Sales of books have been hit by the UK cost-of-living squeeze.
The number of books sold fell 2 per cent to 191m last year as consumers cut back and more people tuned into audiobooks.
Philip Stone, head of publisher account management at Nielsen IQ BookData, said books ‘find it hard to compete with other forms of entertainment like games, streaming services etc.’
The average price hit a record £9.52, a 2 per cent increase compared to 2024, which experts blamed on the rising costs of production and inflation.
Cutting back: Sales of books have been hit by the UK cost-of-living squeeze
But adult fiction bucked the trend, with volumes rising 0.2 per cent to 65m units. Best-sellers included The Impossible Fortune by Richard Osman and The Housemaid by Freida McFadden, which was made into a film starring Sydney Sweeney and Amanda Seyfried.
A slide in sales comes even as publishers benefit from ‘Book Tok’, where social media influencers use TikTok to promote books. Shares in Harry Potter publisher Bloomsbury rose 22 per cent last week after Sarah J Maas announced the release dates of her next two novels.
Sales of audiobooks also increased last year, rising 6 per cent to 27.8m, according to NielsenIQ.
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