Scribd, the online provider of books, audiobooks, and journalism, has hit 1m paying subscribers. Scribd, which was launched in 2007, was originally an open publishing platform but evolved into a content subscription service in 2013. Audiobooks were incorporated into its services a year later.

Starting in 2018, Scribd began offering unlimited access to its library of digital content for a flat monthly fee. Since the release of the unlimited option, the platform has seen a 40 per cent increase in subscriptions, and audio users have increased over 100 per cent. Scribd now has a monthly online traffic of 100m visitors, and users have accumulated over 150m hours of reading.

Scribd has partnered with multiple publishers for additional and exclusive content, including the Wall Street Journal, Time, Newsweek, Financial Times, The New York Times, ESPN, Harvard Business Journal and The Guardian. 

“This is an exciting milestone for Scribd; 1m subscribers is a tipping point for any subscription company and proves we have a reading service that people want, need, and love,” said Trip Adler, co-founder and CEO. “Scribd has been at the forefront of the digital reading evolution over the last decade, driving incremental revenue to the publishing industry while making the written word more accessible than ever before. As we celebrate this milestone, we’re grateful to our partners for trusting us with their content and believing in our mission to change the way the world reads.”