URUMQI -- Shemshinur Batur, a villager in Northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, loves reading and ever since a rural library was established in her village, her family knows exactly where to find her whenever she goes "missing."

Now she has another option. By accessing a digital reading platform on her smartphone, she can listen to her favorite books while preparing meals for her family and doing other household chores.

"I'm recently fascinated by the long novel 'Hobok River'," she said, adding that she is also especially interested in books on agricultural techniques, which have helped solve many problems in planting and livestock breeding.

The "Xinjiang Digital Rural Library" is a free digital platform for farmers and herders of all ethnic groups across the region. It offers books in various genres, including literature, health, children's books, science, agricultural and animal husbandry technology, and wellness in six languages, including Mandarin, Uygur and Kazakh.

Since its launch in September 2024, the platform built within WeChat has brought together more than 17,000 e-book titles and offers a range of services, including audiobooks and videos. So far, it has attracted 241,000 registered users and recorded over 18.37 million visits.

Online readers can earn credits that can be exchanged for daily necessities such as rice, cooking oil and woks. A library map feature has also been launched on the platform, allowing users to check nearby libraries based on their location.

The digital reading platform is part of Xinjiang's efforts to promote reading both online and offline across the region, especially in the vast rural areas. Figures show that Xinjiang has nearly 9,000 village libraries in its 96 county-level regions.

In Shemshinur Batur's village in Kashgar city, the local library regularly hosts reading-sharing sessions and lectures, aiming to make it a vibrant knowledge hub for residents.

With the support of digital technologies, libraries in the city offer services such as inter-library borrowing and returning, online reservations, and home delivery of books, said Zhang Shihang, deputy director of the Kashgar Library.

Reading spaces at remote villages have been equipped with digital reading facilities.

In the remote mountainous Changji Hui autonomous prefecture in Xinjiang, 175 village libraries have now been established.

Zhao Yan, a local villager, recalled that it once took half a day to make a round trip to the nearest bookstore, located 10 km away in town.

"Now that we have a library in our village with a rich variety of categories, our children can come here often to read and study during holidays," Zhao added.

China's 15th Five-Year Plan (2026-30) emphasizes improving the service efficiency of smart libraries and public cultural cloud platforms, encouraging nationwide reading initiatives, and advancing the development of a book-loving society.

The latest national regulations on reading promotion, enacted in February, set out measures to better integrate digital and traditional reading, expand the supply of high-quality digital content, and enhance the convenience of and satisfaction with digital reading.

Among those benefiting is Rabiya Yusup, a primary school student in Xinjiang's Hoxud county and an avid reader. Since the launch of the digital platform, she has listened to Chinese classics such as "Journey to the West" and "Dream of the Red Chamber."

"Listening to audiobooks feels different from reading the text," she said. "The narrators are very expressive, and listening to them inspires me to enjoy reading aloud."