Reading software. How reading paper and e-books affects our memory and productivity. Digital media are more convenient and cheaper

Despite the fact that mobile e-books have appeared, replacing traditional paper sources of information for readers, it is advisable to have a book reader on your own computer. It may be needed, for example, for reading technical, scientific and fiction literature, as well as for viewing drawings that are now created in book format.
There are a lot of programs for reading books on a computer. Below is a selection of readers that have managed to prove themselves from the best side.

Cool Reader

The features of the computer reader are as follows:

• automatic page turning. The function can be disabled if you need to spend significant time familiarizing yourself with the data on the page;
• adjusting the background and font brightness in accordance with the user's wishes;
• viewing the contents of books in archives without unpacking them.

ALReader

The main feature of the reader is its many settings. But the average user is unlikely to have to change anything, and he can easily get by with the default settings. ALReader supports a lot of formats, including ODT and FB2. It is precisely thanks to the ability to view the last two formats that the reader has become in demand.

It is noteworthy that when creating the program, the creators paid special attention to its design. Having opened ALReader, the user will be surprised to see a book on printed newspaper sheets in front of him. To use the reader there is no need to install it. Immediately after downloading it can be used in full mode.

FBReader

It has a simple and intuitive interface that is easy to customize if desired. All open book files are classified according to characteristics - title, genre and author.

There is no need to move e-books to a shared folder - FBReader automatically creates links to their location in the computer's memory. The program has one drawback - a two-page mode is not provided.

Adobe Reader

Documents in PDF format can also pose a threat to your computer. Attackers inject malicious scripts into them, and therefore, before opening anything, you should check the file in an antivirus program.

The same problem applies to other programs where you can open books and documents in PDF. To minimize risks, you should use only the latest versions of the reader. The program takes up a lot of space in the computer's memory and takes much longer to install than other software products with similar purposes.

DjVuViwer

The advantages of the program are as follows:

• opening documents in other formats besides .djvu;
• you can scroll through all the pages, rather than flipping through them two at a time, which happens in the vast majority of programs;
• creating bookmarks in a simple and convenient way;
• fast speed of opening books.

Foxit Reader

The program menu is presented in several languages. The application operates primarily on computers running Windows. But, recently, versions have appeared that can run on PCs running Windows OS.

ICE Book Reader Professional

The program includes two modules of equal importance - a library and a reader. You can choose one-page or two-page mode to view documents.

Often the mode is selected in accordance with the user's preferences and the size of the monitor screen. Each mode has its own set of settings.

The advantage and at the same time the disadvantage (due to the increase in data space occupied) of the reader is that it automatically downloads all books to the library in full. So the file can be deleted from the main location at a later time.

If the amount of data storage space is small, then you should go to the settings and adjust the compression level.

ICE Book Reader Professional has the following features:

• support for files in various formats. Exception - .pdf;
• The entered settings are remembered by the reader automatically. The next time you turn it on, you will not need to change the parameters again;
• data can be opened from archives without involving one or another archiver. Information can be viewed in archives in the following formats: .zip, .rar and others.

STDU Viewer

The most important advantage is multi-format. With it you can open documents in .pdf format.

Conclusion

In fact, over the past five years, the situation in the book, library and information markets of our country has changed significantly. And the main phenomenon that not only shook the usual foundations of working with the reader, but also changed the attitude towards the book itself, was the “electronic revolution”. Over the course of five years, the e-book market and the market for electronic reading devices were not only born in the country (or rather, in the world), but also took on real shape. And it is no longer possible to ignore this when developing new methods for promoting reading. However, in order to correctly formulate approaches to the development of such techniques, it was first necessary to evaluate the processes occurring in the field of hitherto unstudied “electronic reading” and to understand the reader of electronic books.

