3 Ways to Convert Kindle to PDF for Free
Posted by jpluimers on 2025/02/24
After last weeks post Download your Kindle books soon, because Amazon will block them after February 25, 2025. Since I could not get a physical Kindle on time, I decided to do the conversion on Windows as:
- the conversion without a physical Kindle required Kindle 1.17 for MacOS or Windows
- finding the Kindle 1.17 for Windows was way easier because Chocolatey pointed me right to the executable¹ when installing 1.17
- ² finding the Kindie 1.17 for MacOS was hard because it had been deprecated by Homebrew and finding back the 1.17 version was too hard.
[Wayback/Archive] How to Remove DRM From Kindle Books [DRM-free books 2025 ] has steps not just for a physical Kindle, but also when running Kindle 1.17 on MacOS or Windows.
Windows was easiest to find through [Wayback/Archive] Chocolatey Software | Kindle for PC 1.17 which mentions how to try to install version 1.17. That leads to the below mentioned error which mentions the download location and full filename.
The downloads/installers you need are at:
- Kindle app: web.archive.org/web/20170422175347/https://s3.amazonaws.com/kindleforpc/44183/KindleForPC-installer-1.17.44183.exe
- [Wayback/Archive] Chocolatey Software | Calibre
- [Wayback/Archive] Release v7.2.1 — Full Release · apprenticeharper/DeDRM_tools · GitHub
This allowed me to convert all but one book: [Wayback/Archive] Linear Algebra Done Right which I found as PDF at [Wayback/Archive] LADR4e.pdf [Wayback PDF View/PDF View].
Later I also found [Wayback/Archive] 3 Ways to Convert Kindle to PDF for Free, but that fails to mention Kindle version limitations.
Query: [Wayback/Archive] kindle app export to pdf – Google Search
Notes
In case I ever want to install an old MacOS version of Kindle, I need to go back to the homebrew commit that disabled this and find the download from there: [Wayback/Archive] kindle: disable · Homebrew/homebrew-cask@7e44d20 · GitHub
My list of Kindle books is at:
- www.amazon.com/hz/mycd/digital-console/contentlist/booksAll/dateDsc or (without the
dateDscat the end) www.amazon.com/hz/mycd/digital-console/contentlist/booksAll - read.amazon.com/kindle-library which requires an Amazon ASIN to read a book, for instance read.amazon.com/?asin=B01ISNIKES
Domain links are in my blog post I mentioned above: Download your Kindle books soon, because Amazon will block them after February 25, 2025.
Some download scripts which I have not tried as I had few books to convert:
- [Wayback/Archive] raw.githubusercontent.com/chrishol/greasemonkey-scripts/refs/heads/main/download-all-kindle-books.js
Links that might be helpful to others:
Ad ¹: I ran choco install kindle --version=1.17 which then mentioned this:
Downloading kindle
from 'https://s3.amazonaws.com/kindleforpc/44183/KindleForPC-installer-1.17.44183.exe'
ERROR: The remote file either doesn't exist, is unauthorized, or is forbidden for url 'https://s3.amazonaws.com/kindleforpc/44183/KindleForPC-installer-1.17.44183.exe'.
The most recent archived download was at web.archive.org/web/20170422175347/https://s3.amazonaws.com/kindleforpc/44183/KindleForPC-installer-1.17.44183.exe with virus check information at [Wayback/Archive] VirusTotal – File – c3861198d6a18bf1eef6f6970705f7f57b5ff152b733abbadaadd4d1bff4be17.
A slightly earlier version is via kindle-for-pc-1-17-44170 : Amazon : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive at archive.org/download/kindle-for-pc-1-17-44170/kindle-for-pc-1-17-44170.exe with virus check information at [Wayback/Archive] VirusTotal – File – 14e0f0053f1276c0c7c446892dc170344f707fbfe99b6951762c120144163200.
Ad ²:
- [Wayback/Archive] kindle — Homebrew Formulae
Please see https://www.amazon.com/kindle-dbs/arp/B0C9PRPV28 for information regarding application end of life.
- [Wayback/Archive] Setting up your new Kindle for Mac
Support for the old Kindle for Mac, now called the Kindle Classic app, is ending by Oct 31, 2023.
- [Wayback/Archive] homebrew-cask/Casks/k/kindle.rb at 6ef8e5111d357b518e81690d9752a2b3ac2e2741 · Homebrew/homebrew-cask · GitHub
- [Wayback/Archive] Kindle version 1.17.1 revealed why 1.17 was not officially available any more.
I too have found that Kindle for Mac V1.17.1 can no longer download books I have bought and tells me to upgrade. However, I don’t want to upgrade. Is there a way to download the AZW3 version of the book rather than the KFX-ZIP?
Finding back 1.17 through the https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-cask/blob/6ef8e5111d357b518e81690d9752a2b3ac2e2741/Casks/k/kindle.rb commit history was too hard: none of the commit messages indicated a 1.17 version number.
--jeroen
The Wiert Corner - irregular stream of stuff 
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