3 Times When Audiobooks Are Superior to Their Print Counterparts

It’s rarely ever the same experience

When is the audiobook experience better than reading?

The obvious advantage of audiobooks is that someone else does the reading for you. So while you listen, you can either sit down, rest your eyes and relax…or do just about anything else.

Here are 3 occasions when I have found the audiobook offers a superior experience.

When Mundane Moments Turn Into Moments of Joy

I love listening to audiobooks and podcasts whenever I go to the gym.

I know hardcore gym-goers who like to feel the burn will disagree. But I like taking the attention off the workout. Instead, I prefer a distraction. I immerse myself in a different world mentally while my physical body is put under voluntary duress.

I also listen to audiobooks while doing chores or repetitive tasks that require very little mental input. It’s a pain to do the dishes, vacuuming, sweeping, cleaning, and tidying of any sort. But when I’m listening to a good book, my mind is active and my body is on autopilot.

I get to convert mundane moments into moments of joy.

When the Writing Is Irregular or Dense

I tend to avoid books that were written a long time ago.

Why?

Because they aren’t always written in the language or context I understand. The word choices are often so obscure that it’s difficult to digest. It’s tough to get into the flow of things when I regularly need to re-read sentences.

But it’s amazing how much clearer it can be to listen to the audiobook. Narrators do such a great job of breaking up dense passages into digestible chunks by taking brief pauses at the right moments. Where I would have struggled to continue reading, the tireless narrators keep me progressing forward.

Sure, you may be thinking, if a book is that hard to read, why would you even bother? That’s a good question.

There are many highly recommend books that I struggle to read. The problem usually isn’t in the ideas, it’s the delivery. In these cases, audiobooks are a great way of plowing through the less engaging parts.

One of the most insightful books I’ve ever come across is one I had to stop reading myself and switch to the audiobook. Antifragile by Nassim Taleb is a wonderfully insightful but thoroughly exhausting read. I still find myself reflecting on the lessons from that book years after reading it.

If I never got the audiobook, I don’t think I could have finished it.

When the Author Reads the Book

Sometimes, it doesn’t make much of a difference and I don’t really care who reads it. But if I bought a book because I really admire the author, I would prefer to hear the author read it in their own voice.

This is particularly true when I’ve already heard them speak in podcasts or interviews. It adds an extra level of enjoyment to hear how the author reads their own work. Most likely, they’ll read it in the way they intended for it to be read too.

So in this case, if the publisher pays a voice actor to read the book, I would probably stick with the paperback so I could hear the author’s voice in my head.

Could you imagine someone else narrating the autobiography of Morgan Freeman for example?

Exactly.

In Conclusion

While this is not an exhaustive list, it’s clear that there are times when audiobooks can offer you a superior experience to their print counterparts.

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