Nowadays more and more e-books are available online free of charge, without any subscription. Of course, the library purchases access to many e-book packages and individual e-books for Metropolia students and staff. However, there are also several open access e-book services, which offer both academic and fictional e-books for free.
Open Access e-book services
DOAB Directory of Open Access Books
DOAB Directory of Open Access Books is a multidisciplinary directory where you can find links to thousands of e-books from various academic publishers. Links to many DOAB e-books can also be found in MetCat Finna!
IntechOpen
IntechOpen is a leading Open Access published with over 4500 e-books available free online. Subject areas include physical sciences, engineering, technology, life sciences, health sciences and social sciences. As with DOAB, links to many IntechOpen e-books can be found in MetCat Finna!
The OAPEN Library
The OAPEN Library contains freely accessible academic books, mainly in the area of Humanities and Social Sciences. Links also available via MetCat Finna!
OpenStax
OpenStax publishes high-quality, peer-reviewed, and openly licensed college textbooks. Subject areas include math, science, social sciences, humanities, and business. You can access and download all the books on their website.
Project Gutenberg
Looking for literary classics? Project Gutenberg is a library of over 60,000 free e-books, mainly focusing on older works. Many of the greatest novels of all time available in various languages (also in Finnish)!
Mind the licences!
Although these books are openly available online, it does not mean that readers can do whatever they want with the content. Make sure you check the license of each book, or the copyright policies of the e-book service in question!
A license will tell you whether you can share and modify the content. Often, Creative Commons licenses are used. For more information, see Creative Commons licence examples.
Access with Metropolia ID
Of course, Metropolia ID opens access to an even wider range of e-books. The library subscribes to various e-book platforms with thousands of e-books. Find more information on the library e-book services in English on our E-books guide, and in Finnish on our E-kirjat guide!
The information specialists in Metropolia select and promote open access online content that is suitable for Metropolia fields of study. Have you come across a useful open access e-book service that is missing from our list? Let us know, and we will add it to our e-book guides.
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