Millie's Library vs. RIDI Select vs. Welaaa vs. YES24 CremaClub vs. Kyobo sam: The Complete 2026 Korean Ebook Subscription Comparison

As of August 2026, Korea’s book-subscription market has effectively become a five-way race. What used to be a four-way contest among Kyobo Book Centre’s sam, RIDI Select, Millie’s Library, and YES24 CremaClub (formerly YES24 Book Club) now includes Welaaa, the audiobook heavyweight that has expanded into ebooks as well. Gone are the days of buying one book at a time — the norm now is a flat monthly fee, anywhere from a few thousand won to around ten thousand won (roughly US$2–7), that unlocks unlimited access to hundreds of thousands of titles. The catch is that all five services market themselves as “unlimited subscriptions,” yet they differ wildly in actual price, how titles can be read, how much audiobook support they offer, and whether they have a dedicated e-reader — which makes picking just one surprisingly confusing.

This ebook subscription comparison is built on each service’s official pricing pages and recent public filings, not marketing copy. Millie’s Library raised its recurring subscription fee from ₩9,900 to ₩11,900 (about $7 to $8.50) a month in June 2025, and YES24 dropped the “Book Club” name entirely in November 2024, rebranding as “CremaClub.” If you trust the prices and names left over in some blog post from a few months back and sign up on that basis, there’s a real chance you’ll run into a mismatch with what’s actually on offer today.

This piece starts with an all-five comparison table, then works through a feature deep-dive for each product, a content-library benchmark, a full pricing breakdown, recommendations by reader type, practical tips and common mistakes, and an FAQ. Throughout, we’ve been careful to flag unverified numbers as unverified rather than blur estimates together with confirmed facts.

Let’s work through the tables below one at a time. If you’d like to compare content subscriptions more broadly, our Netflix vs. TVING and other OTT streaming services comparison and YouTube Music vs. Spotify and other music streaming comparison posts are worth a look too.

1. Executive Summary: Ebook Subscription Comparison at a Glance

For readers short on time, here’s the essential information on all five major ebook and audiobook subscription services, as of August 2026, condensed into a single table.

📊 Comprehensive Comparison of the 5 Major Ebook Subscription Services

The two rows worth studying most closely here are “Flagship price” and “Audiobook support.” All five services bill themselves as “unlimited subscriptions,” but some, like Millie’s Library, have a ₩3,000 (~$2.10) gap between web and app pricing, while others, like YES24 CremaClub, split into three separate tiers entirely — so “how much does it cost?” doesn’t even have a single-number answer. As for audiobooks, Welaaa, Millie’s Library, and Kyobo sam clearly support them, but it’s worth remembering that whether audiobooks are officially bundled into RIDI Select’s and YES24 CremaClub’s plans hasn’t been clearly confirmed.

2. Feature Deep-Dive: The 5 Major Ebook Subscription Services

📚 1) Millie’s Library — Korea’s Leading Ebook Subscription Service

• Widely described by the media as Korea’s leading ebook subscription service: No official market-share figure has been published, but KT Millie’s Library posted 2025 annual revenue of ₩88.2 billion ($63 million, up 21% year-over-year) and operating profit of ₩14.4 billion ($10.3 million, up 31%), and kept that momentum into Q1 2026 with operating profit of ₩3.9 billion (~$2.8 million, up 4.9% YoY). It has now grown for four straight years since turning profitable in 2022, and cumulative membership stands at 8.9 million.
• Now bundled into all three major carrier membership programs: After signing a membership partnership with SK Telecom in April 2026, Millie’s Library is now available through all three of Korea’s major mobile carriers — KT, SKT, and LG U+. Expanding this B2B2C channel, where users sign up and get discounts through their carrier’s app, is considered a key driver of recent growth.
• Don’t confuse the AI chatbot with the chat-books: The existing “Millie Chat-book” format has been around for a while — it adapts original books into a 10-to-15-minute chat-style dialogue you read through a messaging-app-like UI. Separately, an AI chatbot reading assistant called “AI Dokpaming” was announced in December 2024, targeting a Q1 2025 launch, but whether it’s still officially running as of August 2026 hasn’t been further confirmed.
• Annotation tools now cover the entire library: As announced in December 2024, all PDF and ePub titles now support three writing tools — pen, fountain pen, and highlighter — plus a laser-pointer feature.
• Audiobooks via “My Own Audiobook”: a built-in feature that converts ebook text into an AI-narrated audiobook.
• Family/friend sharing for up to 4 people: a single account can be shared with up to 4 people, and each account allows up to 5 simultaneously connected devices.