In this regard, in September 2011, the Federal Agency for Press and Mass Communications, together with the Yuri Levada Analytical Center, conducted a large-scale sociological study on electronic reading in Russia and the genre preferences of e-book readers. The study was conducted on the basis of 12 largest cities of the Russian Federation - Moscow, St. Petersburg, Volgograd, Yekaterinburg, Kazan, Nizhny Novgorod, Novosibirsk, Omsk, Rostov-on-Don, Samara, Ufa, Chelyabinsk. Residents 18 years of age and older who read books—fiction or specialized literature—were surveyed. More than 1,000 questionnaires were finalized.

The study of trends associated with the transition from traditional “paper” reading to electronic reading began with the question “Do you know about the existence of electronic books?” (here we did not mean electronic book files, but electronic reading devices). The following answers were received: 84% of respondents said “yes” and only 16% of respondents had not yet heard of the existence of e-books (see Figure 1).

Not much time has passed since the appearance of electronic reading devices on the Russian market, but awareness of their existence among residents of Russian cities is already quite high. However, when answering the next question that worried the researchers, “In what form do you read books?”, the distribution of answers was different. Only 3% of the surveyed residents of Moscow, St. Petersburg and other large cities answered that they read exclusively electronic books, without resorting to paper ones. At the same time, 72% of respondents answered that they still read only regular paper books. And finally, 25% of respondents said that they read both regular books and electronic books (see Figure 2).

The latter is especially important for us. Perhaps, it is this moment that best “fixes” the smooth transition from “paper” reading to “electronic”, and here it is important to emphasize that at the current “historical period of time” the majority of e-book readers have not yet given up reading paper books. We do not yet know how long this state of “smooth transition” will be observed and what its scale will be, therefore, in order to identify trends in this area, it is necessary to monitor the situation over time, which the researchers intend to do in the future.

Of course, it was interesting for our analysis to identify the motives that prompted current e-book readers to switch from sight-reading to reading on a screen. It should be noted that the developers of the study had certain hypotheses, which were formed either due to prevailing opinions in the industry environment (and sometimes stereotypes) or empirical observations. So, to the question “Why did you decide to start reading e-books?” As a prevailing answer, the researchers expected to hear in one form or another an expressed stereotype that “an electronic device contains a large number of books - an entire library.”

However, what was quite unexpected, this answer option turned out to be not only not the first, but not even the second or third. Only 21% of respondents said that the large capacity of electronic devices was the main factor for them that contributed to the transition from “paper” to “digital”. The overwhelming majority of respondents – 58% – responded that this factor for them was the fact that they could get the book they needed in electronic format faster (see Fig. 3).

The speed of getting the book you need can itself be interpreted in different ways (for example, that you don’t have to go to the store to get it), but it is noteworthy that the second most popular answer (albeit by a fairly large margin) was the answer “I don’t want to spend money.” Thus, a fairly large group of users who turn to reading electronic books obviously believes that an electronic book, unlike a paper one, is a free product, and the transition from paper to electronic reading will bring them savings. Moreover, the connection between the first and second most popular answers to the question asked once again shows us that a free – pirated – book is still quite easy to find on the Internet, and the reader can get it on his device quite quickly. Moreover, approximately a third of respondents say that in electronic form they can find something that is not on sale. And publishers and booksellers need to take note of this. Questions about the greater convenience of owning and using electronic reading devices compared to paper books, as noted, come into the background, and they are united by the answer options “do not accumulate at home,” “accommodates a large number of texts,” and “it is more convenient to read in transport.” On average, 24–25% of users indicate them.

Many people are accustomed to thinking that when a person switches from “paper” reading to “electronic” reading, he begins to read less. In the industry environment, opinions have been repeatedly expressed that those who cannot “master” a regular, paper book are switching to “electronic reading”; that the perception of information on a screen is different from its perception on paper, and for a person using electronic devices, a different form of information consumption is more convenient - in the form of “clips”, “pictures”. In other words, for many of us, an “electronic” reader is like a “fake” reader, a “under-” or “half-” reader.

However, we decided to ask the “electronic readers” themselves the question of whether they began to read more often or less often after being introduced to electronic devices, and how the transition from “paper” to “digital” affected their perception of the text. The response exceeded all our expectations. Only 3% of e-book readers said they read less electronically (see Figure 4). 48% said they read about the same amount electronically as they did on paper, and 42% said they read even more electronically.

