E-book formats

Electronic books are very popular among book lovers from around the world. After all, it is much more convenient to take with you an easy reader than a heavy print publication that takes up a lot of space. In addition, not every book can be found in printed form - rare, too old or, on the contrary, recently published publications that are eager to read. Internet services as opposed to bookstores are full of a variety of scientific, entertaining and educational literature for every taste.

In addition, each book is available in several formats at once, which greatly increases the chances of the user being comfortable with the publication.

Varieties of e-book formats

The main existing formats of electronic versions of books:

1. FB2 (FictionBook) - quite a popular option, created in Russia. The files in it are well structured and have a small weight, are easily archived and converted to other formats, almost every book on domestic portals is presented in this version. There are also special applications that are completely focused on FB2 files. Minus one, but quite significant: most foreign e-books do not support FictionBook, with the exception of devices with Russian software.
2. PDF (Adobe Portable Document Format) - focused mainly on small scanned A4 documents. It is convenient to work with him on a computer or laptop, but a reader with a smaller screen will not provide comfortable reading, because in this format it is impossible to enlarge the text and place the page on the screen as a whole. Also, PDF files are quite cumbersome, which increases their download time. However, this option is great for publications with a large number of illustrations or formulas.
3. EPUB (Electronic PUBlication) - a very common file type, which is supported by most readers from both Russian and foreign manufacturers. EPUB documents are most similar to archived web pages: they contain images, text, graphics, and fonts. EPUB itself is very light and does not require re-archiving or compression.
4. Djvu - similar to PDF, which makes it equally uncomfortable even for widescreen readers because of the small text and poor image quality. Its plus is that, unlike its “relative”, PDF, in the presence of a separate text layer, editing is possible, as well as some interactive functions, such as a table of contents.
5. DOC / DOCX and TXT - can be opened and edited on almost any electronic device; it is very popular when creating small text notes and texts. But in the case of electronic books, files in such formats are often displayed incorrectly, which hinders their perception.
6. MOBI (Mobipocket eBook) - created exclusively for Amazon Kindle electronic devices. It has a narrow range of possibilities for editing and formatting texts, but does not lose its popularity.

Reference! Recently, there is an improved analogue of this format - KF8 (Kindle Format 8).

What format of e-book to choose

For a more comfortable reading, it is worthwhile to dwell on formats designed specifically for e-books. The list of book formats includes FB2, EPUB and MOBI. The first is to build on the characteristics of your reader and the list of formats available for use. Also, the choice is influenced by what actions need to be performed with the text, only reading or editing and formatting.

Important! If you are engaged in the publication of your own work, then you need to take care of the convenience of readers in advance and publish the book in several common options. This will not only expand the audience, but also allow you to place the publication on all major Internet resources for downloading and viewing electronic books.

Do I need a reader with support for all formats

Of course, the more formats an ebook supports, the better. On such a device it is not difficult to correctly display a variety of publications and works, regardless of size, number of illustrations and fonts.

But even if the reader is designed for one format or several common ones, there is a fairly simple way out of the situation: conversion. Internet space allows the user to easily convert the format to another while being online, even if one of them is rather rare.

It is enough to know the correct name of the file types you need and to have access to the Internet. Also, all popular libraries often present books in all popular formats at once. Their list can usually be found in the description of the work itself and without effort download the one that is right for you.