Maria Girich, Researcher at the Gaidar Institute’s International Best Practices Analysis Department, spoke to Kommersant about price trends in the Russian book market. According to her assessment, the industry’s revenue growth in recent years is primarily due to rising book prices, while the number of printed copies sold is declining.
According to the report “The Russian Book Market,” the average price of a printed book sold rose from 350.92 rubles in 2021 to 509.49 rubles in 2025. The price increase has been particularly noticeable in traditional bookstores: over five years, the average price rose by 56.3%—to 584.49 rubles. In online stores and on marketplaces, the increase was more moderate—about 38%.
However, this increase in revenue does not mean that Russians are buying more books. In 2025, the print literature market grew by 9.7% to 107.98 billion rubles; however, sales in physical terms declined by approximately 3%—from 233 million to 229 million copies. Buyers also began purchasing fewer books at a time: the average number of copies per receipt fell from 2.47 in 2024 to 1.9 in 2025.
“The book market today is growing primarily in monetary terms, but this does not mean an increase in demand in terms of volume. We see that the average price of a book is rising, while the number of copies sold is declining. In traditional retail, prices have more than doubled over the past five years, whereas on marketplaces, the increase has been significantly more modest. Going forward, book prices will be influenced by production costs, paper, printing, logistics, and the terms of working with marketplaces. Therefore, it is important to consider not only the industry’s revenue growth but also how many books buyers are actually purchasing,” noted Maria Girich.
According to the economist, future price trends will depend on changes in the book industry’s costs and distribution conditions. Against the backdrop of rising printing and logistics costs, the question of how to keep books affordable for readers remains a pressing issue for the market.