GoKawiilKaitlyn Cimino / Android Authority
At this point, every gadget in my house wants a monthly fee. Spotify, Netflix, Amazon Prime, cloud storage, smart home apps, fitness platforms. Even my coffee beans are on a subscribe-and-save program. None of them is outrageous on its own, but together they add up. Then Audible announced a new $8.99 Standard plan, and suddenly the math on my long-running Premium Plus subscription didn’t look so great anymore.
Would you subscribe to Audible's Standard Plan? 6 votes Yes, I don't currently have an Audible membership. 0 % Yes, I would change plans from my existing membership. 33 % No, I prefer the Premium Plus membership 17 % No, I don't use Audible. 50 %
My problem with Audible credits
Kaitlyn Cimino / Android Authority
I’ve been a Premium Plus subscriber for years. The plan costs about $15 per month and includes a credit I can redeem for any audiobook in Audible’s catalog. Since most newer audiobooks retail for around $25 or more, as long as I redeem the credit each month, the value holds up. I prefer reading on a Kindle, but there’s something to be said for knocking out a book while doing chores. I also appreciate being able to grab an audiobook on demand right before a road trip or flight.
The problem is that I rarely feel ready to pick a book every single month. Whenever a credit arrives, I end up telling myself I’ll browse later when I have time to choose properly. Then another month passes, and another credit drops into my account. Eventually, I open Audible and realize I have three or four credits stacked. They roll over, but you can’t pause your membership without spending them first.
With my Premium Plus plan, I always end up with a stack of unused credits.
That’s how I end up doing a quarterly credit burn session, trying to spend multiple credits in one sitting just so I can pause the plan. In a surprise to no one, obligation-driven shopping in the Audible store is not the most relaxing way to discover your next audiobook. Meanwhile, because redeemed books stay in my library permanently, I always feel like I should choose something I’d want to listen to more than once. Instead of grabbing whatever title is popular or taking a friend’s casual recommendation, I start overthinking it.
Sometimes that pushes me toward classics, and honestly, that isn’t the worst outcome. A good narrator can make a classic less stuffy, and I’ve ended up listening to a few titles I always meant to read but never got around to (highly recommend The Old Man and the Sea narrated by Donald Sutherland). Other times, I’ve bought audiobooks of books I’ve already read, figuring that having an audio version of a favorite has its perks. If that favorite happens to be a classic, even better. The result is that I’ve heard The Count of Monte Cristo more times than I can count (of monte cristo). The point, though, is that instead of choosing books that match my mood, I always feel like I’m trying to make the correct credit decision.
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