Taiwan-based EVA Air has introduced digital books and magazines as an inflight reading service throughout its global network. Passengers can access the ‘EVA e-Library’ service to download popular newspapers and magazines on their mobile devices before boarding and after arriving at their destinations.
The service is not just in response to Covid or weight savings. Pre-pandemic, EVA Air offered passengers popular local newspapers and magazines, based on each flight’s origin, destination and routing. However, due to onboard space and payload restrictions, no more than 70 publications in Mandarin Chinese, English and local languages could be provided on individual flights, and daily newspapers were often not available for some flights due to delivery limitations. With the EVA e-Library service, passengers can access as many as 500 different publications in 31 languages.
International EVA Air and UNI Air passengers can download publication content to their own mobile devices from 48 hours before until 24 hours after their scheduled departures. Content available to each passenger is based on their infinity MileageLands card tier or cabin class. For example, Diamond Card frequent flyers can access up to 20 different newspapers, magazines, books and periodicals, while business-class passengers can choose from 10. Passengers can also buy additional reading materials.
“EVA accelerated development of its digital reading services to not only expand inflight reading material selections and boost Covid safety, but also to protect our environment,” said EVA president, Clay Sun. “We launched our EVA e-Library to meet the high standards our passengers expect from us and deliver another automated service, consistent with the contact-free check-in and limited-interaction boarding we have been piloting while Covid is upending the travel industry.”
EVA is marking the launch of its e-Library with an introductory offer of nine additional free downloads, from now until 31 March 2022.
