Can I Legally Read Everybody Online Through Libraries?

I tend to be more pragmatic about this: libraries are legal portals, but their reach depends on copyright and licensing. If a work is in the public domain, it’s free to read online and libraries can host or link to it without problems. If the library has a license — for example, for a streaming video, an e-book platform, or an academic journal — you can access those items within the license terms. Often that means logging in through the library, using the library’s network, or accepting digital lending restrictions.

However, you can’t expect libraries to provide unrestricted access to every piece of content on the web. Copyright law protects authors and publishers, and libraries respect those rights. Scanning and uploading modern copyrighted books for mass online reading without permission is generally illegal. The situation also varies by country: copyright lengths, exceptions, and digital lending rules differ, so what’s allowed in one place might not be in another. For safe, legal access, I stick to library-provided services, public-domain repositories, and Creative Commons resources; when something isn’t available, I either request it through the library or purchase it. It’s a little extra effort, but I enjoy knowing I’m supporting creators while getting my reading fix.

Sometimes I get lost in the digital stacks and think about this exact question: can I legally read everything online through libraries? The short reality is that libraries are amazing gateways to a vast amount of material, but they’re not a magic key to every single thing on the internet.

Libraries can lawfully provide access to an enormous collection — public-domain books, materials licensed to the library (like e-books via OverDrive or Hoopla), subscription databases, and digitized archives. Those licensed works are available because the library or its vendor negotiated rights with publishers. That means you can read them while the license is valid, but you’re still bound by rules: limits on simultaneous loans, region locks, and DRM. Public-domain books (think centuries-old literature and works whose copyright has expired) are free to distribute and you can read them from sites like Project Gutenberg with no legal headachE. Creative Commons–licensed works are another sweet spot: they’re often available for reading and sometimes even for reuse, depending on the license.

Where the law bites is with copyrighted material that hasn’t been licensed. Libraries can lend physical copies without issue, but scanning a current copyrighted book and putting it online for everyone is typically not legal unless the rights holder permits it. There’s also a tricky debate around “controlled digital lending,” which some libraries experiment with by lending digitized copies in a one-to-one owned-to-loaned ratio, but that’s a gray area and has led to lawsuits. Academic libraries and public libraries often provide access to paywalled journals and newspapers through institutional subscriptions; you can read those legally on the library’s platforms or on-site, but you can’t necessarily copy and redistribute them.

Practically speaking, if you want to stay on the right side of things: use your library’s apps and databases, enjoy public-domain and Creative Commons collections, and respect the terms of use. If a book or article isn’t offered by the library, you can request your library to acquire it, use interlibrary loan, or seek legitimate purchase or author permission. I still get a thrill when I tap “borrow” on an e-book through my library app and watch something rare unlock — it feels like treasure hunting with rules, and that’s oddly satisfying.