More Than 1.6 Million People Read Free Online Books With Opera Mini and Worldreader

We are thrilled to celebrate International Literacy Day 2019 by announcing that, so far in 2019, more than 1.6 million people have been reading online books in more than 52 languages with Opera Mini and Worldreader. 

This marks a major success in our joint effort to bring free e-books to people around the world.

In 2015, Worldreader partnered with Opera, allowing us to give those with Opera Mini access to one of the largest catalogues of free ebooks. Since then, we’ve been steadily bringing even more books to millions of people around the world who otherwise wouldn’t have access to the same variety of books and literature. By delivering books that matter to them, we are successfully promoting literacy worldwide.  

This initiative started in Africa, where today nearly one million out of the 1.6 million people have read free e-books in 2019 via the Opera Mini browser. 

According to the 2019 edition of the Global Digital Report, there are more than 437 million internet users in Africa. This gives us a major opportunity to increase online reading, particularly when one in five internet users in Africa chooses Opera browsers every day. 

The steady increase in mobile phone usage means more and more readers can access our library from the palms of their hands. Reading a book on a mobile phone is as easy as making a call – it’s a huge game changer.

The number of people using Opera is continuously growing. Today, there are more than 350 million people around the world who have chosen Opera browsers and apps over the defaults on their devices. 

To celebrate International Literacy Day on September 8th, we’d like to  highlight some of the big milestones we have reached with Opera so far in 2019. 

The most popular children’s books read this year are

• Afi and the Magic Drum by Thécla Midiohouan and Hector D. Sonon
• Fati and the Old Man by Therson Boadu
• A House for Mouse by Michele Fry, Amy Uzzell, Jennifer Jacobs

The most popular adults books read this year are:

• A Heart Divided 1: Love at First Sight? By Nicola Thornton
• Plus or Minus by Emily Wood
• Friends Till the End by Amy Lee-Tai

Our aim is to ensure that every person on this planet can access the books they need to reach their full potential and improve their lives. 

Together, we look forward to reaching millions more readers in the coming years!