Russian nationals Anton Napolsky (33) and Valeriia Ermakova (27) are being held responsible for running the Z-Library site since 2018. Not much is known about Z-Library in terms of its official operation and management structure. It profited from the widespread piracy occurring across its domains in the form of donations via multiple online payment providers. Z-Library attracted more than 175 million monthly visits from 165 different countries a month.

One of the most crucial aspects of the service, especially for low-income readers, was that it was free to access.

Z-Library allowed users to search for books and articles by title, author, or keyword and offered a variety of tools and features to help users find and access the information they needed. It was one of the largest digital libraries in the world, with a collection of more than 11 million e-books and 84 million articles available across 200+ domains. Z-Library was a digital library that provided access to millions of textbooks, novels, journal articles, and magazines from a wide range of academic publishers and authors. Internet users who were around in the early days of music file-sharing services may have a sense of deja vu upon hearing of the recent takedown of Z-Library, as the perpetual war for freedom of information moves to a new front: books and academic articles. The shutdown caused a minor uproar among users of the service, who are now being forced to find alternative sources for their books and articles. The online library of pirated books was shut down on November 4, 2022, by the U.S. Z-Library was a shadow library project that provided access to scholarly journal articles, academic texts, and general-interest books.

Zlibrary textbooks