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How long would it take you to read every book in the world? Here are some facts to help you estimate!
How Many Books Are There In The World?
While it is impossible to say exactly how many books there are in the world, as of mid 2016 there was an estimated 134,021,533 books in the world. Another source estimates that approximately 2,200,000 are published each year. That means that at this point in 2017, we can estimate that there are approximately 136 million books in the world.
How Many Books Would You Have to Read Every Day to Read Every Book in the World Before You Die?
The average person lives 79 years, which means in order to read every book in the world right now, not even counting the new ones that will be released, you’d have to read about 1,721,519 books a year. That means that every single day you’d have to read 4,716 books to have any chance of reading every single book in the world right now. So, I hope you’re a really fast reader, and that you were born knowing how to read.
However, if we’re being honest, very few people are actually interested in reading every single book out there. There’s hundreds of thousands of books published for trades, hobbies, reference, etc, that will not appeal to people not interested in that specific area. And that’s not even taking into account those that haven’t been translated into your language.
Good News For Fiction Readers (Kind Of)
In 2015 there were 2,714,409 books published and only 221,597 were classified as fiction (that’s 8.2%). This may sound surprising because fiction novels seem to be everywhere. However, although only 8.2% of books published were fiction, fiction sales accounted for 23% of all book sales, which is why you probably expected there would be more fiction works published.
In reports put out by Bowker, this percentage of fiction to non-fiction books published has been the norm for the past several years. Across that time period, the average of fiction to non-fiction books published was 11%.
So if we assumed that this has been the average of fiction books published every year in the history of the world, then that means out of the approximately 136 million books existing in the world, only about 12,363,636 of them are fiction. Which means if you only wanted to read every single fiction novel in the world, you’d only have to read 156,501 books a year if you live the average 79 year life span, which is only about 429 books a day. While this still is pretty unattainable, it’s seems almost reasonable compared to the 4,716 books you’d have to read a day if you included non-fiction books in your quest.
More Fun Book Facts
About 20 percent of the world’s books are in the public domain, which means that, assuming you could find free digital copies of all of them, you could read 20% of the world’s books for free. And that’s not even counting all the free ones you could stock up on by subscribing to our free ebooks newsletter and taking advantage of all the limited-time offers.
How many books do you read on average a year? How many do you anticipate you’ll read in your lifetime? What percentage of the world’s books will that be? Let us know in the comments below.
Happy reading!
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Your math is off. Your assumption is that you begin reading the day you are born and continue to do so until you croak at 79. Maybe you need to read a book on math?
I think I read about 4 – 5 a week. Of course, I am also reading about 3-4 at a time, between the books on tape, the audio book, the ebook, the physical booksome short, some long. OK, maybe it is more like 7 – 8 a week. Thank goodness for freebees and the library, or I would go broke.
I believe I will have read a couple thousand books in my lifetime if not more love to read never had to hide my reading under the covers I hid under my bed to read lol as for percentage of world book don’t really now I read a lot 2 to 3 a week, and math is not my best subject
My problem is not reading all the new books but that I keep rereading all my favorites, but I try to add at least a hundred new books a year
I read and review about 3 books a week. My Goodreads Goal this year is 160 and I am on track.
Thanks to My Book Cave for contributing to my available books to read!
Remember the books you read when you were young? What genre? How many books I’ve read? Who knows! I only keep the books I like the best, and re sell the rest There is nothing as disappointing as a badly written sci-fi book story or anthology. How many well written books I’ve read in one year? Thirty to fifty depending on the length of each book. I do not enjoy TV much as the program content is aimed at a second grade intellect. I call it “the boob tube”. Reading books makes you think, watching TV makes you stupid (except the rare movie or documentary). If this insults the illiterate, then I do apologize (maybe). Perhaps this makes me seem to be politically incorrect, but I was born in a time when being “politically incorrect” was unknown or frowned upon. I’ve read the “Collected Works of Mark Twain” which is rarely found in Libraries today, because it promoted the thoughts of slavery. Yet, in his time, Samuel Clemens was considered to be extremely literate, and a prolific writer/author well published. I will leave you with that thought.