📖 2) RIDI Select — A Web-Novel Powerhouse’s Low-Price Push

• Lowest list price of the five, at ₩4,900/month (~$3.50): RIDI Select has kept this list price largely unchanged since launching in July 2018, and you can get it down to around ₩3,900 (~$2.80) through channels like the LG U+ carrier deal or the group-buying platform PickPlus.
• Your first subscription is effectively discounted twice: new subscribers get a 1-month free trial, and there’s also a confirmed promotion that refunds 100% of your first payment (₩4,900, ~$3.50) as points.
• Titles in “Select Home” are unlimited; everything else is pay-per-title: the 30,000-plus titles registered specifically for RIDI Select can be read without limit, but everything else on the main RIDIBOOKS storefront still has to be purchased or rented separately. This structure is exactly why the question “is RIDI really unlimited?” keeps coming up.
• Audiobooks remain an unclear area: there have been reports of a partnership with the AI-voice company Selvas AI to bring AI-voice audiobooks (enhanced TTS) to the platform, but there’s no confirmed official statement that audiobooks are formally included in the RIDI Select plan. If audiobooks are a must-have for you, check directly in the official app before subscribing.
• Dedicated hardware: RIDI Paper: launched in October 2015, this line of E-ink readers has continued through successor models (like RIDI Paper Pro), giving RIDI its own hardware lineup — a genuine point of differentiation among the five services.

🎧 3) Welaaa — The Original Audiobook Service, Now “Reading Together”

• Korea’s first subscription audiobook service, launched in 2018: Welaaa started as an audiobook specialist and is both self-described and widely reported as “Korea’s No. 1 audiobook platform.” It added ebooks in 2023, with a stated goal of “10,000 new titles added every month.”
• “Welaaa 3.0” launched in April 2025: a major overhaul that expanded the service’s concept from “reading for yourself” to “reading together.” It followed up with an offline pop-up at the Hyundai Department Store Cheonho branch in June–July 2025 and even a headphone collaboration with Sony.
• Reports mix promotional and list pricing: at the time of research, both a ₩9,900 ($7) figure (a first-subscription promo rate) and a ₩10,900 ($7.80) figure (the standard rate once the promo ends) are cited, so it’s hard to pin down a single confirmed price as of August 2026. It’s safer to double-check the actual price shown at checkout on the official app or website before subscribing.
• Keep “220,000 pieces of content” and “20,000 audiobook titles” separate: as of November 2025, Welaaa stated it holds 220,000 total pieces of content across ebooks, audiobooks, web novels, and classes combined — but other sources cite “around 20,000 audiobook titles,” so the audiobook-only count isn’t clearly pinned down on its own.
• Family sharing works via a single additional invite: a “family sharing” invitation feature, found in the app’s account-info menu, lets you invite one additional account per subscription.
• Free trial: 2 weeks of audiobooks: new subscribers get a 2-week audiobook free trial, and there’s also a confirmed limited-time “first subscription for ₩0” promotion.

📕 4) YES24 CremaClub — A Strategy Built on Three Pricing Tiers

• Renamed from “YES24 Book Club” on November 25, 2024: only the brand name changed, to “CremaClub” — the service itself continued without interruption. That’s why this article also notes it as “formerly YES24 Book Club.”
• Its biggest distinguishing feature is a three-tier pricing structure: the 55 Plan at ₩5,500/month ($3.90) (unlimited ebooks, first month free), the 77 Plan at ₩7,700/month ($5.50) (unlimited ebooks plus ₩4,500 ($3.20) in Crema Money credited every month), and the 99 Plan at ₩9,900/month ($7) (unlimited ebooks plus unlimited music streaming, though the first-month-free offer doesn’t apply here). It’s a structure you can pick based on your budget and how much you value the extra perks.
• Library size: about 150,000 titles as of January 2025: no updated figure has been published as of August 2026, so treat this as a reference point rather than a current count.
• Supports up to 5–7 devices: generally, each account can register up to 5 devices, rising to 7 if you also register a Crema E-ink reader. There’s no limit on the number of downloads.
• The Crema device lineup: this includes the ultralight (139g) Crema Pebble, the Crema Motif, the older Crema Touch and Shine, and the color-display Crema C launched in February 2025. It’s also worth knowing that Crema is a shared platform brand used jointly by several bookstores, including Aladin.

