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Put an Audible Book on a Yoto Card

A Yoto Player will happily play a book from your Audible library — but not the file Audible gives you. You need DRM-free MP3 tracks that fit Yoto's per-track rules, and a Make Your Own card pointed at them. OpenAudible does that half with one setting and one menu command; Yoto's own uploader does the rest.

What you'll need

Before you start: what fits on a card

A Yoto Player does not read files from your computer, a USB stick, or a memory card. Audio lives in a playlist on Yoto's servers, and an MYO card is a token telling the player which playlist to play. So the file rules come from Yoto's web uploader, not from which player you own — Yoto Player, Yoto Player 3rd generation and Yoto Mini all play whatever the uploader accepted.

Yoto's published limits for one MYO card:

Those numbers are why a straight conversion is not enough. A ten-hour novel is one file, hours long and hundreds of megabytes — it breaks the per-track limit on both counts. Splitting it into chapter-sized tracks is what makes it uploadable, and Split for Yoto handles both per-track limits for you: MP3 output, every track under 60 minutes and under 100 MB, and any chapter too long for one track cut into numbered parts.

The card totals are still yours to watch. OpenAudible writes one folder of tracks; it does not group them into cards or warn you when a book overruns 100 tracks or 500 MB. Count the files before you upload, and see Long books for what to do when one book needs two cards.

Short books are the exception. A title already under 60 minutes and under 100 MB is one legal track on its own — convert it to MP3 and go straight to uploading. A book with no chapter marks, or only one, cannot be split by chapter at all; see Common problems.

Steps

1. Download and convert the book

Select the book in your library and let OpenAudible download and convert it. A book needs a finished audio file before it can be split. Either output format works as the source — Actions: Convert to M4B or Convert to MP3 — because Split for Yoto writes MP3 tracks either way.

What the source format changes is whether the audio gets re-encoded. Splitting an M4B re-encodes each track to MP3 at your MP3 quality setting in File: Preferences. Splitting a book that is already MP3 copies the audio straight through with no second encode, and the tracks keep that file's bitrate. Either way, MP3 quality is the dial that decides how many hours fit on a card.

Leave VBR off. Constant bitrate is easier for limited players and uploaders to seek within, and it lets OpenAudible size tracks against the 100 MB limit exactly instead of assuming a worst case.

2. Choose Split for Yoto

Open File: Library Settings, go to the General tab, find Split Audio Settings, and select Split for Yoto.

This is one of three split modes, not a one-off command, so it stays selected until you change it. Underneath it is a chapter split with Yoto's per-track rules on top: a 90-minute chapter comes out as "Chapter 12 (1 of 2)" and "Chapter 12 (2 of 2)" rather than one file Yoto would refuse.

3. Split the book

With the book selected, choose Actions: Split Selected Books for Yoto.

That command is named after the split mode you picked in step 2, so it reads "for Yoto" only once that mode is selected. If it still says Split Selected Books by Chapter, the setting did not take — go back to Library Settings.

4. Find the tracks

OpenAudible reveals the finished folder for you when you split a single book; otherwise use Actions: Reveal. You should see a numbered set of MP3 files, one per track, in playing order — and nothing else. Yoto's uploader does not want a cover image sitting in the folder, so Split for Yoto leaves one out and embeds the artwork in each track instead.

Check the count and the folder size before you upload. More than 100 files, or more than 500 MB, means this book needs more than one card.

5. Upload the tracks to a playlist

The rest happens on Yoto's side — OpenAudible does not upload for you, and there is no "export to Yoto" command. You can build the playlist in a browser or in the Yoto app; the browser is easier for a folder of thirty files.

In a browser

  1. Sign in at my.yotoplay.com/my-cards.
  2. Create a new playlist and give it the book's title.
  3. Add your MP3 tracks. Upload in small groups rather than one large batch — large batches are noticeably less reliable.
  4. Check the track order, and set the playlist's cover art if you want it.
  5. Save the playlist.

In the Yoto app

The app can build the playlist too, and it is the only place step 6 exists. The tracks have to reach the phone first, though — through a cloud folder or a file transfer — which is the extra work the browser path avoids.

6. Link the playlist to a card

  1. Open the Yoto app on your phone or tablet.
  2. Open the playlist you just made.
  3. In its three-dot menu, choose Link to a Card.
  4. Insert a blank MYO card into your Yoto Player when prompted.

That's it. Put the card in the player and the book starts. Each track is a chapter, so the player's back and forward buttons move by chapter.

Long books: more than one card

500 MB is roughly five hours of MP3 at ordinary audiobook quality, so a long novel will not fit on one card. Two ways around it:

Common problems

Next

Download OpenAudible to make your first card, or see Yoto Players and MYO Cards in the documentation for reference detail on split modes and file naming.