Figure 1.12a UK ebook revenue for trade books, 2008–2018
Figure 1.12b Ebook revenue as a percentage of total trade sales in the UK
Figure 1.12c Ebook revenue and rate of growth of ebook sales in the UK
The PA data breaks out ebook sales by broad categories of books – for our purposes here, the relevant categories are fiction, nonfiction/reference and children’s books. Table 1.9 and Figure 1.13 show ebook sales as a proportion of total book sales, print plus digital, in each of these three categories. We see that the ebook surge went much further in the area of fiction: here, ebook sales account for just over 40% of total fiction sales in 2014 and 2015 before levelling off. In the nonfiction/reference category, ebook sales rose to 8.4% of total sales in 2014 and then fell back slightly after that. The lowest levels of ebook uptake are in the children’s category, where ebook sales accounted for 7.1% of total sales in 2014 and then fell back to 5% or less from 2016 on. In each of these broad categories, we see the classic S-curve, represented most clearly by fiction, as ebook sales rise rapidly between 2011 and 2013, peak in 2014 and then begin to level off from 2015 on. The pattern is very similar to the US, though time-shifted to around a year later and plateauing at levels that are lower than those achieved in the US.
Table 1.9 UK ebook sales by category, 2008–2018
| Fiction£m | Non-fiction/ reference£m | Children’s£m | TOTAL FICTION PRINT+ DIGITAL£m | TOTAL NF/REF PRINT+DIGITAL£m | TOTAL CHILDREN’S PRINT+DIGITAL£m | Fictione/total% | NF/Refe/total% | Children’se/total% | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2008 | 2.8 | 1.6 | 0.1 | 524.8 | 868.9 | 323.0 | 0.6 | 0.2 | 0.0 |
| 2009 | 7.6 | 1.8 | 0.5 | 568.9 | 781.7 | 333.7 | 1.3 | 0.2 | 0.1 |
| 2010 | 22.0 | 8.0 | 1.8 | 570.5 | 823.6 | 332.8 | 3.9 | 1.0 | 0.5 |
| 2011 | 85.0 | 25.0 | 9.0 | 576.7 | 807.6 | 315.9 | 14.7 | 3.1 | 2.8 |
| 2012 | 205.0 | 47.0 | 14.4 | 710.1 | 814.2 | 324.0 | 28.9 | 5.8 | 4.4 |
| 2013 | 233.0 | 64.0 | 18.5 | 632.7 | 817.0 | 316.3 | 36.8 | 7.8 | 5.8 |
| 2014 | 248.0 | 63.0 |
25.0
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