The Internet could be a source of many free audio downloads and these files could contain popular music, sound recordings, and even audio books.  These audio books may be classical works, children’s books, crime and thriller books, humor books, history books, business books, biography books, and self-help books.  You may even find those books that you have been longing to have but could not find them in the bookstores as free audio downloads.  It should be noted that owners of these websites that provide free audio book downloads are usually after the added site traffic that is in line with their marketing goals.  It is easy to deduce this if you find that they are also marketing certain services or products.  Nevertheless, it is a win-win situation because audio books may be appropriate for people who want to read books but do not have the time to do it.

Naturally, the most common application of free audio downloads is to have free access to popular music and songs and this need is served by peer-to-peer or P2P networks, including Kazaa and LimeWire.  However, there is a danger that a person may expose himself to when using these file sharing networks as sources for free music or songs.  Many of the available songs and music in the P2P networks may have copyright restrictions and downloading them into your system may constitute  an illegal act because it infringes on the intellectual property rights of the artists.  But there are still millions of free audio MP3 downloads that could be legally obtained because of the works that have been uploaded by aspiring new musicians and singers who are hoping that they will become popular by offering their creations to everyone for free.

You may also want to avoid free audio downloads of music and songs from file sharing networks because malware authors could use them as channels for distributing their works.  Administrators of file sharing sites may find it difficult or impossible to check all of the files that are being uploaded.  People who want to inject viruses into these networks can easily do so because of this problem with security.  Users of free audio music downloads may also notice that some of the files are of poor quality or are incomplete so that it is impossible to enjoy them.  Fortunately, there are membership sites that allow you to download files for free from a selection of millions of music files.  The number of free downloads may not be limited but this is not exactly a free site because of the membership fee that they charge.  Nevertheless, there is the advantage that these sites are not saddled with the common problems found in file sharing networks.