Book sales revenue in the United States in 2022 amounted to 9.1 billion U.S. dollars, of which 3.2 billion was derived from hardback books. Meanwhile, paperback and mass market books reached 3.48 billion U.S. dollars, in line with trends showing consistent growth in this segment since 2017. The source reported e-book revenue as one billion U.S. dollars, a drop from the previous two years, whereas downloaded audiobook revenue continued to grow, and in 2022 surpassed 800 million U.S. dollars for the first time.

This statistic shows global e-book revenue from 2009 to 2011, and a forecast thereof to 2016, broken down by region. In 2010, e-book revenue in North America amounted to 1.2 billion U.S. dollars and was forecast to grow to almost 11 billion U.S. dollars by 2016. The revenue from trade e-book sales stood at 1.1 billion U.S. dollars in 2011 and grew to 1.4 billion U.S. dollars in 2015.

E-books - additional information

Electronic books have been around for over twenty years, but it was not until the recent mobile revolution that the medium’s revenues began to reflect its potential. The North American market, boosted by surge of interest from consumers in the United States, is one of the fastest-growing e-book markets in the world, but growth in Western Europe and the Asia Pacific region is predicted to increase.

Between 2008 and 2012, the unit sales per year increased by over 400 million units, and by 2018, the e-book share of total book sales is expected to grow to over 25 percent, more than doubling its share from 2013. Whereas electronic book consumption and revenue is expected to grow, almost all print book categories are expected to decrease.

Consumers are still refraining from completely embracing the e-reader and e-book trend. A survey of U.S. readers in 2015 revealed that 47 percent only read hard copy books, while only four percent only read e-books. Unsurprisingly, younger people are more likely to be e-book readers, especially as many of the newer e-reading devices are also tablet computers or smartphones, giving consumers even more reason to have these devices around on a more regular basis.

The timeline presents data on e-book sales revenue generated in the United States from 2008 to 2013, as well as a forecast until 2018. The source expects the revenue will grow from 2.31 billion in 2011 to 8.69 billion in 2018.

E-book sales in the United States - additional information

An e-book, also known as an electronic or digital book, is a digitally released version of a book, often consisting of text and images and available on electronic devices, such as specifically designed e-book readers. The most well known e-book device is the Amazon Kindle, originally released in 2007. E-books can also be used on computers, tablets and even on smartphones, as this survey shows.

In the United States, the e-books industry has grown tremendously in the past decade, primarily due to a higher supply and demand of e-book devices and applications, but also due to lower prices compared to hard copies, as well as ease of travel and storage. However, forecasts suggest that the number of e-book users in the U.S. is expected to fall from 92.64 million in 2015 to 88.45 million in 2021.

Many e-books are available through American public libraries, which, since 2003, have an increasingly popular e-book lending model of both fiction and non-fiction titles for different audiences. However, despite the rise in e-book popularity, hard copy books were still the preferred choice for readers in 2015. Based on a survey, 47 percent of all respondents claimed to read only hard copy books, while only four percent of all respondents read only e-books. Unsurprisingly, the most prolific e-book readers are the Millennials (ages 18 to 29), which make up 35 percent of all digital book readers.

In 2023, the German book market generated a revenue of almost 7.3 billion euros from print book sales and around 850 million euros from e-books. Revenue for both segments has remained stable during the period of consideration, with e-book revenue even rising in recent years. The German book market lives on. Book retail Despite repeated dire warnings about reading dying out and bookshops suffering as a result, Germans have not stopped reading or buying books, whether physically or online. Of course, the traditional book trade does face challenges, especially with the rise of e-books. Revenue development in the German book trade has fluctuated during the last two years, which was undoubtedly still influenced by the COVID-19 lockdowns of 2020 and 2021, when physical book retail locations were closed for months on end and book sales through those channels took a big hit. Brick and mortar shops stocking books were still the leading source of revenue among book buying locations, followed by mail order (whether from a shop or buying online in general). Curled up with a book German readers reach for a variety of genres when making their book choices. Preferences and trends, or, more specifically, sales figures, change periodically. Most recently, leading subjects included fiction, children's and young adult's books. 14.4 million Germans read for leisure several times a week.

