2020 Update: Remove DRM from Google Play Books? Proven Ways
Tips and Tricks • August 14, 2020
There are quite a few flaws with Google Play Books, and one that drives me crazy is Google Play Books DRM. Some books only available on Google Play Books, but I need to read those Google Play Books on Kindle, Nook, or iPad.
Now, don’t get me wrong, DRM is a good way to protect the content owners and lower the chances a writer’s hard work being stolen. but sometimes we just don’t want to be locked down like that.
Then how to remove DRM from Google Play books? The first answer which comes to mind would be using Calibre, of course. However, it’s not the only solution, neither the best one. In this article, we’ll show you simple and straightforward ways to remove DRM from Google Play books. With or without Calibre.
Is it legal to remove DRM from Google Play books?
This depends on where you live. The rules differ from country to country, and sometimes the specific use is not allowed. In the US and the UK, there is a law known as DMCA which makes it illegal to remove DRM from ebooks. So, removing DRM from Google Play books is illegal, even if you paid for it. Also, many countries have similar laws.
In practice, you’re very unlikely to get into trouble if you only removing DRM for personal reading needs. and most people would argue that if you buy the book and never share it with others, you are on the safer side, ethically speaking.
Preparation: Download Books from Google books
Before we go further, you’ll need to download your purchased Google play books. Just following the simple steps below.
Visit Google Play Books Store（https://play.google.com/books）in a web browser and log in with your Google account. All eBooks you have added or purchased can be found under the tab “My books” at the left side of the page.
Then the eBooks you want to download, click the three dots icon In the lower-right corner of ebook title. Next select Download EPUB or Download PDF option from the drop-down menu to start downloading the book.
Note: Nearly all Google play books are downloadable in EPUB, PDF, or ACSM. Except for some large DRM books (books larger than128 MBs) will not be available for download. Also, the ebook you uploaded to Google Play Books can only download with Google Takeout.
If you directly get a PDF or epub file and can open it with a PDF or epub reader, then you don’t need to remove DRM from the downloaded google books. If, however, what you get is a .acsm file, then you need to download and remove DRM from these Google Play ACSM books.
ACSM which stands for Adobe Content Server Message file, it is not the real content of the book, but really a download link for you to use adobe digit editions to download the book. Follow the steps below.
Step 1: Download and install Adobe Digital Editions.
Download Adobe Digital Editions for Windows (8.13MB)
Download Adobe Digital Editions for Mac (23.2MB)
Step 2: Open Adobe Digital Editions and click menu Help > Authorize Computer with Adobe ID. Create one if you don’t have it.
Once you have logged in with your Adobe ID, drag and drop the ACSM file into Adobe Digital Editions. then a window will be opened to show the downloading process.
Depending on the original format, the book you downloaded will be in EPUB or PDF. You can locate the download book easily by right-click the book and >> Item Info.
Books downloaded via this way are DRM protected, so you can only read the book with Adobe Digital Editions. which prevents you from reading the book on other readers like Kindle, Kobo, or Nook. Just follow the below steps to remove the DRM protection from ACSM Google Play Books.
Using Calibre with DeDRM Plugin
For removing ebook DRM, Calibre is one of the best tools out there. Calibre itself can’t remove DRM from Google Play books, And to remove DRM with Calibre, you should install De-DRM Plugin. Once DRM removed, Calibre can also help you convert the ebooks into your preferred format. Though, it’s a bit complicated to setup.
Step 1. First, download the latest version of Calibre and DeDRM Plugin
https://calibre-ebook.com/download
https://github.com/apprenticeharper/DeDRM_tools/releases
Step 2. Install DRM Removal plugin in Calibre. First, click the menu “Preferences” Go to Advanced section and click Plugins.
Next, click on the Load plugin from file button.
Step 3: Navigate to the DeDRM_calibre_plugin folder and select DeDRM_plugin.zip. Calibre will add this plugin under its “File type plugins” list in the Preferences window.
Step 4: Restart the Calibre.
Step 5: Drag and drop the downloaded Google Play books into Calibre’s main interface. DRM gets removed soon after you add it to Calibre library.
Step 6: Then click the “Convert books” button. choose your output format as PDF. Click the “OK” button and it will convert your Google Play books to PDF.
