New Audible Initiative Gives Free Audiobooks to Underrepresented Youth

Audible today unveiled Imagine Louder, our first global program leveraging our product for social good. At launch, the program will provide free six-month Audible Premium memberships to 15,000 young people within its first three years, offering more than 180,000 hours of listening per membership. Audible will work with seven nonprofit organizations serving underrepresented youth aged 12 to 18 in the United States, the United Kingdom and Mexico in the first year, with plans to expand to additional marketplaces in subsequent years.

As screens and short-form content are dominating young people’s attention, and the literacy gap is growing worldwide, Audible is using the power of audio storytelling to help. According to the United Nations, six in 10 children worldwide cannot read and understand a simple text by age 10, and 61 percent of children from low-income households don't own a single book, per the World Literacy Foundation. Yet the benefits of audio storytelling are immense: audiobooks can significantly increase vocabulary, support struggling readers, improve reading comprehension and more, according to MIT and the Educational Psychology Review, while research from UC Berkeley shows that listening activates many of the same brain regions as reading, indicating many similar benefits.

"Ages 12 to 18 are the years when young people are figuring out who they are and what's possible for their lives, and the stories they hear can shape how they see themselves and the world around them," said Aisha Glover, Global Head of Urban Innovation at Audible. "Imagine Louder puts the power of audio storytelling directly into the hands of young people who don't always have the same access and opportunity and gives the organizations we work with the tools to make that experience their own."

The free Audible Premium memberships include unlimited listening to thousands of titles, as well as one monthly credit to buy an audiobook from the full Audible catalog. A parent or guardian manages the account and adds appropriate titles to a kid’s profile. Our grant funding and support will also help each nonprofit weave audio storytelling directly into their programming, from creative arts and poetry workshops, to book clubs for visually impaired youth, to sessions focused on community-building and mental health, showing audio’s versatility as a tool for youth engagement and development.

Tiffany Jackson, Head of Social Innovation at Audible, emphasizes, “We wanted to ensure that we weren't just providing access alone. These organizations know best how to leverage audiobooks in a way that helps the young people they work with reach their full potential.”

Audible piloted the program for six months to help refine how it could best support young people. Early results showed the positive impact of audio storytelling paired with dedicated programming: 77 percent of caregivers in Audible's U.S. pilot with the nonprofit Reading Partners rated their child "engaged" or "very engaged" with audio content, 100 percent of teachers in the National Literacy Trust's UK pilot agreed the program encouraged students to listen to more audiobooks, and 95 percent of Girl Rising participants in Mexico agreed that stories are a tool for self-expression and personal development.

“During the pilot, we saw young people selecting titles that matched their identity, which we thought was really powerful,” says Jackson. “They were looking for strong female leads, (or) for queer stories, for example. And young people developed a real community around listening. They would tell their friends, ‘I'm reading this; you should read it too.’”

In June, the team opened a call for submissions and “were pleasantly surprised by the response we got,” reports Jackson, with more than 400 applications from organizations, underscoring the community’s interest in using audio storytelling to support young people.

The finalists were selected based on program design, technical capabilities and location, amongst other criteria, and then went on to an interview round. “It was a chance to hear them talk about their plans in a way that really brought their ideas to life,” says Jackson. In addition to literacy and comprehension, “they’re using audiobooks to bring people together, to support imagination and love and community.”

The seven nonprofits selected for the first year of the program include Girl Rising in Mexico; DreamYard, Flockworks, and Life Anew Restorative Justice, in the U.S.; and VICTA, Be Free Campaign, and Exodus Youth Worx UK in the UK; with plans to expand to more countries in following years.

Imagine Louder is one of Audible’s many Imagination Next initiatives working to expand opportunities for young people around the world. Last year Audible invested $3.3 million across 27 social impact programs in 12 countries, reaching more than 1,000 young people and supporting 660 emerging creators worldwide. We’re excited to continue developing programs that unlock the next generation’s potential and inspire a lifelong love of stories.