games, lullabies, and songs.
Homer Stories – here you’ll find 200+ animated and interactive stories that engage kids aged 2 to 8 years old.
Light Up Your Brain – a collection of audio stories for children read by Chuck Brown available for listening online or download in MP3.
Magic Keys – this site has illustrated children’s stories for kids of all ages. A few of the stories include audio for online listening.
Robert Munsch – a collection of 50+ audiobooks written and read by one of my favorite children’s authors, Robert Munsch. Be sure to check out Something Good, Love You Forever, and The Paperbag Princess. The audiobooks are available for listening online or download in MP3.
Sora – getting books and audiobooks from your school is quick and easy with Sora. Just sign in with your school account, then borrow and open books with one tap.
Storyline Online – a collection of videos featuring actors reading children’s books alongside creatively produced illustrations. The site is a production of the Screen Actors Guild Foundation.
Storynory – has published a free audio story for children each week since 2005. The online collection includes a mixture of original stories, fairytales, and specially adapted myths and histories aimed at children aged around 8 to 11 years old.
World of Tales – features stories for kids, folktales, fairy tales and fables from around the world available for online listening.
Best Audiobook Recommendations For Kids
Are you looking for specific audiobook recommendations for your kids? We recommend the following websites:
Audiobooks for Kids & Teens from AudioFile – the AudioFile editors pick the best audiobooks for kids and families. Listen together, or find choices for independent listening.
Sound Learning from the Audio Publisher Association – has a large list of audiobook recommendations based on the kid’s ages. It also has tips and hints for how to help your kids get the most out of audiobooks.
