One of the strongest continuing areas is romance and romantasy, particularly books combining romance with fantasy, adventure, or supernatural themes. Romance remained a major category in 2025, with print sales increasing 3.9%, while science fiction also showed strong growth. For an ebook store, this suggests that broad categories such as Romance, Fantasy, Science Fiction, Mystery, and Thriller can still attract readers, but there may be additional opportunity in smaller subgenres. Examples include cozy fantasy, paranormal romance, historical romance, psychological thrillers, dystopian fiction, and mystery series.
The ebook market has changed significantly in 2026. Readers are still buying and downloading popular fiction, but current publishing data suggests that niche genres, practical nonfiction, self-help, hobbies, and escapist fiction are attracting growing attention. At the same time, readers appear increasingly interested in discovering something specific rather than simply browsing a massive ebook catalog. Research from Everand and Fable found that 80% of readers explored a new genre, including niche areas such as cozy fantasy, cowboy romance, dark academia, and afrofuturism.
Another important change is the growing interest in practical nonfiction ebooks. Readers are looking for information they can use rather than simply information they can read. Self-help, personal development, money management, entrepreneurship, small business, online business, artificial intelligence, hobbies, crafts, journaling, and wellness all fit this behavior. Circana’s 2026 research identified continued interest in hands-on nonfiction, including crafting, journaling, adult coloring, puzzles, and other screen-free activities. Its research also identified humor, hobbies, and true crime as areas of consumer interest.
This represents an interesting change from several years ago. The ebook market was once heavily associated with the convenience of replacing a physical book with a digital version. Today, search intent and usefulness appear increasingly important. Someone searching for an ebook about “starting an online business,” “using ChatGPT for business,” “personal budgeting,” “healthy living,” or “writing a business plan” is often looking for a solution to a specific problem. This creates opportunities for carefully curated how-to ebooks, practical guides, educational ebooks, business ebooks, AI guides, financial guides, and personal development books rather than relying exclusively on traditional fiction categories.
There is also an important countertrend: readers are looking for human recommendations and curated discovery, as SmartChoicesEbooks.com offers, in an increasingly crowded digital marketplace. The 2026 State of Reading research from Everand and Fable reported that personal recommendations had become the leading source of book discovery, ahead of platforms, social media, and AI-driven tools. That finding is particularly relevant to a smaller ebook retailer. Instead of trying to compete with enormous ebook marketplaces on quantity, an independent ebook store can emphasize curated ebook collections, recommended reading, niche ebook categories, practical guides, themed collections, and the personal judgment of a curator.
Finally, 2026 brings another major consideration: artificial intelligence is changing the ebook marketplace itself. A recent academic study examining more than 14,000 self-published genre-fiction books reported substantial growth in books containing detectable AI-generated text and found that the number of books generating sales grew much faster than overall revenue. This means readers are facing an increasingly crowded marketplace. For an independent ebook store, that makes curation, useful descriptions, transparent recommendations, original commentary, and a recognizable human voice more valuable. The future may not simply belong to stores with the largest number of ebooks. It may increasingly favor stores that help readers decide which ebook is worth their time.
Sources and Research Note: This article was partially researched and written using AI. Information was reviewed using industry and publishing sources including Circana’s 2026 book-market analysis, Everand/Fable’s 2026 State of Reading Report, Publishers Weekly, and a 2026 academic study concerning generative AI and self-published books. Market trends can change, and the information above should be viewed as a snapshot of available 2026 research rather than a prediction of future sales.
Written by Curator @ Smart Choices Ebooks September 23, 2026
Smart Choices Ebooks — Curated Digital Books for Practical Learning and Personal Growth SmartChoicesEbooks.com
