Magazines have always been my favorite media to consume.
When I was a kid my grandma would give me $5 to go to the Quik Check up the street from her house, which I used to buy magazines like Bop or 16 or YM, and a Whatchamacallit candy bar.
Back in college I interned at Seventeen magazine, a cool experience that was not at all similar to The Devil Wears Prada.
Today I still like to buy and collect magazines.
My home magazine collection.
Over the years I’ve purchased and subscribed to many magazines (mostly fashion, entertainment, and travel titles) to the point that they would accumulate because I didn’t have time to read them all. It was not uncommon to see stacks of magazines on my coffee table at home.
The Hoboken Public Library has over 120 titles in its magazine collection, and I can (and do) borrow as many magazines as I wish. This has helped significantly cut down on the coffee table clutter.
But now the library offers Zinio, an online service that offers full color digital magazines to borrow using your library card. Zinio has over 130 titles in its collection.
The easiest way to access Zinio is from the banner on the Hoboken Public Library’s homepage. To start borrowing magazines, you’ll need to enter your library card number and then create an account on Zinio. You can search for magazines by title, or browse by categories.
Some titles that are not in the library’s physical magazine collection that can be borrowed through Zinio are:
- Architectural Record
- Road & Track
- Owl
- Knitter’s Magazine
- OK! Magazine
- Parent & Child
- Saveur
- Games
- Organic Gardening
- Shape
- Woodcraft Magazine
- Dwell
- Town & Country
- Men’s Fitness
- Guitar Player
- Newsweek
- The American Spectator
- Field & Stream
- Outdoor Life
- Mental Floss
- Golf
- National Geographic Traveler
- Nylon
Magazines borrowed from Zinio can be viewed on your computer or tablet and on your smartphone. I usually access Zinio through the Zinio app on my iPhone. (An Android version of the app is also available.) What I like best about Zinio is that there is no due date to return magazines–you can keep them for as long as you like. This appeals to my magazine-hoarder tendencies.
See this link for more information on accessing Zinio. Contact the Reference Department at (201) 420-2347 or at hobkref@bccls.org if you have any additional questions.
-Written by Kerry Weinstein, Reference Librarian
Hoboken Library Staff Picks 
This is a fabulous service; was using it yesterday to read ‘House Beautiful’ and ‘Elle’. The navigation is smooth and I love no due dates. Between this and Hoopla, the e-lending scene has gotten much better this year.