A new report from The Economist (via 9to5Mac) indicates Apple could expand its services offerings during 2022 to include an audiobook subscription service.
While The Economist article covers all of Apple’s existing services, such as Apple Music, Apple TV+, Apple Fitness, Apple Arcade, and others, the article also makes a one-line mention of a possible audiobooks service.
In the past couple of years Apple has made smaller media bets including Arcade, a subscription gaming package, News+, a publishing bundle, and Fitness+, which offers video aerobics classes. There is talk of an audiobooks service later this year.
The article makes no mention of an audiobooks service other than the one line, so it’s not clear where The Economist got its information nor what such a service from Apple may look like. However, Apple already offers an ebooks service that sells audiobook versions, so an audiobooks subscription service would be a logical next offering from the Cupertino firm.
Potential competitor Amazon’s Audible offers credits for audiobooks for a monthly fee along with a selection of “Audible Plus” titles that do not require credits.
Audible Plus subscriptions start at $7.95 for a small selection of audiobooks sans new titles. An Audible Premium Plus is priced at $14.95 for Plus access as well as a credit for a new book each month.
We’ll keep you posted if we hear any more about the potential service.
(Photo by Distingué CiDDiQi on Unsplash)