The next question that interested the researchers concerned where people most often read e-books. We also had our own hypothesis on this issue: of course, in transport. This assumption was not formed by chance: each of us, when traveling to or from work on public transport, more than once saw people reading e-books on one device or another.

However, it turned out that city transport is not the most “favorite” place for reading e-books. As it was discovered during the research, e-books are most often read at home (see Figure 5). And this fact, in our opinion, is very positive. He says that electronic reading, like traditional reading, is still a home activity. That is, with the transition from “paper” reading to “electronic” reading, the tradition of home reading does not disappear.

The fact of the predominance of “home” electronic reading is partly explained by the answers to another question that we asked respondents: “How do you read electronic books?” Thus, 46% of e-book readers say that they read them from the screen of a regular computer. 45% note that they use one or another special portable device or gadget for reading, and 9% responded that they print electronic texts onto paper and read them in their usual form (see Fig. 6).

Of the total mass of e-book readers, we were most interested in those who use not only a personal computer for reading. We asked them a question: what devices do they use to read electronic texts? More than half of the respondents (56%) indicated that this is an e-book, or reader, which is usually associated with an “electronic book” when we talk about a “book” as a device (see Fig. 7). Next on the response scale were a communicator/smartphone (25%), a mobile phone (22%), and only 13% of respondents noted that they use an iPod or iPad to read e-books. Here it is important to note the difference between the Russian and American markets of electronic reading devices: while in our country the vast majority of their users prefer reading from readers, then abroad they read more from iPods and iPads.

Speaking about the electronic gadgets that respondents use for reading, we could not help but ask them what advantages and disadvantages they see in them. When asking the question about the merits of electronic devices, we, as in the case of identifying factors contributing to the transition from “paper” to “digital”, assumed that the most important of them would be that the electronic device can accommodate a large number of electronic books. However, here too this answer did not become the most popular - it was noted by 37% of respondents. Half of the respondents see the main advantage of electronic reading devices as the fact that they can download and erase unnecessary things (see Fig. 8). That is, half of the users of electronic gadgets use them “like” paper libraries - “read and throw away (erased).” The second most popular answer (42% of respondents), which is typical for the Russian market, was the answer that reading electronic books is much cheaper than buying paper books. This answer can be interpreted in different ways: an e-book today is indeed significantly cheaper than a paper one, but this same answer does not deny that by the words “much cheaper” some users mean pirated downloading of books. But we will talk about this below.

38% of e-book readers surveyed prefer them because these books do not take up space at home. At the same time, 8% believe that paper books as a product are outdated.

As noted above, we asked what disadvantages these devices have, according to users of electronic gadgets. And the first, quite expected, answer was “harmful for the eyes.” Despite the fact that manufacturers of electronic reading devices are improving them every year, and more and more new models appear on the market every year, this answer option is chosen as the main disadvantage by 34% of respondents (see Fig. 9).

A fairly large place in the list of shortcomings is occupied by the consumer properties of electronic devices. Factors such as rapid battery drain are noted as negative by 31% of gadget users, the fact that an e-book “can only be read indoors” - 27%, and the fact that to “access” the text the electronic device must be turned on (and then – turn off) – 18%.

However, a fairly large proportion of users expect electronic devices to display a number of properties of a paper book and experience inconvenience associated with their absence. Thus, 21% of users of electronic gadgets are dissatisfied with the lack of the ability to make notes in the margins; the same number note the lack of book design; 13% of readers complain about the same type of font; 10% - on the weak contrast between the text and the “page”, and, finally, 6% note that the formats of paper books are much more diverse.

As already noted, in recent years there has been an opinion in the library and pedagogical community that when reading text from a screen, what is read is absorbed worse. However, this thesis was refuted by e-book readers: only 6% of them claim that what they read on the screen is absorbed worse than what they read on paper.

From the consumer properties of electronic devices, we decided to move on to the content aspects of electronic reading. And the first question we asked in this block was the question “What books do you download most often?” The answers were distributed quite proportionally. Half of the respondents download books for leisure reading, a quarter for study, and the same number “for both” (see Figure 10).

