News October 23, 2011

Results of the “What’s Your Primary eBookstore” Poll

Gear Diary Results of the Whats Your Primary eBookstore Poll photo

The votes are in, and I know you’re all thrilled to learn the results of our “What’s your primary ebookstore” poll. As it turns out, Gear Diary readers break down fairly similarly to what’s widely assumed about ebook demographics. Amazon’s Kindle was overwhelmingly first, with B&N pulling a solid second place, but far behind Kindle’s numbers. Meanwhile, iBooks and Kobo duked it out for the remaining share, with one vote for “Other”.

So what does this mean? As I said, this was highly unscientific, and you could argue there’s a lot of factors skewing the results: our readers may be mainly US-based, which means they’re more likely to shop B&N and iBooks over Kobo, we tend to cover B&N and Amazon more than the smaller stores, 38 votes is too small of a sample size, etc. But there’s no denying it-even our very informal questioning lines up with much bigger polls. Poor Kobo. And iBooks.

I think the issues Kobo and iBooks face were summed up extremely well in the comments from our readers:

Erin524

I have a Kindle (two actually) and a Kobo. Only reason I bought the Kobo was that it was 1) on sale at Borders during their going-out-of-business sale, and 2) I could get library books with it.

Now that Kindle gets library books, I havent used the Kobo much. The Kobo is a very nice eReader, but I don’t think it’s as nice as the Kindle is. What I use the Kobo for now is to read free fan fiction that I get off the internet. But, I don’t read on it as often as I thought I would. Thinking of selling it so I can put some money towards a new Kindle Touch, or a Kindle Fire.

Michael Anderson

I will NEVER buy a book from iBooks (ok, never say never and all that acknowledged) unless they have some major discount on something better than everywhere else. Since that isn’t likely to happen.

I have a nook Touch and my family all have nooks, so we are BN centric … plus it is great visiting the local shop and browsing with our nooks.

But I have a load of stuff on Kindle as well … which will come in handy soon enough with the Kindle Fire

Judie Stanford

I was Peanut Press / eReader for years, but we all know what happened there! I am now all Amazon Kindle. I don’t see them folding up or changing things; I think they are the best choice. =)

AlsiB

Ditto on Judie’s post. I bought from eReader for years, but now they won’t sell most books to me because of country restrictions. I have a Kindle now and I buy exclusively from there. I’m yet to find a book that I want that they don’t have.

So why aren’t people shopping elsewhere? Basically, the bigger stores locked them in with better devices and flexibility. Amazon has pricing, reach and less geo-restrictions, while B&N has the lure of physical stores to augment the digital experience. iBooks has some fans, but it seems the majority of voters didn’t want to be locked into the iOS ecosystem for all their book purchases.

Kobo is a funny one. They actually offer a fair bit of international exposure, but unfortunately it seems to still throttle their overall marketshare. However, while the broader numbers claim to be 5%, we came in far higher at 13%. And really, whether it’s 5%, 13% or 1%, if it’s enough to keep them in business and serving customers who aren’t reached by B&N, iBooks, or Amazon, that’s what’s important!

Or as one commenter put it:

veethree

I must be one of the 5%! Kobo is my primary store for two reasons: (1) Its prices are generally better for me, not living in the US and (2) I use an HTC Flyer and the bookstore is integrated into its inbuilt Reader app. B&N isn’t available where I live, so I don’t know if that would have any impact on my first reason.

Did our results surprise you? Share your thoughts below!

Tags: Amazon Kindle, Barnes and Noble NOOK, Books and eBooks

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About Carly Z

View all posts by Carly Z

Carly has been a gadget fiend for a long time, going back to her first PDA (a Palm M100). She quickly went from researching what PDA to buy to following tech news closely and keeping up with the latest and greatest stuff. She loves writing about ebooks because they combine her two favorite activities; reading anything and everything, and talking about fun new tech toys. What could be better?