Notebookcheck Logo

Buying eBooks on Android just became a lot harder as Barnes & Noble stops selling eBooks in its Android app

Barnes & Noble is getting rid of the ability to buy books from inside its app. (Image source: Mohamed Hassan on Pixabay)
Barnes & Noble is getting rid of the ability to buy books from inside its app. (Image source: Mohamed Hassan on Pixabay)
Due to a policy shift from Google, Barnes & Noble will stop offering users the ability to purchase digital books from inside the company's NOOK app from next week. Google first announced the in-app purchase policy under question in September 2020.

Users of Barnes & Noble’s Android app and Audible will find it much harder to buy digital books from inside the respective apps starting next week. In the case of Barnes & Noble, the company is removing the ability of users to purchase eBooks from inside the NOOK app because of the enforcement of an in-app billing policy by Google. According to The Verge, Google’s updated in-app billing policy requires developers to update their apps to support the Google Play billing system by 31st March 2022.

Audible’s case is slightly different than Barnes & Noble. Instead of restricting the purchase of books from inside the app, Audible will be removing the ability to use your debit or credit cards to purchase books from the Audible app. You can only use Audible credits to buy digital books. That said, you can buy Audible credits from the app using your credit/debit card.

If you want to buy books or pay for any membership plans that you have subscribed to or plan to subscribe to, you’ll need to use Google Play’s billing system instead of Audible’s own.

The development comes right on the heels of the announcement of a program from Google that allows developers to offer their payment methods instead of the Google Play billing system. But, as it turns out, developers can only offer their payment method after first committing to billing through the Google Play.

Buy Kindle Paperwhite Essentials Bundle on Amazon

Source(s)

static version load dynamic
Loading Comments
Comment on this article
Please share our article, every link counts!
> Expert Reviews and News on Laptops, Smartphones and Tech Innovations > News > News Archive > Newsarchive 2022 04 > Buying eBooks on Android just became a lot harder as Barnes & Noble stops selling eBooks in its Android app
Fawad Murtaza, 2022-04- 3 (Update: 2022-04- 3)