No more O'Reilly subscriptions for me
36 comments
·December 8, 2025cauliflower99
Anytime I'm asked for feedback via the O'Reilly website (I manage the business account for my company), the first thing I always say is that the app is unusable. I've tried it on my Amazon Fire Tablet, Ipad, different phones - it doesn't work.
The user metrics in O'reilly (and probably most learning apps) has floored in the last 12 months. I see they've launched a new AI platform now. They're definitely going in a direction - time will tell if it's the right one.
Personally, I'd love a website that can provide all the ebooks oreilly provides. But it needs to work on a tablet.
whenc
It went un-noticed here, I think, but The Pragmatic Bookshelf recently fired most of its staff and are taking on no new books. In the email they sent to authors, they quoted a 40% YoY fall in non-fiction sales, industry-wide.
adamors
Wow, would be interested to read more about this, could you submit the email maybe as its own post? Even as a text version, I actually love the PragProg, would hate to seem them gone (but I guess it’s a foregone conclusion).
anticorporate
Honestly, I wonder how some of these publishers stay in business at all. I haven't written a book, but I've been a technical reviewer for friends who have been published with some of the larger technical publishers. Nobody was making money from the process. I do wonder if maybe they're just taking on too many titles and reaching saturation. Do we really need "The guide to making X on Y with Z" for every potential iteration?
tjr
Is this because people seek knowledge from LLMs rather than from books now?
Or is it because LLMs know everything that is in books, so people don't feel compelled to learn any more themselves?
riffic
loaded questions.
vittore
Anecdotal evidence, all books I bought this year were used.
vittore
I don't use an app, I use website via SFPL proxy, and it works just fine on iPad Pro (12"), but bookmarks do not work, so you need to remember where you stopped to continue after re-login.
vittore
If you are in Bay area, San Francisco Public Library (sfpl.org) gives you access to O'Reilly for free, if you have library card, while it does not improve on usability issues, at 0 cost it is phenomenal resource.
Goofy_Coyote
My two problems with access through libraries is lack of app access, and that every time I login, all my progress is gone (not reset to cover - gone gone), and I have to find the resource again, open it and go to the page/time I was at. Also can’t create my own playlist or favorites.
At least my library acts like that.
otterley
Seattle Public Libraries (spl.org) also provides no-cost access to the O'Reilly Complete collection as a membership benefit.
Support your local public library!
markus_zhang
I have figured that I’m going to get exactly one CS hobby that is not work, and 0 CS hobby if I can find a job that fits the hobby.
Then I figured there are less than ten books that I need to read, and probably less if I can get such a job because it is always a lot better to learn on the job.
So I agree with the author that such subscription is not very useful, and a paper book + a paper notepad are way better than reading books on a tablet.
tombert
I get the O’Reilly subscription through the ACM. It’s an extra $75 a year after a regular ACM membership. A lot less than $500/year.
thesurlydev
For a while, the O'Reilly subscription was included in the $99/yr ACM membership. Then they stopped offering O'Reilly for a bit. Then they brought it back as part of the $75 skills add-on.
I feel like this is a little known secret (discount via ACM) that more folks should know about. Hopefully this post helps spread the word.
leejoramo
I do this too. It was a easy sell to my department
throw0101a
> I get the O’Reilly subscription through the ACM.
I get it through my library:
* https://www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/detail.jsp?Entt=RDMEDB00...
crazysim
For those curious about the ACM membership: https://www.acm.org/membership/membership-options
reader9274
> ACM is pleased to share an important milestone for the computing field. Beginning January 2026, all ACM publications and related artifacts in the ACM Digital Library will be made open access.
layer8
Doesn’t help for O'Reilly content.
aaaaaaron
Is this ACM membership worth it?
helsinkiandrew
If your paying $500 for an O’Reilly subscription, then the $99 membership plus $75 add-on for O'Reilly would seem to make it so even if you don't use any of the other facilities:
> unlimited access to ACM's collection of thousands of online books, video courses, interactive sandboxes, practice labs, and AI-enabled tools from O'Reilly and Skillsoft Percipio
gruntledfangler
At one time I worked at a research institute. It had a huge library that was only partially filled. One of the directors wanted to buy every developer their own Safari subscription. The cost was quoted at around $4K/mo IIRC.
I pointed out that it would be far more cost–effective to simple let us request hard copies of whatever books we wanted, and then they would just stay in the library. No one worked remotely at the time.
We ended up getting Safari subscriptions for everyone.
teddyh
It’s capex vs. opex. A large enough company has a fixed budget for both, and for your situation, I assume that the opex budget had the funds, while the capex did not.
DannyPage
You can quite often get a $300 yearly sub to O'Reilly, they run a discount ~4 times a year.
That said, like a lot of other content subscriptions, it can be quite anxiety inducing to make it seem like you're getting your money's worth. I've gotten the sub via my work, and I think the labs and videos are quite good, plus the occasional opportunities to do live-chats with the authors. But you have to sift through a lot of content and dedicate a lot of hours to use them. For most folks, I think buying a few technical books a year as needed would be a much better use of time and money.
jldugger
I have O'Reilly subs available both from my employer and my local library. Doesn't fix the UI issues but does at least shift the ROI calculus.
There are some applications that try to export O'Reilly books into Kindle formats, but every time I've tried they've mangled a few tables, formulas or sidebars, etc. I should probably sell or hand down my kindle and find something more suitable to O'Reilly.
AlexB138
I just checked, and I've had an O'Reilly account since March of 2014 without major interruption, back when it was called Safari. It is by far the best source for high quality tech content out there. There is so much filler content in tech blogs, that I'm happy to pay to get access to high quality.
I must be on some grandfathered plan though, as I'm not paying near $500/year. That is a very steep price.
theli0nheart
What are you paying?
AlexeyBrin
I get it through my public library.
thih9
> will most likely not make me renew my subscription for the new year. Given the price, it will be probably
Will the author find the time and energy to actually cancel the subscription? The fact that he wrote the blog post and still haven’t cancelled makes me wonder.
charliesbot
Yeah, I agree about the O'Reilly app. It's pretty bad, so I'm actually thinking about just getting the book instead of using their app.
I signed up many years ago when they had 50% off and then was allowed to renew at the same price. Made it very difficult to cancel, knowing that I will have to pay full price if I ever want it back, but one year I looked at how much I had paid in total for reading those books and decided to cancel anyway.
Great site though. I never used the app, but mobile browser support was not bad.
Paid for it to read computer books, and did a lot of that, but also discovered much else. They also had (have?) courses and paid video presentation. I noticed one series of videos I watched there would have cost more to watch legally than I paid for an entire year of O'Reilly.