Digital Rights Management (DRM) options for books on Google Play

Important:

  • Google Play partners can sell ebooks and audiobooks in certain countries/regions. The features described here aren't available in every country/region.
    • Due to regulatory requirements, Google can't offer pre-orders in India. Your book will be available in the Google Play Store in India on the release date.
  • Pre-orders allow customers to order, but not read, your book before its release date. On the release date, customers who pre-ordered your book are charged for the purchase and they gain access to the book.
  • Before you upload any files, make sure your content meets Google's guidelines. If you plan to sell your books on Google Play, review our publisher content policies for books on Google Play.
  • Analytics charts and sales transaction reports use the date the customer placed the pre-order, so that you can measure customer anticipation level. Revenue shown in such orders isn't paid to you until the book is released. For a financial report that matches your payment, go to Google Play earnings reports.

The purpose of Digital Rights Management (DRM) is to protect the content owner and prevent unauthorized sharing of ebooks. If you prefer to make your book available on Google Play without DRM, users who purchase and download the book have more flexibility in how they use the content file.

To turn off DRM, follow the steps below.  

  1. In your Partner Center account, go to Book Catalog.
  2. Click the book's title.
  3. At the top, click Settings. 
  4. In the menu under “Apply DRM encryption?,” select No
  5. Under “Distribution settings,” uncheck DRM Enabled.

Tip: To disable DRM for any new books, use templates. Learn more about template settings.

For DRM on download files, Google supports Adobe Content Server 4. Google requires users to authenticate their books once per device. These devices may then request ACS4-encrypted EPUB or PDF files via a Google-provided API.

Tip: Due to technical limitations, DRM-enabled books larger than 128 MBs can’t be made available for download.

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