On average, I read a book a week! However, if it’s a trilogy, I can read it n a week or less. On Morgan Rice’s series, “The Sorcerer’s Ring”, I read all 17 books in about three weeks. Most series, if all are present and in print, I can read a book in two days. What can I say? I started reading in the third grade, (circa 1958), and haven’t stopped.
I love reading. I can only read 3 to 4 a week due to time restraints. I did go through a period of time when I was younger reading 3 to 4 a day seven days a week, mostly Harliquin Romances. It drove my parents mad trying to get me out doing other things.
I read on average between 5-7 books a week, sometimes more, rarely less. Most all fiction except for my faith selections. LOVE TO READ!!! I go through different periods where I read all mystery or All historical romance, etc. For past few years it has been medieval, Regency and Scottish Historical Romance novels. I read every night into the wee hours and have been doing so since between 2nd and 3rd grade. I am now 56 years old so I guess I have read a lot! I used to be a regular patron of the library where I would borrow my books. I would then buy them if I loved them 🙂 I am now almost exclusively a kindle reader since I can easily carry my library with me wherever I go and it saves my spot whenever I have to stop reading!
I read approximately 1 book a day. I have been doing this pretty much every day, except Sundays, since I have been disabled which is approx. 20 years. I am 57 now and if I live to be 79 and continue to do this I should read approx. (pause here while I go to the calculator) I will have read 13,104. That doesn’t count the 2-3 books a week I read since I was a teenager until age 40.
Amazing facts. This bookaholic will never have to worry about his supply chain, lol.
I read approximately one book per day, although there are some that may run into two days, so I can safely say that I read about three hundred and fifty books per year. Of course I don’t work and my activities are limited, so I have all the time in the world to read. My preferred genre is historical romance, but I can get captivated in a good mystery
WOW! You’re living the dream. I feel lucky if I make it through 2 books a week!
I am shooting for about 38 books per year this year up from 36 last year. I own approximately 500 physical books and who knows how many e-books, plus I’ve started listening to audio books in the car on my daily commutes. Ideally, I want to get to 1 per week. Assuming that, I’ll be lucky to finish the physical books in 10+ years if that is all I concentrate on. I’ve probably read about 1000 books in my 45 years if I had to guess, but who knows. I’ve only started keeping track since I joined goodreads in 2012 and I’m around 200 there. I used to read a lot more when I was younger, but now I’m just trying to get through as many as possible before my eyes give out!
These are great goals! Best of luck on finishing your books!
I like the idea of listening to books. I can do work around the yard or house listening as well! I hope your eyes don’t ever give out!
I try to read as much as I can. But there would be no way I could read almost 5000 books a day. I am good if I get a couple books in a week. But I do love to read. Books help take me to another world at times or to others problems. I realize my problems aren’t that bad.
Actually the number of books varies probably by an order of magnitude, or more, depending on what you define as a book, on when you consider two books to be variants of the same one, on how many pages are enough to constitute a book, on whether you count the number of volumes as different books, etc. The figure given here seems to me rather an upper bound to the number of books.
Good point!
As a child, I remember thinking to myself how great it would be to read every book in the world! I started by attempting to read every book in the school library. I can’t remember how far I got, but it was the start of my lifelong love of reading.
I bet you’ve read enough books to fill a couple school libraries by now!
I could not read every book in the world because some just don’t interest me, but I could live in a library and make a dent in them if allowed. If I were alone and didn’t have a family to take care of, I’d read all day. I do go from one book to the next and always have something ready to read. You can never be lonely if you like to read and the knowledge you gain from just reading books is amazing.
Couldn’t have said it better myself!
Thanks…
Books keep me sane in an insane world…
Escape to anywhere anytime…Comfort,travel,play,escape and just be whatever you want to at anytime.
Thanks to those wo write for us…
Write on. Sandra Beck
Thanks, Sandra!
I don’t know where I’d be without books. 🙂
Try to read 1 to 2 books a week if I can and I have been reading since I was in the 3rd grade. I would read under the covers with a flashlight until the early morning hours when I was in elementary school and have continued to read since. I will jave probable read well over a couple of thousand books in my lifetime uo to now.
Nice! Sometimes I miss those days of having to hide my late-night readings from my parents. There was something exciting about it.