At the same time, quite eloquent answers were received to the question of how e-book readers download online literature (see Fig. 11). Almost 80% of e-book readers admitted that they only download books for free. 18% of readers noted that they turn to the paid version of books only in the absence of a free one, and as a rule, less than 0.5% of readers honestly pay for downloaded works. No comments needed.

The study of the content aspects of e-reading could not but include the study of the genre preferences of e-book readers. We analyzed reading preferences in both fiction and non-fiction.

Among the most “readable” genres of fiction in electronic form, users ranked fantasy in first place, followed by modern foreign prose, foreign detective stories and science fiction (see Fig. 12).

Looking at this picture, we can conclude that the most “readable” genres of fiction depend, rather, not on the medium of these texts (paper or electronic), but on the age of the reader, since the designated genres largely reflect the reading range of the young reader. This is also evidenced by the range of the most “unreadable” genres in electronic form - modern domestic and translated poetry, prose of the Soviet years, Russian pre-revolutionary classics, historical novels and books about the Great Patriotic War (see Fig. 13). Young people rarely read such books even on paper.

When starting to study reader preferences in the field of electronic non-fiction literature and imagining a young, modern, active person, we expected to hear the option “business literature” among the first answers. However, in reality the picture turned out to be different. Only 13% of respondents noted that they read business books from electronic media. The most read books in electronic form were books on the specialty (29%), educational literature (24%) and encyclopedias (23%) (see Fig. 14).

Among the most “unreadable” types of non-fiction literature were dream books, books on magic and fortune telling, religion and customs, as well as books about nature and animals, memoirs and biographies (see Fig. 15). Obviously, readers of such literature have not yet mastered electronic media, and publishers prefer to sell it in paper form.

It was quite interesting during the study to analyze the models of reading and purchasing behavior of consumers of paper and electronic books. Since, as we saw above, the majority of e-book readers have not yet given up reading paper books, it seemed interesting to compare the motives for buying books by “clean wallets” and readers who combine reading paper and e-books.

To the question “Why do you most often buy books?” readers of paper books more often give “traditional” answers, corresponding to book consumption patterns characteristic of the late 1970s – early 1980s: “for the home library” (about 50%), “read and give away” (45%). At the same time, readers who combine electronic and paper reading are more practical in choosing books and more often than “paper-readers” buy them “for study” (about 30%), “for work” (22%), i.e. for educational and business purposes (see Fig. 16).

Similar results were given in answers to another question – “Why do you read books in the first place?” The motivation of “paper” readers was quite traditional: their answers are more often found in the groups “to unwind, have fun”, “get away from everyday worries”, “pass the time, dispel boredom”, “get emotions, experiences” (see Fig. 17). On the contrary, a practical approach to reading prevails among readers who combine “paper” and “electronic” reading: “to learn something interesting, broaden their horizons,” “get new experience,” “for work,” “for study.” In other words, “paper” reading today is mostly recreational, while electronic reading is educational and business.

Continuing the topic of purchasing behavior, we asked readers of paper books and readers who combine “paper” and “electronic” reading where they usually buy books.

The results turned out to be quite interesting. It turned out that readers who combine “paper” and “electronic” reading are more likely to visit “classic” bookstores compared to those who read only paper books (80% versus 71%), and more often shop online (15% versus 4%) (see Fig. 18). Readers of only paper books, more often than readers of paper and electronic books, buy books in supermarkets, at bookstores, in kiosks, on trays, i.e. at non-stationary and non-specialized retail points.

Answers to the question “Approximately how many books have you bought in the last 6 months?” were even more interesting. If in the groups “None”, “1-2 books” and “3-5 books”, “paper” readers are in the lead, then in the groups “6-10 books”, “11-15 books” the majority are readers combining “ paper" and "electronic" reading (see Fig. 19). That is, e-book readers not only visit bookstores more often, but also buy traditional books more often.