Data on revenue from hardback book sales according to the publishers reporting to the source in the United States between 2016 and 2022 showed that the figure increased consistently on an annual basis with the exception of 2019 and 2022, and reached heights of 3.7 billion U.S. dollars in 2021. Hardback print sales generally account for roughly 30 to 35 percent of total trade sales.

Data on global book publishing revealed that book sales generated 122 billion U.S. dollars in revenue in 2018, and will amount to 129 billion in 2023. The source has previously estimated that book publishing revenues would not reach 122 until after the year 2021, so the current figures look positive and are predicted to increase by 1.2 percent over the next five years.

Estimates show that 191 million e-books were sold in the United States in 2020, according to the most recently available data. Precise figures on e-book sales are difficult to gather due to smaller publishers and major retailers such as Amazon being missed from sales data, and other factors such as the varying methodologies sources use to track and measure the market. For example, whilst figures for 2016 and 2017 are lower than the immediately preceding years, it was noted that figures for these years only included around 450 publishers. E-books in the U.S. E-book sales revenue in the United States fluctuates, and like unit sales, is prone to readjustments and changes in measurement. The best and most accurate estimates place revenue at over one billion U.S. dollars, the highest recorded so far but only a small improvement from the numbers given for 2017 and 2018. Expenditure on digital book readers also wavers, tending to hover between 19 and 25 U.S. dollars per year. In 2013, annual spending on e-readers averaged over 30 U.S. dollars, but the number has not reached that level again since, suggesting that such devices have already lost ground as consumers instead opt to use their smartphones for on-the-go media consumption. E-book readers Book fans all across the United States read e-books, though data on e-book readers by urbanity shows that consumers in rural parts of the country are less likely to engage with the format than those living in urban and suburban areas. Survey data on print and digital book readership highlights the continued preference for print, with only a small number of consumers exclusively reading digital books. However, growing numbers of book readers favor a combination of print and digital books, which is good news for publishers branching out beyond traditional formats but still wanting to produce printed books.

In 2021, U.S. book publishers generated 6.06 billion U.S. dollars selling adult trade books, up from 5.25 billion in 2020. Meanwhile in 2021, children's books generated a revenue of 2.95 billion U.S. dollars.

In 2022, books in the adult category remained the most lucrative in terms of revenue, generating over 5.76 billion U.S. dollars that year. Meanwhile, due to a drop in print sales, revenue from children's books fell slightly between 2021 and 2022, having previously seen consistent growth for a number of years.

Print book sales in Russia reached over 90 billion Russian rubles in 2022, up from 84 billion Russian rubles in the previous year. In 2020, the industry was negatively impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic and the closure of traditional bookstores during the lockdown. The market of electronic and audiobooks, however, has continuously increased over the observed period. In total, Russian print and digital book sales grew by around seven percent in 2022. Print book sales in Russia Offline bookstores are the main sales channel of print books in Russia, accounting for around 46 percent of the revenue. E-commerce websites rank second with a nearly 30-percent share. The highest earnings from print book sales come from the Central Federal District. The Northwestern and Volga Federal Districts are the second- and third-leading regions in terms of revenue. Reading behavior of Russians Nearly eight out of ten Russians aged 18 to 24 years read at least one book in the past six months, according to a survey from June 2021. That age group represented the most active readers among the adult population. To compare, in the age group from 35 to 44 years, the share of book readers over the same period was 10 percent lower. When asked about their favorite book genres, most Russians named fiction and popular science.

The statistic above presents data on consumer book sales in the United States from 2008 to 2013 and a forecast until 2018, broken down by platform. According to PwC, the U.S. print and audiobook market value will fall from 13.1 billion in 2011 to 7.94 billion U.S. dollars in 2018.

E-books in the United States – additional information

In a survey among authors and publishers in May 2014, the following question was asked; How would you rate the quality of most e-books you have read? Only 7.91 percent of respondents stated the felt the quality of e-books was excellent and a further 31.63 percent of respondents stated that the quality was okay. These results suggest that there are some improvements to be made in the industry in order to secure its popularity in the future.

A cheaper alternative to purchasing a book, in any format, is of course to borrow the book from a local library where the choices are endless. In the recent past, libraries have become aware of the need to cater to the e-reader community. In a survey of over 500 public libraries in the U.S. between April and July 2014, respondents were asked if their library offered e-books. An overwhelming majority of 95 percent stated that they did.

