Publishing Statistics

  • Altogether total book sale income (physical and digital) was up 4% in 2017 to £3.7bn. Physical book sales continue to outpace digital, with revenue up 5% last year to £3.1bn, while total digital sales income including journals rose 3% to £1.8bn

  • Fiction sales income (physical and digital) is up 3% to £547m.

  • Consumer e-book sales are down from last year by 7% to £191m

  • Out of 1,000 respondents aged 16-24, 64% said they preferred print books, 16% said ebooks, and 20% said they didn’t mind.

  • Self-help had the largest unit gain within adult nonfiction; sales were 18% higher than in 2016

  • The UK reached peak e-reader in 2014, when a quarter of UK book buyers owned one. Three years on that figure was back to only just over one-fifth

  • Sales of printed books rose 7% in 2016 while e-book sales fell as mobiles and tablets overtook dedicated e-readers

  • The BBC is becoming a “monopoly broadcaster” and as such is risking the business of local newspapers.

Sources: The Bookseller, Digital Book World, Nielsen BookScan, Publishers Weekly, BBC, The Times, PwC, The Guardian