But not only are they more active shoppers, they are also more active readers. When we asked, “Approximately how many books do you read per month?” (without dividing into fiction and non-fiction), readers of paper books more often answered that only one book or were at a loss to answer, and readers of paper and electronic books more often said “2-3 books”, “4-5 books” and even “more than 5 books" (see Fig. 20).

If the answers to questions about buying and reading books by “paper” and “electronic” readers are somehow explainable, then the answers to the question “Are you enrolled in any library?” turned out to be completely unexpected for us. It turned out that among readers who combine “paper” and “electronic” reading, more are those who are registered in the library (both in one and in several), and among those who read only paper books, more often there are those who have never been registered in the library, and those who were previously registered, but no longer use it (see Fig. 21). That is, readers of paper and electronic books also turned out to be more active visitors to traditional libraries than readers of only paper books.

Thus, the conducted research, in fact, destroys the hitherto prevailing opinion about e-book readers as “inferior” readers. In fact, e-book readers, compared with those who only read in print, were found to be more active readers, more active shoppers, and more active library patrons.

Apparently, this is primarily due to the active phase of “non-family socialization” - studying, starting work, acquiring professional qualifications. In addition, young age is traditionally the phase of the most intensive “reading” of literature. In addition, we decided to compare how many books were in the families (in the house) where today's readers of printed and electronic books grew up. It turned out that today's e-book readers had more books in their families than today's paper readers—the former report having more complete home libraries than the latter (see Figure 22). Probably surrounded by books since childhood, they inherited the reading habit from their parents, and the electronic gadgets that have appeared in recent years have simply given them the opportunity to read (“swallow”) more books, receive (download) them faster, and manage their libraries more efficiently.

Completing our study of “electronic” reading in Russia, we tried to create a portrait of a modern e-book reader. Obviously, such data will be of interest to publishers and distributors of electronic books, as well as manufacturers of devices for reading them. It turned out that readers who combine regular and electronic reading are younger than those who read only “from sight”: the average age of the former is about 30 years, while those who prefer regular books is 44 years old; they are more educated: more than half (53%) have already received or are receiving higher education (among paper book supporters, the share of highly educated people is 42%). E-book readers, as a rule, have an increased level of consumer capabilities: 49% can easily purchase durable goods, 60% have a car in the family, 70% have a desktop computer, and 60% have a laptop.

We presented the results of the first large-scale study characterizing electronic reading in Russia. Like any undertaking, it is apparently not without some shortcomings, and some issues require clarification and specification. It is obvious that the research carried out records the state of affairs at a certain point in time, so, of course, we intend to track the identified trends over time. And of course, these dynamics should be monitored by those directly involved in developing strategies for promoting reading in today's difficult times for the publishing industry.

A. Voropaev, Head of the Department of Book Exhibitions and Reading Promotion of the Federal Agency for Press and Mass Communications, Candidate of Philological Sciences

Several years ago, I came across an article in which the author believed that mentioning to your friends that you had read an e-book yesterday was a source of pride. Now this won’t surprise anyone. But despite this, a small problem remained. The problem of choosing a reading program. I'm not going to talk about Adobe's dedicated e-reader products. Everything is clear with them. But reading regular (.txt .doc and so on) files is not so simple. You can, of course, read them in MS Word or even in Notepad. But those who read them there will soon realize that they can find something more comfortable to read. I'm not an exception. Well, it’s inconvenient for me to read electronic text in Notepad or MS Word. Having realized what I needed, I went in search.

And today I will tell you about several convenient reading programs that, it seems to me, deserve a certain share of your attention, dear readers.

Programs for reading electronic texts (not books of a special format, but regular .txt) come in two main types.

The first type is built on the principle of scrolling text, similar to Notepad.

The second type uses the principle of a classic paper book.

Personally, I like the second type better. But, as they say, there is no match for taste and color, so read the description and choose.

The reader, which uses the principle of text scrolling in its work, has the proud name ICE Book Reader Professional. Recently a new, fifth version was released.