However, when it came to the book consumption per capita in the U.S. in March 2014, by format, e-books were still trailing behind. In a survey of those aged 18 and over, 46 percent of respondents stated that they only read hard books compared to six percent of respondents who stated that they only read e-books. This reveals that in early 2014 that the traditional paper book was still the more appealing format to readers.

In 2022, religious books generated 757.7 million U.S. dollars in sales revenue. Religious book sales grew consecutively in each year since 2017 (with the exception of a small dip in 2019), and the majority of revenue is generated via hardback sales.

Is the U.S. book market still healthy?

U.S. book store sales on the whole have been in decline in recent years. The sales revenue peaked at over 17 billion U.S. dollars in 2007 but has since shrunk to less than 11 billion. However, net revenue of the book publishing industry as a whole has remained comparatively stable – the 25.82 billion U.S. dollars recorded in 2018 was not dissimilar to the 2008 figure of 26.5 billion. Some categories are more successful than others, with higher education book materials seeing a decline in revenue whilst adult fiction and non-fiction books have shown improvement.

Whilst it is true that digital media has had a profound and ongoing impact on print, books have fallen less foul to this trend than other formats, namely newspapers, which have been struggling for years. News consumers and magazine readers have moved online, whereas print books are still popular among U.S. readers. The vast majority of respondents to a 2019 survey confirmed that they had read a print book in the last year, and U.S. adults cite multiple benefits to reading physical books. As the music industry has seen a resurgence in popularity of vinyl records, print books remain valuable to U.S. consumers.

As of April 2024, the book category with the highest sales revenue in Norway were fiction books with a revenue of around 101.312 million Norwegian kroner so far that year. The second highest revenue figure came from non-fiction, with over 98 million Norwegian kroner.

This statistic displays data on consumer, educational, and professional book and e-book publishing revenue worldwide in 2013 as well as a forecast for those figures in 2018, broken down by platform and type. According to PwC, consumer e-book revenue is projected to grow from 8.4 billion U.S. dollars in 2013 to 18.9 billion U.S. dollars in 2018.

Data showing how many books were sold in 2023 revealed that the printed book market remains healthy: a total of 767.36 million units were sold that year among outlets which reported to the source. Whilst this marked a small drop from the previous year, the figure still remains higher than in the years prior to 2021. Trade paperbacks remained the dominant format.

Book sales statistics Looking at book sales by year, 2005 to 2010 were the most lucrative for the printed book market, with well over 700 million units sold annually during that five-year period. After dropping below 600 million in 2012, gradual and consistent increases can be seen each year, with the exception of between the years 2018 and 2019. For bookstores though, how many books are sold each year depends on the success of key months across a twelve-month period.

Bookstore sales in the United States are at their highest in December, January, and August, but figures for December are consistently higher than other months. Books are popular holiday gifts, with around 30 to 40 percent of consumers responding to annual surveys in each year from 2012 to 2020 saying that they planned to purchase books as presents during the festive season.

This statistic shows the revenue of the industry “book publishers“ in New York from 2012 to 2017, with a forecast to 2024. It is projected that the revenue of book publishers in New York will amount to approximately 10,9 billion U.S. Dollars by 2024.

A total of 48.79 million books were sold in Canada in 2023, generating total revenue of a little over 1.1 billion Canadian dollars. Book sales revenue in Canada had previously been increasing slowly and surpassed one billion Canadian dollars for the first time in 2017, though it dropped again from 2021 onwards.

In 2023, the revenue from children's and youth book sales in printed format in Sweden amounted to 645.4 million Swedish kronor, making printed books in this category one of the most lucrative revenue sources for the book market. Crime and suspense literature however generated a total sales revenue of over 970.11 million Swedish kronor in both printed and streamed format, making it overall the most lucrative revenue source on the Swedish book market.

In 2022, the estimated net revenue of the U.S. book publishing industry amounted to 28.1 billion U.S. dollars. This marks a small decrease from the previous year, but revenue remains stable and is an improvement on the figures recorded for previous years.

Total print and digital revenue of book publishers in the United Kingdom amounted to 7.1 billion British pounds in 2023, of which 4.4 billion GBP was derived from exported sales. Revenue overall increased year over year, and exported book sales remained the main revenue driver in terms of market.