Booksology Commenters rush to contest these numbers. Audiobooks do not count. And graphic novels don’t count. And romance is not Really count. Nor is YA. Or a novella.
Some people create their own TikToks to reassure others that by all accounts, no one has read hundreds of books and is lying about it all. They make up the numbers to brag.
Anyone who has been on the bookish internet long enough will know the truth. There will always be someone who has read more books than you. I read about 100 books a year. By normal standards, that’s a huge amount of books. However, I personally know readers who read more than 500 books a year. (Yes, really.)
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There’s always someone who can read more pages in a minute, have more hours in a day, or listen to audiobooks faster than you.
I don’t read many books, so it always baffles me when people think 100 books a year is an impossible number. I read for 30 minutes to an hour every day, sometimes more on the weekends. There are several reading marathon days throughout the year. You don’t have to be unemployed or have other responsibilities in your life to achieve this number. If you really made reading a priority, you would probably triple that number if you read as much as you do scrolling on your phone, watching TV, or binge-watching YouTube.
To the commenters who claim that people online who say they read more books than we do must be lying, I’d like you to hold on to that sentiment for a moment. Do you think people who say they watch a lot of movies in a year are lying? Do you get anxious if you don’t watch the same number of movies? What’s the difference in reading?
Most importantly, why would you care how much a stranger reads? This is a hobby. We do it for fun. I’m not saying that people haven’t lied about how much they read on BookTok, but is it more likely that there’s a conspiracy of bookworm influencers faking their Goodreads accounts all year long, or is it more likely that some people just like to read a lot?
So this year, when you hear about other people’s annual reading totals, remember that the rules are made and the numbers don’t matter. It is impossible to compare the reading of two people with different formats, styles, reading speeds, etc. Plus, there’s no competition here. Just because one person reads more doesn’t mean they give you fewer books.
If you’re one of those people who can’t help but question how much other people read based on monthly or yearly summaries, it might be time to take a break from social media for a while. Try a new hobby. Why not pick up a book?
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