Sales of non-fiction books increased for the first time in four years in 2025. And it is a trend reversal that has persisted, according to book sales statistics for the first quarter of 2026.
Is the light finally shining on non-fiction?
In any case, I dare say that we have reached the bottom and are on our way up, says Kerstin Almegård, the publisher responsible for non-fiction at Albert Bonniers Förlag.
The world situation
However, over a longer period, the decline is large: non-fiction books' share of the book market's total turnover was 35 percent in 2018 and 22 percent in 2025.
According to Kerstin Almegård, there are several explanations for the current increase in interest, but the world situation is always crucial to the popularity of non-fiction.
During the pandemic, many people were at home gardening, cooking or renovating, and that was a fantastic "peak" for these types of books. Now, the full-scale invasion of Ukraine and other crises make us want to understand our world, and the non-fiction book is superior when it comes to well-founded, high-quality facts.
Another contributing factor may be that two non-fiction book festivals have been established in Sweden in recent years: the Minerva Festival at the ABF building in Stockholm and Sakligt at the Rikstolvan cultural centre in Österlen.
Karin Westin Tikkanen is the chair of the non-fiction section of the Swedish Writers' Association, which is behind the Minerva Festival. The latest edition of the festival more than doubled the number of tickets sold compared with the inaugural year, from 450 to 900.
Our goal is to create a platform where readers and non-fiction writers can meet, because that's something that's been missing, she says.
Contact surface
This weekend it's time for the non-fiction festival Sakligt, with room for around 250 visitors and guests such as Lea Ypi and Roland Paulsen.
Anna Jungstrand, Sweden's first professor of non-fiction, is one of the programme directors.
We focus on issues of form and the role of non-fiction in the contemporary world, in addition to highlighting the latest publications. The idea is to offer a platform for in-depth conversations between publishers, authors, the public and researchers.
It has been requested that you, as "Sweden's most qualitative festival" , should be streamed live ?
In terms of audience, we are quite small, but the small format is deliberate and invites discussions that continue between panels and in the audience for several days. Instead of live streaming, we record and post the conversations afterwards.
The non-fiction genre includes everything from sudoku books to cookbooks, biographies and reportage books.
In 2025, non-fiction was sold for SEK 1.16 billion, an increase of 2.2 percent and SEK 24.6 million compared with 2024. However, compared with 2018, the non-fiction genre has lost SEK 377 million in sales, or 24 percent.
All titles on the list of the 20 best-selling titles in 2025 were fiction except one: Bea Uusma's "Vitön" (Norstedts), which became the third best-selling book in 2025. (Source: Swedish Booksellers Association and Swedish Publishers Association's book sales statistics 2025.)
The Sakligt non-fiction festival runs from 31/7 to 2/8 at the Rikstolvan cultural centre in Österlen. 45 authors are participating and this year's theme is "memory".
The Minerva Festival, organised by the Swedish Writers' Association and ABF in Stockholm, will return in January 2027, but after that the future is uncertain; it depends on whether they receive funding.
Sweden's first professorship in non-fiction was established in 2023 and is held by Anna Jungstrand.
