The reason I decided to write this analysis are twofold – one, I think there is an enormous amount of misinformation as it relates to eBook data. The most popular source of eBook market share data comes from “Author Earnings Report” now known as “Bookstat.” This data is quoted all across the internet and by some of the most legitimate news sources in the world, but there’s one problem – the data itself is dodgy and seems totally unreliable, so dodgy I wrote an entire article about why you shouldn’t trust Author Earnings Report. The data out there besides the inaccurate data from AER seems just as esoteric, with countless info-graphs and forum posts backed up by no legitimate sources. So, since the purpose of this website is to help authors and publishers, and knowledge is power, I’m going to do my best here to give you some good information. This will be a really, really broad overview, a birds eye view of the entire eBook industry. Please note the deficiencies of this analysis – the major players in general, and specifically Amazon, do not share their sales data. At all. The following is analysing the data we do have, and I try to keep the extrapolation to a minimum. All references to Amazon market share is based on estimates.

Due to the proprietary nature of most eBook purchases, for example using a Kindle device to download from Amazon, eBook sales are vastly underreported here. So keep in mind the following eBook sales, generally speaking, can be considered much higher – in my personal opinion, the majority of the market. However, insofar as paperback trends would somewhat mirror eBook trends, and no honest data is bad data, I still recommend you read this analysis if your income depends on market trends.

Since the market share of the various booksellers seems to be the most quoted aspect of the industry across the web, we’ll start there. What is the market share of Amazon vs all other eBook & paperback sellers, does it really make every other bookseller insignificant? What percentage of book sales are represented by iBooks, Google Play, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Smashwords, KDP, etc?

To answer these questions, I’m going to share some subjective experiences and then do a deep dive for some objective facts. With well over a thousand books published, most of them wide (that is to say, not exclusive to Amazon) and many friends in the publishing industry, plus running a publishing website I suppose, I have a very good grasp of which retailers actually get sales for authors, and in my experience most authors not enrolled in Kindle Unlimited have around 50% of their income coming in from Amazon, with the other 50% coming from other booksellers. After Amazon, it generally goes in order of Apple iBooks, Google Play Store, NookPress by Barnes & Noble, then smaller stores such as Kobo and Smashwords, and then finally the dozens of smaller retailers which you would usually only ever publish on via a book distributor that automatically submits and maintains your books for you, such as PublishDrive. (Check out my comparison of book & eBook distributors later)

Looking at the hard data, I was expecting to find most of it confirming my pre-existing expectations, but I was actually quite wrong in that respect. To my surprise Amazon really did seem to totally dominate in terms of eBook market share, and I think I realized why their sales are nearly all of the market yet most authors who are “wide” only get half their sales from Amazon. Knowing that most sales are through Amazon, most authors and publishers are likely to spend their advertising dollars to run promotions on Amazon only, because you get more bang for your buck with a higher sales rank leading to more visibility, and it’s easier to focus on the main bookseller vs 5 of them. So, those with books on all retailers find half of their “natural” sales from outside of Amazon, and those exclusive to Amazon get all of their sales from Amazon. The third group that have their books on all booksellers without being in KU are probably focusing more on money in their pocket than unit numbers, and if you have slim margins on Amazon (keep in mind it’s much harder to make a positive ROI on Amazon without your book being in Kindle Unlimited, as you’re losing what can often be the bulk of income there) then your percentage of income coming from Amazon might not be much better, or even worse if like many inexperienced authors you take a loss. I would speculate this explains the juxtaposition between Amazon being the vast majority of total sales, yet most authors with books on all platforms reporting diverse income streams, with the occasional author even making more on other individual booksellers than on Amazon. If Amazon has 80% of the market, so all the big competition is dumping their ad dollars and marketing efforts there, and many publishers are in Kindle Unlimited and only on Amazon, you might be better off focusing on the 20% of the market that isn’t Amazon, especially if you’re going to be light on actual advertising. If you are not planning to advertise, you might not do too well on Amazon, albeit, it is essential to care about Amazon.