Method 2. Remove DRM from Google Play books using Epubor Ultimate
Many users asked is there anyways easier than Calibre? well for these uses, we recommend Epubor Ultimate. Which only need 2 steps to finish the DRM removing and ebook converting process.
Epubor Ultimate integrates functions of eBook DRM removal and file conversion, it supports removing DRM from Adobe, Kobo, Kindle, Nook, etc. and convert books to PDF, Epub, Mobi, AZW3, TXT, etc, while at the same keeps quality and all metadata.
Though it is paid software, it does offer a free trial version which only transfers 20% of the contents in TXT format. Once you register the full version it will complete decrypting and converting the full book.
Step 1: Run Epubor Ultimate. All your Google Play books will be automatically detected and display under the “Adobe” tab. Just drag and drop Google Play Books from left to the right main window to remove DRM.
Step 2: After DRM removing, just click the word “Decrypted” to locate your DRM-free Google Play books (PDF/EPUB). Now you’re able to read Google Play books on Kindle/Kobo/Nook/Sony/ eReaders and any epub/pdf reading apps.
Conclusion
Google Play Books is where we will sure to buy some books. But the DRM really limit our reading experience, we do need a way to remove DRM from Google Books.
There are several steps and tools required to remove DRM from Google Books. in this article we provide the two most easy and freeways, so don’t waste your time – start reading Google Play Book on any device you like!
Just tried with with some Google Play ebooks and it worked! Thanks!
Thanks to that, I was able to remove the DRM from the book I bought from Google Books. Thank you! However, when I tried to view the book on Kindle, the photos overlap behind the text. Can this result come because I convert the book from epub to Kindle?
One thing that tripped me up that should be clarified. When you are using Calibre you are adding the ebook files that Adobe Digital Editions create after you import the original ebook files, not the original ebook files you downloaded from Google.
So I tried the Calibre version and ended up with this error. What am I doing wrong?
calibre, version 4.23.0 (win32, embedded-python: True)
Conversion error: Failed: Convert book 1 of 1 (Brickman’s Family Challenge Book)
Convert book 1 of 1 (Brickman’s Family Challenge Book)
Conversion options changed from defaults:
output_profile: u’generic_eink’
pdf_sans_family: u’MS Shell Dlg 2′
verbose: 2
pdf_serif_family: u’MS Shell Dlg 2′
read_metadata_from_opf: u’C:\\Users\\Lenovo\\AppData\\Local\\Temp\\calibre_ydplks\\_dcisn.opf’
Resolved conversion options
calibre version: 4.23.0
{‘asciiize’: False,
‘author_sort’: None,
‘authors’: None,
‘base_font_size’: 0.0,
‘book_producer’: None,
‘change_justification’: u’original’,
‘chapter’: u”//*[((name()=’h1′ or name()=’h2′) and re:test(., ‘\\s*((chapter|book|section|part)\\s+)|((prolog|prologue|epilogue)(\\s+|$))’, ‘i’)) or @class = ‘chapter’]”,
‘chapter_mark’: u’pagebreak’,
‘comments’: None,
‘cover’: None,
‘custom_size’: None,
‘debug_pipeline’: None,
‘dehyphenate’: True,
‘delete_blank_paragraphs’: True,
‘disable_font_rescaling’: False,
‘duplicate_links_in_toc’: False,
’embed_all_fonts’: False,
’embed_font_family’: None,
‘enable_heuristics’: False,
‘expand_css’: False,
‘extra_css’: None,
‘filter_css’: u”,
‘fix_indents’: True,
‘font_size_mapping’: None,
‘format_scene_breaks’: True,
‘html_unwrap_factor’: 0.4,
