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Best Free and Open Source Alternatives to Adobe Digital Editions

Adobe is a large multinational computer software company with over 29,000 employees. Its flagship products include Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Premiere Pro, XD, Acrobat DC, and the Portable Document Format (PDF). The products are wrapped up and marketed as the Creative Cloud, a subscription-only way of accessing more than 20 desktop and mobile apps and services for photography, design, video, web, UX, and more.

We are long-standing admirers of Adobe’s products. They develop many high quality proprietary programs. It’s true there are security and privacy concerns in relation to some of their products. And there’s considerable criticism attached to their pricing practices. But the real issue is Adobe Creative Cloud does not support Linux. And there’s no prospect of support forthcoming.

What if you are looking to move away from Adobe and embark on a new world of online freedom, where you are not tracked, monetised and attached to Adobe’s ecosystem. We only recommend free and open source alternatives. Our recommended software don’t necessarily replicate every feature of their Adobe counterparts but they offer sufficient functionality for many tasks.

Adobe Digital Editions is an e-book reader software program. It lets you acquire, manage, and read e-books, digital newspapers, and other digital publications.

Adobe Digital Editions is proprietary software and it’s not available for Linux. We recommend the best free and open source alternatives.


1. Foliate

Foliate is an eBook viewer built with GJS (GNOME JavaScript bindings) and Epub.js, a JavaScript library for rendering ePub documents in the browser, across many devices.

Foliate


2. Calibre

Calibre is a complete e-library solution. It offers library management, format conversion, news feeds to ebook conversion as well as e-book reader sync features.

Calibre is primarily an e-book cataloging program. It manages your e-book collection for you. It’s designed around the concept of the logical book, i.e. a single entry in the database that may correspond to ebooks in several formats. It also supports conversion from a dozen different e-book formats to LRF and EPUB. A graphical interface to the conversion software can be accessed easily by just clicking the “Convert E-books” button.

Calibre


3. KOReader

KOReader is a wonderfully responsive document reader. It’s fast, brimming with features, and highly customizable. The fact that it supports a wide variety of devices is the icing on the cake.

KOReader - reading screen


For more great free and open source e-book readers, check out our roundup.

All articles in this series:

Alternatives to Adobe's Products
Adobe Acrobat ReaderAcrobat Reader is a multi-platform PDF reader. It lets users view, print, sign and comment on PDF documents.
Adobe After EffectsAfter Effects is digital visual effects, motion graphics, and compositing software used in the post-production process of film making, video games and television production.
Adobe AnimateAnimate is a multimedia authoring and computer animation. Animate is used to design vector graphics and animation for television series, online animation, websites, web applications, rich web applications, game development, and more.
Adobe AuditionAudition is a digital audio workstation featuring both a multitrack, non-destructive mix/edit environment and a destructive-approach waveform editing view.
Bridge is a creative asset manager that lets you preview, organise, edit and publish multiple creative assets quickly and easily.
Character Animator is software that combines real-time live motion-capture with a multi-track recording system to control layered 2D puppets based on an illustration drawn in Photoshop or Illustrator.
Digital Editions is an e-book reader software program. It lets you acquire, manage, and read e-books, digital newspapers, and other digital publications.
Adobe DimensionDimension is 3D rendering and design software. It's designed to build brand visualizations, illustrations, product mockups and other creative work.
Adobe DreamweaverDreamweaver is a web development tool. It includes a code editor that supports syntax highlighting, code completion, real-time syntax checking, and code introspection for generating code hints to assist the user in writing code.
Fill & Sign lets users fill out PDF documents on a smartphones and tablet and share them directly with others.
Firefly is software which uses generative AI and simple text prompts to generate images. Its Firefly generative AI models are trained on licensed content, such as Adobe Stock, along with public domain content where copyright has expired, and images from Wikimedia.
FrameMaker is a document processor designed for writing and editing large or complex documents, including structured documents.
Fresco is a vector and raster drawing and painting app. It's primarily used for digital painting by artists, illustrators, animators, and sketchers.
Adobe IllustratorIllustrator is a vector graphics editor and design tool. The software lets you create everything from web and mobile graphics to logos, icons, book illustrations, product packaging, and billboards.
Adobe InCopyInCopy is a professional word processor that integrates with InDesign. The software enables editors to write, edit, and design documents.
Adobe InDesignIndesign is a desktop publishing and page layout designing application. The software is used to create posters, flyers, brochures, magazines, newspapers, presentations, books and ebooks
Adobe Photoshop LightroomLightroom is a creative image organization and image manipulation. Its main uses include importing/saving, viewing, organizing, tagging, editing, and sharing large numbers of digital images.
Lightroom Classic is a creative image organization and image manipulation software. This photo editing app is optimised for the desktop.
Media Encoder is an encoding engine for Adobe Premiere Pro, Adobe After Effects, Adobe Audition, and Adobe Character Animator.
Adobe PhotoshopPhotoshop is a raster graphics editor with multiple layers, masks, alpha compositing. It edits and composes raster images in multiple layers and supports masks, alpha compositing and several color models.
Photoshop Express is a mobile and Windows app made for all-in-one photo editing and sharing.
Adobe Premiere ProPremiere Pro is a timeline-based video editing tool. It is geared towards professional video editing.
Scan provides a portable scanner that recognizes text automatically (OCR) and allows you to save to multiple files formats including PDF and JPEG.
Adobe XDXD is a prototyping tool for user experience and interaction designers. Adobe XD features are used for creating wireframes, prototypes, and screen designs for digital products.
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anenasa
anenasa
5 months ago

Probably many people use Adobe Digital Editions just for opening Adobe DRM files (.acsm). For that you need a calibre plugin.