The average Maltese buys three books a year, new study finds
Almost two-thirds say there are enough bookshops in Malta
The Maltese buy an average of three books a year, a new study has found, with more than half opting to read in English.
The findings, which emerged from a study carried out by Vincent Marmarà, were presented during the National Book Council’s first edition of the National Book Conference held last week.
According to the survey, 53% of respondents said they preferred to read in English, while 46% would prefer Maltese-language titles.
Almost two-thirds (62.5%) agreed that there are enough bookshops in Malta.
Many respondents pointed to a lack of time or inclination to read as a factor in their reading relatively few books, while others said they prefer to read online content instead.
When it comes to choosing a book to buy, respondents pointed to genre, language and price as the most important factors in their decision.
The study appears to echo previous data that pointed to the Maltese public’s reluctance to read.
In 2024, EU data found that more than half all Maltese had not read a single book throughout an entire year, well below the EU average.
Those figures had shown that two-thirds of men don’t read at all, while reading habits tended to dip as people aged.
During last week’s conference, National Book Council chair Mark Camilleri said the voucher scheme introduced during the most recent edition of the Malta Book Festival had resulted in €306,000 worth of sales across several publishers
Meanwhile, the Malta Book Fund had increased from €140,000 to €159,000 to support other forms of book releases, such as ebooks and audiobooks, with a separate subsidy scheme to mitigate for rising paper costs.
In the run-up to the conference, a group of Malta’s book publishers had said they would be boycotting the conference, arguing that the council had failed to address the “existential threats” the industry was facing.