🎓 5) Kyobo sam — A Well-Rounded Knowledge Subscription That Even Covers Academic Papers

• A knowledge-and-culture subscription platform launched in February 2013: Kyobo Book Centre’s “sam” service spans a lineup that includes fully unlimited ebooks (“sam Unlimited”), a tiered plan letting you pick 2, 3, or 12 books a month (“Premium”), and an audiobook-only tier (“Audio&”) — bringing ebooks, audiobooks, video lectures, and academic papers together under one roof.
• The three Premium tiers are the core offering: sam2 lets you read 2 books a month for ₩7,000 ($5, first month ₩1,000/$0.70), sam3 lets you read 3 books a month for ₩9,900 ($7), and sam12 lets you read 12 books a month for ₩18,000 ($12.90). The exact list price for the “sam Unlimited” plan isn’t confirmed on the official page — only a “first month free” promotion is known.
• Annual passes and top-up options: an annual sam2 pass costs ₩60,000 ($43), about 28% cheaper than paying month to month, and once you’ve used up your Premium allotment you can add more with a top-up pass (₩2,500/$1.80 for 1 book, ₩5,000/$3.60 for 3 books, ₩10,000/$7.10 for 5 books).
• By far the most granular content breakdown of the five: as of April 2026, Kyobo sam holds 277,583 ebooks, 4,573 audiobooks, 1,013 videos, and 535,115 academic papers. For graduate students and researchers who need papers as well, this academic-paper collection is a decisive differentiator.
• How long you can keep reading after downloading varies by plan: on the Unlimited plan, you can keep reading a title until your subscription ends, but on the Premium plans, access expires 180 days after the download date. If you’re working with material you’ll need to reference for a long stretch — exam prep, a thesis — factor this 180-day limit in ahead of time.
• Dedicated hardware: shared Crema devices: like YES24, Kyobo shares the Crema device lineup; there’s no separately confirmed Kyobo-exclusive hardware brand.

3. Head-to-Head: Content Library & Free Trial Benchmarks

When it comes to ebook subscription comparisons, what people want to know most boils down to two questions: “how many books can I actually read?” and “how much can I try for free?” Here’s a summary using only officially confirmed figures.

[Content library size - based on confirmed figures]
Kyobo sam        : ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 277,583 ebooks + 4,573 audiobooks + 535,115 papers (Apr. 2026)
Millie's Library : ⭐⭐⭐⭐☆ 200,000+ ebooks
Welaaa           : ⭐⭐⭐⭐☆ 220,000 combined pieces of content (ebooks + audiobooks + web novels + classes)
YES24 CremaClub  : ⭐⭐⭐☆☆ ~150,000 ebooks (as of Jan. 2025)
RIDI Select      : ⭐⭐☆☆☆ 30,000+ ebooks (Select Home only)

Judging by raw numbers alone, Kyobo sam looks overwhelmingly larger, but keep in mind that’s largely because it’s adding in 530,000-plus academic papers. If you’re comparing purely on “ebooks — novels, essays, self-help” terms, Millie’s Library (200,000+ titles) and Welaaa (220,000 combined pieces of content) may actually feel like the bigger libraries in practice. Conversely, RIDI Select’s “30,000 titles” is the smallest number of the five, but to be fair, that’s only the count of titles included in the unlimited Select Home — RIDI’s main storefront has a vast web-novel and webtoon catalog you can expand into freely through individual purchases.