The program itself is quite convenient. It supports several text scrolling modes, many file formats, allows you to adjust the size of letters, the level of anti-aliasing and many other useful functions. On the website of the developer company they claim that one of the goals of creating the program is to reduce eye fatigue when reading e-books and gives a rather interesting justification for the usefulness of the program. There is also a lot of information about the program. In general, the thing is definitely worthwhile. For its normal operation, you need a fairly powerful computer - a 1 GHz processor, a decent video card. The developers claim that it can work with huge files without any problems. If interested, go to their website and read a detailed description of the program.

Fb2 format was created as a universal way to store books. It has many useful properties, and one of them is the ease of conversion to a number of other formats. However, not every user has a fb2 reader on their computer. This is what slowed down the development of the format. But if you have a special utility, you can enjoy convenient book reading.

Free FB2 readers

Universal "reader". It supports most formats for storing books and works with any amount of information and number of sheets. To use it, you don’t need to install anything, you just need to run the executable file. It's really convenient and fast.

It would seem that such a simple program should have little functionality, but this is not true. In fact, Cool Reader meets all modern requirements. In addition to reading the fb2 format, this program will ensure work with any documents, including those located on the network! For this, there is convenient access to online libraries.

The utility's interface is very convenient and simple. It is divided into several parts, one of which shows recent files, the second - the document directory, and the third - settings. This approach allows you to use it regardless of the localization language. According to many users, this is the best program.

A little old-fashioned, but very functional program for Windows. It allows you to work with absolutely any text formats, and can also connect to archives! Now you don't need to extract books from RAR, ZIP or other packages, you just need to specify the path to them.

In addition, it should be noted that there is a huge variety of settings. In the program you can customize almost everything - from the catalog to the font. It should also be noted that the cataloging system is incredibly extensive and convenient. In it you can divide books by categories, genres, your own wishes, the number of bookmarks and even corrections. By the way, they allow you to remove typos from the text.

ICE Book Reader Professional will help you preserve your vision. There are a number of different viewing modes available to suit different conditions.

It's not called that for nothing. This program works with all formats that a user can find on the Internet. Docx, abw and even chm books can be read in Alreader. This is the main advantage of the utility. It does not have any outstanding interface design, but it is not irritating to the eyes, even after a very long time of reading.

Alreader will help you tune in and focus on the process. To do this, you can choose the most convenient font, background color and illumination, and even anti-aliasing mode. This approach to customization allows the user to truly enjoy reading. The program has the usual “day” and “night” modes, as well as a lot of unique settings.
It is important to note that the background for reading can be as authentic as possible - in the form of paper of varying degrees of preservation. The background images are made of very high quality, which will help you get aesthetic pleasure.

At this stage, the program is still being finalized, so it has several shortcomings. For example, table formats and CSS styles are not fully supported. However, this practically does not limit the reader. Problems will occur extremely rarely, on single copies.

In FB2 Reader you can create an entire library, cataloging information according to one of a dozen different parameters. This program can be downloaded for free and used without any restrictions.

STDU Viewer- can hardly be called a classic reader. It is designed to work with any documents, including e-books. Many free programs specialize in reading ease. This is very important, but not in all cases. The same program is more aimed at maximum functionality. You can view any document format in it. It's hard to even think of a book that STDU Viewer can't open.

The program interface is laconic, but very convenient. Small symbolic icons can be understood intuitively, especially since everything is translated into Russian. Despite the huge number of different possibilities, they are neatly placed in several panels, allowing the user to concentrate on the text.

Among the unique features, it is worth noting the format converter and the ability to work with images. Also, STDU Viewer allows you to print documents.

Good afternoon.

Whoever predicted the end of books with the beginning of the development of computer technology. However, progress is progress, but books have lived and still live (and will continue to live). It’s just that everything has changed somewhat - paper tomes have been replaced by electronic ones.

And this, I must note, has its advantages: on the most ordinary computer or tablet (on Android) more than one thousand books can fit, each of which can be opened and started reading in a matter of seconds; there is no need to keep a large cabinet in the house to store them - everything fits on the PC disk; Electronic video makes it convenient to make bookmarks and reminders, etc.

