
Words-of-mouth: BookTok reignites a love for reading

Reading is back on the rise thanks to social media, particularly TikTok, with #BookTok amassing over 60 million views after taking off during the pandemic. “The rise of BookTok really coincided with the pandemic, and I think it was this wonderful way for other book lovers to sort of find each other,” RMIT lecturer of writing and publishing, Angela Meyer, tells Azzet. According to NPD BookScan, print book sales increased by 9% from 757.9 million in 2020 to 825 million in 2021, the highest jump since they started tracking in 2004. NPD BookScan largely attributed this to “BookTok” and said no other social media platform had impacted sales like this before. A key findings report of 2,001 16 to 25-year-olds in the UK found that the phenomenon that is BookTok has also encouraged more young people to read. Almost two-thirds of respondents said book influencers have helped them discover a passion for reading, 55% rely on BookTok for recommendations, and nearly half of the respondents said they had visited a physical book shop to buy a book they had seen on BookTok.What books are popular on TikTok?Meyer says backlist titles are often capturing the attention of BookTok users as opposed to newly published books. Backlist title