On free trials, RIDI Select’s “1 month free plus 100% points cash-back on your payment” is the most generous deal on paper, while Welaaa’s “2 weeks free” is comparatively short but practical, since it lets you actually listen to the audiobook content before deciding. Millie’s Library and Kyobo sam don’t have a clearly published, fixed trial length and tend to rely more on seasonal or carrier-partnership promotions instead, so it’s worth checking the in-app promo banner right before you sign up.

4. Full Pricing & Plan Comparison

[Monthly list price - lowest to highest]
RIDI Select          : ₩4,900          (~$3.50; ~₩3,900/$2.80 with LG U+ discount)
YES24 CremaClub 55   : ₩5,500          (~$3.90; unlimited ebooks, first month free)
Kyobo sam2           : ₩7,000          (~$5; 2 books/mo., first month ₩1,000/$0.70)
YES24 CremaClub 77   : ₩7,700          (~$5.50; unlimited + ₩4,500/$3.20 Crema Money)
Welaaa               : ~₩9,900-10,900  (~$7-7.80; list price reported inconsistently)
Kyobo sam3           : ₩9,900          (~$7; 3 books/mo.)
YES24 CremaClub 99   : ₩9,900          (~$7; unlimited + music streaming)
Kyobo sam12          : ₩18,000         (~$12.90; 12 books/mo.)
Millie's Library     : ₩11,900 web / ₩14,900 app (~$8.50 / $10.60)

💰 Detailed Pricing & Plan Comparison

If you judge an ebook subscription comparison on price alone, there are three traps that are easy to fall into. First, Millie’s Library’s price swings by ₩3,000 (~$2.10) depending on how you pay. Because of app store in-app-payment fees, paying through the web (browser) is ₩3,000 cheaper per month, so even iPhone users are better off signing up through the browser rather than paying inside the app. Second, YES24 CremaClub’s 99 Plan bundles “unlimited + music,” but it loses the first-month-free deal. Unlike the 55 and 77 plans, the 99 Plan isn’t eligible for the promotion, so if you just want to try the service out, it makes more sense to start on the 55 Plan and upgrade later if you need to. Third, Kyobo sam’s Premium plans are “book-count capped,” not unlimited. You’re limited to 2, 3, or 12 books a month depending on the tier, and anything beyond that requires buying a separate top-up pass — ₩2,500 ($1.80) for 1 book, ₩5,000 ($3.60) for 3, or ₩10,000 (~$7.10) for 5 — which can end up costing a heavy reader more than expected.

5. Final Recommendations by Reader Type

🎯 1) Heavy Readers Who Don’t Want to Miss New Releases and Bestsellers

• Best pick: Millie’s Library
• Why: Its edge comes from a massive library of 200,000-plus titles and the new-release supply power backed by 8.9 million cumulative members. Subscribe through the web and you pay ₩11,900/month ($8.50); pay annually and that drops to as low as ₩9,900/month ($7) — the more you read, the better your per-book cost gets.

🎯 2) Budget-Conscious Readers Just Getting Started

• Best pick: RIDI Select
• Why: Its list price of ₩4,900/month ($3.50) is the cheapest of the five outright, and it drops further to around ₩3,900 ($2.80) through carrier channels like LG U+. Stack the first month free with the 100% points cash-back on payment, and you can effectively try it out for close to two months at no real cost.

🎯 3) People Who Mainly “Read with Their Ears” During Commutes or Workouts

• Best pick: Welaaa
• Why: As the original service that’s focused on audiobooks alone since 2018, it now offers 220,000 combined pieces of content spanning ebooks too, following the “Welaaa 3.0” overhaul in April 2025. That said, the price fluctuates between ₩9,900 and ₩10,900 (~$7–7.80), so double-check the final amount right before you check out.

🎯 4) Practical Readers Who Want a Plan Sized to Their Needs

• Best pick: YES24 CremaClub
• Why: With three tiers — ₩5,500 / ₩7,700 / ₩9,900 (~$3.90 / $5.50 / $7) — you only pay for what you need: the 55 Plan if you just want to read, or the 99 Plan if you also want music streaming thrown in. Pair it with a Crema E-ink reader and you can register up to 7 devices total.

