Sales of religious books at companies that report results to the Association of American Publishers’ StatShot program rose 7.8% last year over 2022, hitting $819.7 million.
All formats expect e-books had an increase. The biggest gain was in trade paperback, where sales increased 11.1%. Hardcover sales rose 6.7% and accounted for 60.1% of segment sales last year, roughly even compared to 2022.
On the digital side, sales of digital audiobooks rose 8.5%, but e-book sales fell 3.3%. Digital audio accounted for 5.5% of religion book sales last year, even with 2022, while e-books share of religious book sales fell to 6.6% from 7.3% in 2022. The digital formats represented 12.1% of segment sales in 2023, compared to 12.% in 2022.
The religious press segment, which includes sales of both adult and children’s books, had the largest sales increase among all StatShot categories. Total sales for the 1,225 publishers who report to the AAP program inched up 0.4%. In the trade categories, sales of adult books slipped 0.3% while sales in the children’s/young adult category fell 2.6%.
Sales for the religious press segment are based on reports from five major publishers, two distributors, and the ECPA.
