Black Library App / Free eBooks / BL Site Closure / Celebration 2026

[Lord Marshal]

Something something digital age.

 

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On the 18th of March, you’ll be able to find thousands of eBooks and audiobooks more conveniently than ever before, plunging you right into the epic battles of the Warhammer worlds.  And you can link your account right now to make sure all your books and audio books go across to the new app seamlessly.

The new app will allow you to browse and buy from a vast library – including the latest releases as they come out – and both read and listen to them all in one place with a built-in eReader and MP3 player. This includes more than  2,000 English-language eBooks and audiobooks, as well as French- and German-language eBooks where available. 

 

Linking your existing BlackLibrary.com and BL Audio app libraries will mean you can transfer everything you’ve picked up so far into the new app, and it’ll only take a few clicks. You can start doing it right now, so hit the button below to find out how.

 

The Black Library app launches on the 18th of March and we’d love for you to try it straight away, so if you download it and start reading in the first month of release,* you can get all of these stories to keep for FREE:

• Avenging Son in English, French, or German eBook, or English audiobook

• Mark of Faith in English, French, or German eBook, or English audiobook

• Sanguinius: The Great Angel in English, French, or German eBook, or English audiobook

• Dominion in English, French, or German eBook, or English audiobook

• Ciaphas Cain: The Anthology in English eBook or audiobook

• Darkoath in English eBook or audiobook

• The Return of Nagash in English eBook or audiobook

• Realmslayer: A Gotrek Gurnisson Series – the audio drama

 

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Once things are underway and you’ve had plenty of time to link your libraries, the venerable BlackLibrary.com website will be taking its well-earned rest from the 31st of August. This is the last time you’ll be able to link your accounts, so make sure you get it done with time to spare!

 

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To cap it all off, we’ve got one more thing to announce – the Black Library Celebration is coming back for 2026!  This is the single biggest reveal event of the year for Black Library fans and those looking for the next great Warhammer novels, and we’ll be unveiling the date very soon. We’ll also be chatting more about the new Black Library app closer to its release. Tell your friends!

 

Edited 11 hours ago by Lord Marshal

[phandaal]

Interesting choice. Must not be getting enough traffic on the Black Library website to justify keeping it up and running in addition to their audiobook app. Tells me they are seeing most of their digital sales coming from channels outside of their own website.

 

Although I do wonder how many people will browse to another app for reading/listening rather than just using Kindle, Audible, or something like that.

[Casual Heresy]

Not an announcement I would have expected but very interesting. And that is quite the haul of free titles they're giving away, most of which I don't have in any form so think I'll be signing up based on them alone!

[Lord Marshal]

14 minutes ago, phandaal said:

Interesting choice. Must not be getting enough traffic on the Black Library website to justify keeping it up and running in addition to their audiobook app. Tells me they are seeing most of their digital sales coming from channels outside of their own website.

 

Although I do wonder how many people will browse to another app for reading/listening rather than just using Kindle, Audible, or something like that.

 

Even by GW standards the website was trapped in the early 2000s, and that was before the rise of Audible. I guess in some respect it was inevitable.

 

I have a fair amount of books bought off the site for no other reason than buying them a long time ago, so I'll probably end up using it in a pinch, though I dislike reading off my phone.

 

May also be an attempt at curbing piracy, since it's not difficult with ePubs.

 

Edited 11 hours ago by Lord Marshal

[Firedrake Cordova]

Thanks for this.

 

As someone who doesn't have a (compatible) tablet/smartphone, this is rather annoying. I guess I'll have to hoover up the books on my wish list sooner rather than later...

Edited 11 hours ago by Firedrake Cordova

[Orange Knight]

This is cool, only issue is I have a vast collection of 30 and 40k audio books on my audbile account, and I don't think they would be transferrable.

 

Edit: Ignore me. I misread. This appears to be ebook related 

Edited 8 hours ago by Orange Knight

[phandaal]

2 minutes ago, Lord Marshal said:

May also be an attempt at curbing piracy, since it's not difficult with ePubs.

 

No kidding! A friend of a friend (not me, no siree Bob) may or may not have stumbled across an archive of the entire Black Library digital catalog while searching for the mythical OOP Dark Hunters book a while back. Piracy is real.

 

(Decent book, BTW. Shame they never picked it back up under a different Chapter name.)

[Craig]

Hopefully the e-reader will be better than the vault one and wh+ subscribers can use it to read the vault content.

[Aramis K]

I hope we can continue to download and own ePubs and read them in other apps.

 

I don't want to buy ebooks locked to a specific publisher app.

 

I can't see any customer focused reason for this to be an app rather than a website. Just control for them.

 

I also suspect this sets us up for books as a subscription service.

 

Anyone got anything reassuring to add?

[phandaal]

11 minutes ago, Aramis K said:

Anyone got anything reassuring to add?

 

Reassurance is in the eye of the beholder, but GW loves money and giving up their sales channel through Amazon's Kindle/Audible services would be a hit for their revenue, so it will probably continue to be available there. Not sure about other e-readers though.

[Mogger351]

I'm struggling to understand a lot of this. I won't lie, I don't understand who is using the black library webstore rather than Amazon/kindle etc. I just dont get why this needed to happen and can't help but feel GW would have been better off just going to market rather than trying to host something?

