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February 2018 Comic Book Sales to Comics Shops

Estimated Comics Shipped to North American Comics Shops

Based on Reports from Diamond Comic Distributors

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With no new Doomsday Clock issue in the offing, February was a slow month in comics shops. But whereas comics and graphic novels were equally responsible for 2017's overall shortfall, a lackluster graphic novel slate was the main culprit in February's decline, with periodicals nearly, but not quite, holding their own. Retailers ordered $36.66 million in comics and graphic novels; comics were off 3% in dollars and graphic novels off 18.5% to land down 8% for the month.



An important thing to remember when looking at the February 2018 data is to ignore the comics units sales, because the year-to-year comparisons are impacted by February 2017's 25th anniversary Image event, which included a reported 750,000 copies of a 25¢ issue of Walking Dead. (Walking Dead #163 is not found in our charts for that month, because Diamond reports nothing with a cover price below $1.) That said, the more than 101,000 copies shipped of the top-selling issue, Dark Nights Rising: The Wild Hunt #1, ranks as the lowest figure for a bestseller since May 2011, shortly before the DC "New 52" relaunch. (Overall unit sales remain 15% higher than that month, however.)



The 6.3 million copies shipped this February finds a nearer comparative in the most recent four-week month experienced to that point, December 2017 — and there, comics unit sales were slightly up over that very weak month. Sales levels were also higher in 50th, 100th, 150th, and 300th place than in December, with the 300th-place comic book also topping its February 2017 counterpart.



February saw the release of the Black Panther movie, but while its blockbuster success led to a large wave of reorders, they mostly came after the February reporting period.



Read more in our preliminary and final analysis posts for the month; you can also see the archived reorder charts for the weeks ending February 4, 11, 18, and 25. You can also click to skip to the Top Graphic Novels for the month.



—John Jackson Miller

This list includes all items on Diamond's Top 300 charts, plus any post-#300 items from its Top 50 Indy and Small Publisher charts. If you don't see a book, Diamond released no data for it.

Items marked with asterisks [*] had their reported orders reduced by 10% due to returnability.

Distributor charts are regional commodity reports, not measures of a work's total reach. Read our FAQ.

The links lead to current listings for each item on eBay. You can also find the books at your comics shop.

February 2018 Graphic Novel Sales to Comics Shops

Estimated Graphic Novels and Trade Paperbacks Shipped to North American Comics Shops Based on Reports from Diamond Comic Distributors

This list includes all items on Diamond's Top 300 charts, plus any post-#300 items from its Top 50 Indy, Manga, and Small Publisher charts. If you don't see a book, Diamond released no data for it.

The links lead to details about each title on Amazon. You can also find the books at your comics shop.

#1 #2 #3 #4

A lackluster new-release slate for February, with no new releases shipping more than 3,000 copies. The top seller came out in December.



