If you are a regular Audible member, you might already be aware of how Audible subscription works. At the end of every subscription period, your account will automatically be charged for the new term.
But, what if you do not want to get charged for the next subscription period?
Should you cancel your membership?
Well, that may not always be the best option. If you cancel your membership, you will lose all your membership benefits along with any unused credits in your account.
Instead, you can place your membership on hold.
When your membership is on hold, you won’t be charged and your credits will remain unchanged until your membership is resumed. You will enjoy most of the Audible benefits even if your membership is on hold. It’s just that you won’t get any more credits and Audible originals during that period.
You can pause your membership for up to 3 months at a time. One way to do this is by contacting Audible customer care and asking them to do it for you.
However, in this article, you will learn how to pause audible membership without contacting customer care.
But before that, you should be aware of a few important things regarding this feature.
4 things to know before you pause your Audible membership
1. Your Audible Membership can be placed on hold once every 12 months for a duration of up to 3 months. During this time you will not be billed your monthly membership fee.
Let’s say you put your membership on hold for two months beginning March 1st. When your membership restarts again on May 1st, you cannot place it on another hold for a full 12 months from that first resumed bill date, that is, May 1st.
2. As of now, you cannot pause your membership from the Audible app. You will have to do it from Audible’s Official Website.
3. Placing your membership on hold does not mean canceling your membership. If you cancel your Audible account, any unused credits associated with your account will be terminated with your membership.
4. If you do not have any credits left on your account, you may consider canceling your account if you are not really using it.
You can restart your subscription again whenever you want. You will not lose any earlier purchased audiobooks when you cancel your membership. Once you buy an audiobook, you can keep it forever!
You can save the pausing option for later when you will actually have credits in your account.
How to pause audible membership?
Here’s the step-by-step process to pause Audible membership:
1. First, try canceling your membership (You don’t actually have to cancel your membership, just pretend that you want to cancel it).
2. Go to Audible’s Official Website and sign in. Click or hover over your name and from the menu choose Account Details.
In the membership details page, you will see the option to cancel your membership as shown below.
Please note that membership cancelation option is not available on Audible app. You will have to do it from the desktop site.
If you are on a mobile, just go to the official website and click on ‘Full Site’ at the bottom of the page. You will be redirected to the desktop site. And then follow the above steps.
4. Now click on ‘Cancel Membership’. You will be asked to choose the reason for canceling your membership. Choose ‘I don’t use it enough’ and then click ‘Continue Canceling’
5. Once you click on Continue Canceling, you will land on a page with two offers, one with the Audible Silver membership offer and the other with an offer to Pause Your Membership as shown below.
6. Now select your pausing period and then click on ‘Pause Membership’.
That’s it. Your membership will now be paused for a period of 30 days or 60 days or 90 days whichever you chose.
Please remember that you won’t be able to pause your membership again for the next 1 year even if you resume your membership immediately.
As you can see, this is a tested method to pause Audible membership. If for some reason, you do not get the above options, you can contact Audible Customer Care. They will activate it for you.
So, that’s how you can pause your Audible subscription without contacting customer care. I hope this article was helpful to you.
If you have any doubt or question regarding the method mentioned above, please share it in the comment section below. I would be glad to answer them as best as I can.
Oh my gosh! This worked perfectly!!! Thank you so much for posting!
They got rid of the pause option as of 4/2021. They now ask you to cancel or switch to 7.95 audible catalog with no credits
Worked for me today 26/05/21. Clicked on cancel and was immediately presented with option to pause for 30/60/90 days
Thank you! That was perfect!
Thank you for the detailed explanation, it was incredibly helpful!
So helpful! Thank you so much!
Thank you!!! I’m so behind on my audibles I need a few months to catch up! Much appreciated!
thanks for your pausing info…my question is, i am pausing so i can finish the 2 books i have to listen to…when the pause is lifted, will i be charged another month that same day or should i cancel (or can i even cancel) before the paused months are completed.
basically i want to cancel after pausing but don’t want another monthly charge
how can you listen to your audio books without audible?
thank you.
Hello Dar!
You can cancel your membership even before the paused months are over.
I’m not really sure about whether you will be charged on the same day when the pause is lifted, but you can check your next billing date in ‘Acount Details’ section.
If you already had those books in your library, then there was no need to pause your membership. If there was no unused credit in your account, you could have simply canceled your membership.
You can listen to audiobooks in your library even without a membership.
Thanks. This article is very helpful!
Can you still swap titles if you don’t like them when your membership is on pause?
No, Ana! You won’t be able to swap titles during the paused period!
So helpful, thank you!!
On UK site you can also access https://www.audible.co.uk/ep/pause directly (I found the link under FAQ).
Thanks for the helpful information. Through your article, I learned that there’s an option for a cheaper (Silver) kind of membership, aside from the ability to pause it. Good to know, indeed!
You are welcome, Max!
Very Helpful. Thank you!
This still works as of 12/8/2019! Thank you!
This may have changed as I just went through this process, when I selected ‘I don’t use it enough’ the only option that popped up was a number to contact customer service. I went back and selected ‘it’s too expensive’ as the reason and then my options changed to selecting an annual membership, switching to every other month, or pausing my membership.
THANK YOU KATE——-
Yes, they changed it and the pause option appeared when I selected “too expensive”
Thanks Subodh this is exactly the information I needed to help with some short term cut backs.
Regards
Paul
Sincere thanks for sharing this! I’ve tried this so many times on an iPad, but never considered requesting the desktop site. Worked perfectly!
Thanks!
TC
You are welcome, TC! I’m glad it was helpful! 🙂
Hi there,
I’ve just looked it up for the UK and it seems to be slightly different over here!
“Monthly Audible membership plans can be placed on hold for up to three months at any given time. While on hold, your membership fee won’t be charged to your credit card, but you will also not receive any new credits, or free access to Audible Original Podcasts. You will still have access to many of your benefits while on hold such as:
Access to any unused credits
Advanced notice of sales and promotions
To place your account on hold, please contact Customer Service. If you need more time, you can take another hold later, so long as there is at least one month of paid membership between holds.
Note:Annual Audible memberships cannot be put on hold.“
I really appreciate your effort for this comment, Rug. It will surely help Audible users from UK.
Thank you!
Thanks much. Very helpful. And this works for the UK version as well in case anyone was wondering.
You are welcome, Kelli. And thanks for the information on UK version. I’m sure people will find it helpful!
Wow it worked! I was slightly nervous that I would lose my outstanding credits, but it was fine.
THanks
You are welcome, Simon!
Thank you so much for this; I had never realized pausing was an option! The screenshots provided are very helpful as well.
You are welcome, Gennavieve.
Actually I too did not know about it. I accidently came accross this method while trying to cancel my membership. ?
Thanks for the article! It helped me pause my audible while on a budget cut back. 🙂
I’m glad that it was helpful, James 🙂