🎯 5) Graduate Students and Researchers Who Also Need Academic Papers

• Best pick: Kyobo sam
• Why: Its 535,115-strong academic paper collection is a scale none of the other four services can match. It also bundles in ebooks, audiobooks, and video lectures, making it a good fit if you want to cover both paper research and general reading with a single subscription.

🎯 6) Readers Who Want a Dedicated E-Reader for Long, Eye-Strain-Free Reading Sessions

• Best pick: RIDI Select (RIDI Paper) or YES24 CremaClub (Crema series)
• Why: Millie’s Library and Welaaa have no dedicated hardware of their own, so you’re stuck reading on a smartphone or tablet app. RIDI, by contrast, has its own RIDI Paper E-ink ecosystem, and YES24/Kyobo share the Crema series — both are easier on the eyes during long reading sessions.

6. Practical Tips & Common Mistakes

✅ Tip 1) Always Pay for Millie’s Library Through the Web

Because of app store in-app-payment fees, paying inside the app costs ₩14,900/month ($10.60), while paying through your web browser costs ₩11,900/month ($8.50). That’s a ₩3,000 ($2.10) difference every month, or ₩36,000 ($25.70) a year — so as a rule, even iPhone users should go through the browser sign-up flow instead.

✅ Tip 2) Start YES24 CremaClub on the 55 Plan

The 99 Plan throws in music streaming, but it doesn’t get the first-month-free deal. The 55 and 77 plans, on the other hand, do get 1 month free for first-time subscribers — so it makes more sense to try the service out on a lower-priced plan first, then switch up to the 99 Plan later once you decide you actually need the music streaming.

✅ Tip 3) Don’t Mix Up Kyobo sam’s “Unlimited” and “Premium” Plans

Despite their name, the Premium plans known as sam2, sam3, and sam12 come with a hard cap of 2, 3, or 12 books a month respectively. Access also expires 180 days after you download a title, so if you’re prepping for an exam or need to reference a paper for a long time, the Unlimited plan is the safer bet.

✅ Tip 4) Always Double-Check the Final Price Before Subscribing to Welaaa

Both ₩9,900 and ₩10,900 (~$7 and ~$7.80) show up in reporting, so if you don’t check the actual amount displayed on the sign-up screen, you could end up being charged a different figure than you expected. Check ahead of time, during the 2-week free trial, that the amount you’ll be charged is clearly displayed.

✅ Tip 5) Distinguish Between RIDI Select’s “Select Home” and the Main RIDIBOOKS Store

Only the 30,000-plus titles registered in Select Home are unlimited — everything else in RIDIBOOKS’s vast web-novel, webtoon, and ebook catalog has to be purchased or rented individually. If you’re wondering whether a specific new release is included in the unlimited plan, get in the habit of checking whether the title’s detail page carries a “Select” badge.

✅ Tip 6) If Audiobooks Are a Must, Confirm What Each Plan Actually Includes Before You Subscribe

Welaaa, Millie’s Library, and Kyobo sam all clearly support audiobooks, but whether audiobooks are formally included in the RIDI Select and YES24 CremaClub plans hasn’t been officially confirmed either way. If audiobooks are the deciding factor in your subscription choice, the safest approach with these two services is to search directly inside the app before signing up.

7. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Q. What’s the first thing I should check when comparing ebook subscriptions?

Whether the content you mainly read falls into novels/essays, web novels/webtoons, audiobooks, or academic papers. Sort yourself into one of these four categories and your candidates narrow down to 1–2 of the five services right away. Budget and free-trial terms come next, and since each service structures its plans differently, we’d recommend checking the tables in Sections 3 and 4 of this article first.

Q. Why did Millie’s Library raise its price?

As of June 10, 2025, Millie’s Library’s recurring subscription fee went up from ₩9,900 to ₩11,900 ($7 to $8.50) a month. This change was confirmed through official announcements from KT and SKT, and you can stay close to the pre-hike rate by paying annually, which brings the monthly-equivalent cost back down to ₩9,900 ($7).

Q. Are YES24 Book Club and CremaClub different services?

No, they’re the same service. The name “YES24 Book Club” changed to “CremaClub” on November 25, 2024, and the service itself continued without interruption. If you find old material or reviews that reference “Book Club,” just treat that as the same service under its previous name.

