Scribd is an online document sharing platform that hosts millions of documents, books, audiobooks, magazines, sheet music, and more. While Scribd offers some content for free, most of its premium content requires a paid subscription to access in full.
If you come across a PDF on Scribd that interests you but you don’t want to pay to subscribe, there are a couple of legitimate ways to download and access that content for free. Here are the best methods:
Table of Contents
Use the Scribd Free Trial
The easiest way to download PDFs from Scribd for free is to use their 30-day free trial. Here’s how:
- Go to scribd.com and click on “Start free trial”
- Enter your email address and payment info to sign up
- Once logged in, find and open the PDF you want to download
- Click on the download icon in the top right and select “Original PDF”
This will allow you to directly download the PDF to your computer. You’ll then have 30 days of unlimited access to read it before the paid subscription kicks in.
Just remember to cancel your subscription within the 30 days if you don’t want to be charged.
Search on Google
Believe it or not, some PDF content from Scribd gets indexed on Google and can be discovered through search.
To try finding a free PDF this way:
- Go to Google and search for the exact title of the document wrapped in quotation marks
- Scan through the search results to see if the PDF you want is hosted on another website
- If you find it hosted somewhere else, you should be able to download it there for free
For example, searching for "An Introduction to Machine Learning" may surface PDF copies uploaded to sites like DocDroid, SlideShare, or personal websites.
Check Document Sharing Sites
There are various document sharing sites similar to Scribd that host user-uploaded content. Sometimes the same PDFs uploaded to Scribd get shared on these other sites too.
Sites to check include:
- DocDroid
- SlideShare
- Issuu
- Academia.edu
- Semantic Scholar
Use the search bars on these sites to find the PDF you need. If hosted there, you should get free access.
Use a Scribd Downloader Site
There are some websites designed specifically to bypass Scribd’s paywall and download restricted documents. However, be aware that downloading from Scribd this way without permission likely violates their Terms of Service.
Some popular Scribd downloading sites (use at your own discretion) include:
To use these, you would enter the Scribd URL of the restricted PDF, solve a captcha, and download the unlocked file. Just know that Scribd actively works to block these types of sites, so they tend to come and go.
Copy Text From Preview Pages
For documents restricted to preview pages only, you can manually highlight, copy, and paste chunks of text into a text document. Doing so allows you to extract at least portions of the content.
- Open the PDF and click into the first preview page
- Highlight a paragraph of text you want and copy it
- Paste it into a text document like Word to save it
- Repeat for each preview page to extract more content
While tedious, this approach lets you capture key passages from the PDF without paying or downloading it directly from Scribd.
Use a Free Scribd Account Instead
Rather than downloading PDFs from Scribd outright, you can simply create a free Scribd account instead. This gives you access to:
- 3 ebooks and 1 audiobook each month
- Unlimited reading of Scribd-hosted sheet music
- 5 article previews daily without subscribing
So if you plan to only read a few docs per month, the free account may suit your needs without requiring any downloads.
Consider Supporting Scribd
Ultimately, Scribd is home to a treasure trove of documents worth paying for. If you find yourself needing lots of documents hosted there, consider supporting the platform with a paid subscription.
Rates start at $8.99 per month for unlimited reading, downloads, and more. The small fee helps Scribd license content from authors and compensate them for their work.
