Kindle for Mac finally makes an appearance

 

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By Stuart Turton

Posted on 18 Mar 2010 at 11:06

Amazon has released the first beta of its free Kindle for Mac application that lets users read eBooks bought via the Kindle store on their Mac.

The Kindle for Mac application allows users to buy and read eBooks in Amazon's proprietary AZW format, without having to shell out £202 on the Kindle reader.

It follows similar apps for the PC, iPhone and BlackBerry, and shares much of their functionality - though it lacks full-text search and the ability to make notes within the books.

Kindle for Mac users can synchronise bookmarks, notes and page information with other computers and their Kindle eBook reader. That means you can start reading a book on the Kindle, for example, and pick up where you left off on the Mac.

The app also allows users to download any books already purchased for the Kindle, or go shopping on the US Kindle store - though bizarrely the latter option rips you out of the app and drags you to the Kindle website.

As with the Kindle for PC software, the app strips out the ability to download subscriptions to newspapers and magazines.