eBook sales have been plummeting year-round in the United States. E-book revenue was down 8.3% for the month from April 2021 to a total of $84.3 million. The Downloaded Audio format grew 5.6% in April, with revenue of $66.6 million. Physical audio, such as CDs, fell 47.9% to $1.2 million. Are commercial sales, such as paperbacks and hardcovers, offsetting the decline?

Year-to-date eBook revenue was down 9.7% from the first four months of 2021 to a total of $338.1 million. Digital audiobooks grew 3.4%, with revenue of $261.1 million. Physical audio fell 31.5% to $4.9 million.

Trade sales (consumer books) fell 8.9% in April to $685.7 million. In terms of physical paper revenues during the month of April, in the Commerce category (consumer books), related revenues decreased by 16.8%, to $232.4 million; Paperbacks fell 2.8%, with revenue of $251.9 million; The mass market fell 22.0% to $14.1 million.

Year-to-date, trade revenue fell 1.0% to $2.8 billion for the first four months of the year. Hardcover revenue decreased 6.8% to $974.0 million; Paperbacks grew 9.6%, with revenue of $1.0 billion; The mass market fell 20.5% to $63.6 million; and specialty binders fell 2.0%, with revenues of $56.1 million.

Michael Kozlowski has been writing about audiobooks and e-readers for twelve years. His articles have been picked up by major and local news sources and websites such as CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and The New York Times. He lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.