‘input_encoding’: None,
‘input_profile’: ,
‘insert_blank_line’: False,
‘insert_blank_line_size’: 0.5,
‘insert_metadata’: False,
‘isbn’: None,
‘italicize_common_cases’: True,
‘keep_ligatures’: False,
‘language’: None,
‘level1_toc’: None,
‘level2_toc’: None,
‘level3_toc’: None,
‘line_height’: 0.0,
‘linearize_tables’: False,
‘margin_bottom’: 5.0,
‘margin_left’: 5.0,
‘margin_right’: 5.0,
‘margin_top’: 5.0,
‘markup_chapter_headings’: True,
‘max_toc_links’: 50,
‘minimum_line_height’: 120.0,
‘no_chapters_in_toc’: False,
‘no_inline_navbars’: False,
‘output_profile’: ,
‘page_breaks_before’: u’/’,
‘paper_size’: u’letter’,
‘pdf_add_toc’: False,
‘pdf_default_font_size’: 20,
‘pdf_footer_template’: None,
‘pdf_header_template’: None,
‘pdf_hyphenate’: False,
‘pdf_mark_links’: False,
‘pdf_mono_family’: u’Courier’,
‘pdf_mono_font_size’: 16,
‘pdf_odd_even_offset’: 0.0,
‘pdf_page_margin_bottom’: 72.0,
‘pdf_page_margin_left’: 72.0,
‘pdf_page_margin_right’: 72.0,
‘pdf_page_margin_top’: 72.0,
‘pdf_page_number_map’: None,
‘pdf_page_numbers’: False,
‘pdf_sans_family’: u’MS Shell Dlg 2′,
‘pdf_serif_family’: u’MS Shell Dlg 2′,
‘pdf_standard_font’: u’serif’,
‘pdf_use_document_margins’: False,
‘prefer_metadata_cover’: False,
‘preserve_cover_aspect_ratio’: False,
‘pretty_print’: False,
‘pubdate’: None,
‘publisher’: None,
‘rating’: None,
‘read_metadata_from_opf’: u’C:\\Users\\Lenovo\\AppData\\Local\\Temp\\calibre_ydplks\\_dcisn.opf’,
‘remove_fake_margins’: True,
‘remove_first_image’: False,
‘remove_paragraph_spacing’: False,
‘remove_paragraph_spacing_indent_size’: 1.5,
‘renumber_headings’: True,
‘replace_scene_breaks’: u”,
‘search_replace’: ‘[]’,
‘series’: None,
‘series_index’: None,
‘smarten_punctuation’: False,
‘sr1_replace’: None,
‘sr1_search’: None,
‘sr2_replace’: None,
‘sr2_search’: None,
‘sr3_replace’: None,
‘sr3_search’: None,
‘start_reading_at’: None,
‘subset_embedded_fonts’: False,
‘tags’: None,
‘timestamp’: None,
‘title’: None,
‘title_sort’: None,
‘toc_filter’: None,
‘toc_threshold’: 6,
‘toc_title’: None,
‘transform_css_rules’: ‘[]’,
‘uncompressed_pdf’: False,
‘unit’: u’inch’,
‘unsmarten_punctuation’: False,
‘unwrap_lines’: True,
‘use_auto_toc’: False,
‘use_profile_size’: False,
‘verbose’: 2}
InputFormatPlugin: EPUB Input running
on C:\Users\Lenovo\AppData\Local\Temp\calibre_ydplks\ne1py4.epub
Python function terminated unexpectedly
ne1py4.epub (Error Code: 1)
Traceback (most recent call last):
File “site.py”, line 114, in main
File “site.py”, line 88, in run_entry_point
File “site-packages\calibre\utils\ipc\worker.py”, line 209, in main
File “site-packages\calibre\gui2\convert\gui_conversion.py”, line 43, in gui_convert_override
File “site-packages\calibre\gui2\convert\gui_conversion.py”, line 28, in gui_convert
File “site-packages\calibre\ebooks\conversion\plumber.py”, line 1110, in run
File “site-packages\calibre\customize\conversion.py”, line 246, in __call__
File “site-packages\calibre\ebooks\conversion\plugins\epub_input.py”, line 290, in convert
DRMError: ne1py4.epub
Thank you for this tutorial! I’m so trying this!
You’re by far the best teacher on ebook reading I’ve ever seen
Calibre skills – 100%
Communication skills – 100%
❤️
Your explanation is so clear, I followed the guide and did successfully removed the DRM from google books.
Wow man 😳
Never saw someone explain remove DRM so nicely!! First time saw your article. Subscribed! 😊
The BEST tutorial for this technique.
Amazing! Tks a lot!