Q. Which of the five services has the most solid audiobook support?

Welaaa is the original, having started as an audiobook specialist back in 2018. Millie’s Library offers AI-voice conversion through “My Own Audiobook,” and Kyobo sam provides 4,573 audiobook titles separately through its “Audio&” lineup. RIDI Select and YES24 CremaClub, by contrast, don’t have official clarity on whether audiobooks are actually included in their plans.

Q. Which service lets me share an account with my family?

Millie’s Library has the widest family-sharing scope, letting up to 4 people share access across 5 devices. Welaaa allows sharing between 2 people, by inviting one additional account. Family-sharing features for RIDI Select, YES24 CremaClub, and Kyobo sam aren’t officially confirmed, so if this matters to you, it’s best to contact customer support directly before subscribing.

Q. Which services have their own dedicated e-reader?

RIDI Select has its own branded RIDI Paper (E-ink) series, while YES24 CremaClub and Kyobo sam jointly use the Crema device series. Millie’s Library and Welaaa have no dedicated hardware of their own and run primarily through smartphone and tablet apps.

Q. Which service is best for grad students or researchers?

Kyobo sam is the only one of the five that integrates academic papers, with 535,115 titles as of April 2026. The other four services are built around ebooks and audiobooks and have no paper search or reading functionality, so if you need to work with academic papers too, Kyobo sam is really the only option.

Q. Can I just try several free trials and then cancel?

You can, but there are a few conditions worth checking first. Perks like RIDI Select’s points cash-back or YES24 CremaClub’s first-month-free are usually limited to once per account, ever, and in most cases the same benefit won’t reapply if you cancel and resubscribe. If you want to try several services in sequence to compare them, the safe move is to check each service’s checkout screen first to see whether the benefit applies again on a repeat sign-up.

8. Conclusion: The Real-World Takeaway from This 2026 Ebook Subscription Comparison

As of August 2026, the bottom line of this ebook subscription comparison comes down to picking not “the most famous option” but “the one that fits your reading habits.” Millie’s Library remains a strong choice for heavy readers, backed by a 200,000-plus-title library and the new-release supply power of 8.9 million members, but it’s worth factoring in that the app-payment price has climbed to ₩14,900/month ($10.60) since the June 2025 fee increase. RIDI Select, on the other hand, holds its ground with an overwhelmingly low ₩4,900/month ($3.50) entry barrier, while YES24 CremaClub carves out its niche with a finely tiered three-plan structure.

The choice splits cleanly by content type. If listening-based reading is your main habit, Welaaa, the original audiobook service, is the pick; if you also need academic papers, Kyobo sam, with its 530,000-plus scholarly items, is essentially the only real alternative. If you want to read for long stretches without eye strain on a dedicated device, RIDI Select, YES24 CremaClub, and Kyobo sam — all backed by RIDI Paper or the Crema series — have the edge over Millie’s Library or Welaaa. If you’re curious how to apply similar selection criteria to other subscription services, our Notion vs. Obsidian and other note-taking apps comparison post is worth a look from a similar angle.

[Summary: The right pick for your situation]

Heavy reader chasing new releases and bestsellers
  → Millie's Library (₩11,900/~$8.50 web, ₩9,900/~$7 annualized)

Budget-first beginner
  → RIDI Select (₩4,900/~$3.50 list price, ~₩3,900/$2.80 with carrier discount)

Audiobook-focused reading on your commute
  → Welaaa (~₩9,900-10,900/~$7-7.80, 2-week free audiobook trial)

Want a tiered plan sized to exactly what you need
  → YES24 CremaClub (55/77/99 plans, ₩5,500-9,900/~$3.90-7)

Need academic papers alongside everything else
  → Kyobo sam (535,115 academic papers, sam2/3/12 plans)

Long reading sessions on dedicated hardware
  → RIDI Select (RIDI Paper) or YES24 CremaClub (Crema series)

Make it a habit to double-check the latest prices and promotions on each service’s official app or website before you subscribe, and the tables in this ebook subscription comparison alone should be enough to help you pick the right service without any unexpected costs.