The best programs for reading e-books (*.fb2, *.txt, *.doc, *.pdf, *.djvu and others)

For Windows

Several useful and convenient “readers” that will help you immerse yourself in the process of absorbing another book while sitting at your computer.

Cool Reader

One of the most common programs, both for Windows and Android (although, in my opinion, for the latter, there are programs that are more convenient, but more about them below).

Among the main features:

• supports formats: FB2, TXT, RTF, DOC, TCR, HTML, EPUB, CHM, PDB, MOBI (i.e. all the most common and in demand);
• adjusting the brightness of the background and fonts (a mega convenient thing, you can make reading convenient for any screen and person!);
• auto-flipping (convenient, but not always: sometimes you read one page for 30 seconds, another for a minute);
• convenient bookmarks (this is very convenient);
• the ability to read books from archives (this is also very convenient, since many are distributed online in archives);

AL Reader

Another very interesting “reader”. Among its main advantages: it is the ability to select encodings (which means that when opening a book, “cracked” and unreadable characters are practically excluded); support for both popular and rare formats: fb2, fb2.zip, fbz, txt, txt.zip, partial support for epub (without DRM), html, docx, odt, rtf, mobi, prc (PalmDoc), tcr.

In addition, it should be noted that this program can be used both on Windows and Android. I would also like to note that this program has quite fine adjustments to brightness, fonts, indents, and other “things” that will help you adjust the display to perfect condition, regardless of the equipment used. I definitely recommend you check it out!

FBReader

Another well-known and popular “reader”, I could not ignore it in this article. Perhaps its most important advantages are: it is free, it supports all popular and not so popular formats (ePub, fb2, mobi, html, etc.), flexible ability to customize the display of books (fonts, brightness, indents), a large network library (you can always pick up something for evening reading).

By the way, we can’t help but say that the application works on all the most popular platforms: Windows, Android, Linux, Mac OS X, Blackberry, etc.

Adobe Reader

This program is probably known to almost all users who have ever worked with the PDF format. And many magazines, books, texts, pictures, etc. are distributed in this mega-popular format.

The PDF format is specific, sometimes it is impossible to open it on other readers except Adobe Reader. Therefore, I recommend having a similar program on your PC. It has already become a basic program for many users and its installation does not even raise questions...

DjVuViwer

The DJVU format has become very popular recently, partially replacing the PDF format. This happens due to the fact that DJVU compresses the file more strongly, with the same quality. Books, magazines, etc. are also distributed in the DJVU format.

There are quite a lot of readers of this format, but among them there is one small and simple utility - DjVuViwer.

Why is it better than others:

• light and fast;
• allows you to scroll through all pages at once (i.e., there is no need to flip through them, as in other programs of this kind);
• there is a convenient option for creating bookmarks (convenient, not just its presence...);
• opening all DJVU files without exception (i.e., it’s not like the utility opened one file but couldn’t open the second... And this, by the way, happens with some programs (like the universal programs presented above)).

For Android

eReader Prestigio

In my humble opinion, this is one of the best programs for reading e-books on Android. I use it on my tablet all the time.

Judge for yourself:

• a huge number of formats are supported: FB2, ePub, PDF, DJVU, MOBI, PDF, HTML, DOC, RTF, TXT (including audio formats: MP3, AAC, M4B and Reading Books Out Loud (TTS));
• entirely in Russian;
• convenient search, bookmarks, brightness settings, etc.

Those. A program from the category - installed it once and forgot about it, you just use it without thinking! I recommend trying it, a screenshot from it below.

FullReader+

Another convenient application for Android. I also often use it, opening one book in the first reader (see above), and the second in this one :).

Main advantages:

• support for a bunch of formats: fb2, epub, doc, rtf, txt, html, mobi, pdf, djvu, xps, cbz, docx, etc.;
• ability to read aloud;
• convenient setting of the background color (for example, you can make the background like a real old book, some people like it);
• built-in file manager (it’s convenient to immediately search for what you need);
• a convenient “memorizer” of recently opened books (and reading the current one).