Publishing remains a large, multi-format industry spanning consumer books, course materials, journals, exports, and professional content. In 2024, U.S. publishers generated an estimated $32.5 billion from books and course materials, while UK publishing revenue increased 1%. The figures below show where that activity was concentrated, how formats changed, and what the available workforce data reveals.
Table of contents
- Publishing market size and revenue
- Print, digital, and audio formats
- Consumer book publishing
- Education and academic publishing
- Sales channels and international publishing
- Publishing workforce and industry footprint
Publishing market size and revenue
The American Association of Publishers’ AAP StatShot Annual Report: Publishing Revenues Totaled $32.5 Billion for Calendar Year 2024 estimated aggregate U.S. publisher revenue from books and course materials at $32.5 billion in 2024. That was a 4.1% increase from 2023. The estimate covers publisher revenue rather than a census of every publishing business.
Consumer books were the largest named U.S. segment. U.S. trade, or consumer-book, publishing revenue reached an estimated $21.2 billion in 2024, up 4.4%. Other segments included $5.3 billion in PreK–12 instructional materials, up 5.1%; $4.3 billion in higher-education course materials, up 1.8%; $1.4 billion in professional books, up 2.5%; and $350 million in university-press revenue, up 3.1%. These categories use the definitions reported by the AAP source.
The UK market showed a different balance between domestic and overseas activity. The Publishers Association’s Publishing in 2024 reported that UK publishing-industry revenue increased 1% in 2024. Exports represented 63% of industry revenue. Export-market revenue grew 3%, while home-market revenue fell 2%. Total net units increased 5%.
| Market or segment | 2024 revenue or share | Change reported |
|---|---|---|
| U.S. books and course materials | $32.5 billion | +4.1% |
| U.S. trade publishing | $21.2 billion | +4.4% |
| U.S. PreK–12 instructional materials | $5.3 billion | +5.1% |
| UK publishing exports | 63% of industry revenue | +3% revenue |
The U.S. and UK figures are not directly interchangeable: the U.S. total is an estimated aggregate for books and course materials, while the UK figures describe the UK publishing industry using the Publishers Association’s market definitions.
Print, digital, and audio formats
Print continued to account for most U.S. publishing revenue in 2024. Print formats represented 50.5% of total U.S. publishing revenue. Hardback revenue reached $7.9 billion, up 3.6%, and paperback revenue reached $7.8 billion, up 3.2%.
Digital audio was the fastest-growing major U.S. format in the supplied figures. Digital-audio revenue reached $2.4 billion in 2024, increasing 22.5% from 2023. Across 2020–2024, it grew 78.1%. eBook revenue reached $2.1 billion in 2024, up 1.5% from 2023 and 2.0% across 2020–2024. Digital audio and eBooks together represented 14% of total U.S. publishing revenue, while digital formats represented 21.2% of U.S. trade-publishing revenue.
The UK data also shows a shift toward digital, although print remained dominant in consumer publishing. UK publishing print revenue fell 3% in 2024, while digital revenue rose 6%. Print represented 78% of UK consumer-publishing revenue. In UK academic publishing, digital journal revenue increased 4%.
These measures describe different denominators. The U.S. 14% figure covers digital audio and eBooks across total publishing revenue, the 21.2% figure covers digital formats within trade publishing, and the UK 78% figure is specifically a consumer-publishing print share. They should therefore be read as separate indicators rather than combined into one global format split.
Consumer book publishing
UK consumer publishing generated £2.5 billion in revenue in 2024, up 5% from 2023, according to Publishing in 2024. Home-market revenue was £1.5 billion, up 2%, while export revenue was £1 billion, up 9%. The export result was therefore the faster-growing part of the consumer market in the reported period.
Print remained the biggest UK consumer format by revenue at £2 billion, up 2%. Digital consumer revenue was £566 million, up 17%. Audio downloads reached £268 million, up 31%, making audio downloads the fastest-growing named consumer format in the UK figures.