 

Literally money spent on something nobody asked for or wanted it seems.

[darkhorse0607]

4 minutes ago, Mogger351 said:

I'm struggling to understand a lot of this. I won't lie, I don't understand who is using the black library webstore rather than Amazon/kindle etc. I just dont get why this needed to happen and can't help but feel GW would have been better off just going to market rather than trying to host something?

 

Literally money spent on something nobody asked for or wanted it seems.

Unless they remove the stuff from the other sources like Audible, forcing people to go to their app

 

Would they lose some folks, yes, would it stop them from doing it? Who knows, youre not going to invest in this app without a plan to get people on it other than free books

Edited 10 hours ago by darkhorse0607

[SvenIronhand]

Well, that's interesting, for sure.

[W.A.Rorie]

Hmmmm.....I wonder if why Audible is having their sale on Warhammer Books?

[Flaherty]

I hope this doesn't prefigure a removal of BL from Audible. It feels unlikely, it seems like too good of a lead-gen source for them, but I would have thought the same about popular web video series so who knows.

[ChapterMasterGodfrey]

They will simply never compete with Audible and they would be dumb to take their titles off Audible and try to bend our arms into using a BL audible-esque platform.

[Firedrake Cordova]

1 hour ago, Mogger351 said:

I don't understand who is using the black library webstore rather than Amazon/kindle etc

*raises hand* I've bought e-books from the Black Library site. The reason for that largely centres around how they're provided - I don't have a Kindle e-book reader, nor does my home PC run Windows (I use Linux). The books Black Library provide can be loaded onto my Kobo e-reader, and read using Calibre on my PC.

 

For audio books, I use Audible, because it's so much cheaper.

1 hour ago, W.A.Rorie said:

Hmmmm.....I wonder if why Audible is having their sale on Warhammer Books?

Audible runs offers on GW books about once per month (reduced price, 2-for-1, etc), so it may or may not be related.

[Mogger351]

From their FAQ, books will be locked to the app.

Edited 8 hours ago by Firedrake Cordova
Added link :)

[OrkPlayer137]

Related to this, I also just saw that warhammerdigital.com will be shut down at the same time, with no more orders from 18th March. They haven't added anything new there in several months though.

[Firedrake Cordova]

Salient points for those with existing purchases:

• It will not be possible to make further purchases via Black Library (or Warhammer Digital) from 10am BST 18th March 2026
• You will be able to download any items you have purchased until 10am BST 31st August 2026
• You can link your Black Library/Warhammer Digital account to your My Warhammer account until 10am BST 31st August 2026. When you do this, any purchased items will be transferred over to the App.
• Any items which are no longer listed for purchase will not be transferred over to your account in the App.

Edited 8 hours ago by Firedrake Cordova

[Mana]

2 hours ago, OrkPlayer137 said:

Related to this, I also just saw that warhammerdigital.com will be shut down at the same time, with no more orders from 18th March. They haven't added anything new there in several months though.

So Digital rulebooks are gone gone (they weren't releasing the new ones anyway), from the FAQ (https://www.warhammerdigital.com/Home/Frequently_Asked_Questions.html):

 

Spoiler

Q. What is happening to WarhammerDigital.com?
Warhammerdigital.com is closing. You will be able to browse and download past purchases on WarhammerDigital.com until 10:00am (BST) on 31st August 2026, however you will not be able to place any new orders from 10:00am (GMT) on 18th March 2026. You can continue to buy digital rules for some of our games on the Apple Book Store. You can also find rules on Warhammer 40,000 - The App and Warhammer Age of Sigmar - The App.

Q. What happens to my existing purchases from WarhammerDigital.com?
You will need to download all of your past purchases made on warhammerdigital.com before 10:00am (BST) on 31st August 2026 or these will be permanently lost.

Q. I was subscribed to the Warhammer Digital Newsletter, will I still receive Newsletter information?
You will no longer receive emails specific to WarhammerDigital.com. If you're subscribed to any other of our newsletters, you will continue to receive these as normal.

Q. If I have a question or concern not answered in the FAQ section, who should I contact?
If you have a question or concern not answered in this FAQ, please Contact Us for further assistance.

 

[Aramis K]

3 hours ago, Firedrake Cordova said:

*raises hand* I've bought e-books from the Black Library site. The reason for that largely centres around how they're provided - I don't have a Kindle e-book reader, nor does my home PC run Windows (I use Linux). The books Black Library provide can be loaded onto my Kobo e-reader, and read using Calibre on my PC.

 

 

Same - I buy from BL website, 5 or 6 times a year, so I can use the eBooks where I want.

I avoid Amazon products and services as well, so I'm not going Kindle (as best one can avoid Amazon, don't tell me about AWS or logistics deals).

 

Locked to their app. That's bad news, a big new restriction not an exciting opportunity.

[Valkia the Bloody]

Well, just having spend 60 Euro on Audible books at the end of January, having them removed would be a really foul move.

I also use my Kindle to read the ebooks. 

Sorry, the app is no deal for me.

And I will be frank- if I lose the books due to them being pulled from Amazon (and I also have some on iTunes, I just realized....) I would actually pull the plug on any further BL purchases.

That would be a total deal-breaker for me and would basically blow all my trust to the wind. 

I am sick to the bone of all the gate-keeping, having to use a special device, streaming service or app for any different flavor fart these days.