- Number of Kobo users: 26 million
- Number of Amazon.com users: 244 million
- Number of ebooks available on Kobo: 4.7 million
- Estimated number of ebooks available on Amazon: 4 million
- Average number of ebooks purchased by Kobo’s most dedicated customers: 1 per month
- Average number of print books purchased by Kobo’s most dedicated customers: 16 per year
- US bookstore sales increase in 2015 (over 2014): 2.5%
- Last year when US bookstores reported a sales increase: 2007
- US bookstore sales in 2015: $11.17 billion
- US bookstore sales in 2007: $17 billion
- Percentage of book-publishing market represented by ebooks in the U.S.: 13%
- In the UK: 11.5%
- In Germany: 5%
- In the EU: 1.5%
Sources: By the Numbers: 110+ Amazing Amazon Statistics (January 2016); Amazon Kindle Wikipedia entry; Kobo CEO Faces Uphill E-Book Battle against Apple, Amazon; E-Books: Evolving Markets and New Challenges
Jane Friedman has spent her entire career working in the publishing industry, with a focus on business reporting and author education. Established in 2015, her newsletter The Bottom Line provides nuanced market intelligence to thousands of authors and industry professionals; in 2023, she was named Publishing Commentator of the Year by Digital Book World.
Jane’s expertise regularly features in major media outlets such as The New York Times, The Atlantic, NPR, The Today Show, Wired, The Guardian, Fox News, and BBC. Her book, The Business of Being a Writer, Second Edition (The University of Chicago Press), is used as a classroom text by many writing and publishing degree programs. She reaches thousands through speaking engagements and workshops at diverse venues worldwide, including NYU’s Advanced Publishing Institute, Frankfurt Book Fair, and numerous MFA programs.