Content categories moved at different speeds. UK consumer fiction revenue reached £1.1 billion, up 18% in 2024. Non-fiction revenue was also £1.1 billion, but fell 4%. Children’s publishing revenue was £413 million and was unchanged from 2023.
| UK consumer category or format | 2024 revenue | Change from 2023 |
|---|---|---|
| Total consumer publishing | £2.5 billion | +5% |
| Export revenue | £1 billion | +9% |
| £2 billion | +2% | |
| Digital | £566 million | +17% |
| Audio downloads | £268 million | +31% |
| Fiction | £1.1 billion | +18% |
| Non-fiction | £1.1 billion | -4% |
| Children’s publishing | £413 million | Unchanged |
The category figures are reported revenue measures, not unit sales. The same source separately reported that UK publishing total net units increased 5% across the industry, so revenue and unit movement should not be assumed to be identical.
Education and academic publishing
Education publishing was under pressure in the UK domestic market in 2024. Total UK education-publishing revenue was £640 million, down 3%. Home-market revenue was £171 million, down 11%, while export revenue was £467 million, unchanged from 2023.
The format split also favored print in absolute revenue, even as digital grew. Education-publishing print revenue was £539 million, down 5%. Digital revenue was £100 million, up 5%. Digital-export revenue reached £64 million, up 15%. The export figures and digital-export figure use the market definitions reported by the Publishers Association and should not be treated as a global education-publishing total.
UK academic publishing was substantially larger than UK education publishing in the same source. Academic-publishing revenue totaled £3.5 billion in 2024, down 1%. Home-market revenue was £852 million, down 9%, while export revenue was £2.7 billion, up 2%.
Academic journals were the larger named academic category at £2.5 billion, up 3%. Academic books generated £1 billion, down 8%. Digital journals alone reached £2.2 billion, up 5%. This indicates that journal publishing was the principal source of the reported academic revenue, and that digital journal revenue accounted for most of the journal figure, although the source does not state that the two numbers are perfectly coterminous.
The education and academic figures reinforce the importance of international markets. UK education exports were unchanged while domestic education revenue declined, and academic exports grew while the home market contracted. Those movements are specific to 2024 and to the Publishers Association’s UK reporting scope.
Sales channels and international publishing
Online retail was the largest named U.S. sales channel in the supplied AAP figures. U.S. publisher sales through online retail totaled $12 billion in 2024. Within U.S. online-retail publishing revenue, digital formats made up 34.5%, print formats 57.1%, instructional materials 6.5%, and physical audio and other formats 1.9%.
The online-retail shares provide a useful channel-specific view. They are not the same as the format shares for total U.S. publishing revenue because they measure the composition of online-retail revenue only. Print still represented the largest online-retail share, while digital formats had a substantial 34.5% share.
U.S. physical-retail publishing revenue reached $6.2 billion in 2024, up 3.3%. It grew 48.0% from 2020 to 2024. U.S. trade online-retail revenue rose 11.0% to nearly $11 billion in 2024.
The UK results place international sales at the center of the industry. Exports represented 63% of UK publishing-industry revenue in 2024, and UK consumer-publishing export revenue reached £1 billion, up 9%. Academic publishing was even more export-oriented in absolute terms: its export revenue was £2.7 billion, compared with £852 million in the home market. These are UK market figures, not estimates of worldwide publishing exports.
Publishing workforce and industry footprint
Eurostat reported that the EU employed 868,700 authors, journalists, or linguists in 2023, down 2.5% from 2022. The EU also had 76,328 enterprises in books-and-periodicals publishing in 2023. France had 23,648 books-and-periodicals publishing enterprises, while Germany employed 237,600 authors, journalists, or linguists.
The Eurostat measures describe the EU and its books-and-periodicals publishing activity. They combine authors, journalists, and linguists in the employment measure, so the 868,700 figure should not be read as a count of publishing-company employees alone. Enterprise counts and employment counts also measure different aspects of the industry footprint.
For the United States, the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Publishing Industries (except Internet): NAICS 511 page reported 883.2 thousand seasonally adjusted employees in August 2026, preliminary. The same source reported 34,380 editor jobs in U.S. publishing industries except internet in 2025.
The U.S. employment figures have different time periods and measurement types: the August 2026 total is a preliminary, seasonally adjusted employment estimate, while the 2025 editor figure is an occupational job count. The BLS scope excludes internet publishing, and the Publishers Association and Eurostat figures use different geographic and industry definitions. Comparisons across these workforce statistics should therefore remain descriptive rather than treated as a single global employment ranking.