Key points
- In the first half of 2026, participants of the “eBook” program purchased 114,361 books – an average of 629 per day.
- Funds were received by 63,567 out of 64,808 applicants, with an average of 2.83 books per person.
- 325 stationary and 38 online bookstores have joined the program, with 56.87% of sales being offline.
- Hailey Di Carlton’s book became the leader in sales, surpassing Colleen Hoover.
- Among Ukrainian authors, Volodymyr Stanchyshyn ranks first with 876 books sold.
In the first half of 2026, participants of the state program “eBook” purchased 114,361 books – an average of 629 books per day, according to the Ministry of Culture of Ukraine.
In total, 64,808 applications for state aid were submitted during this period, of which 63,567 have already received funds. On average, each participant purchased 2.83 books.
For payment with “Diya” cards, young Ukrainians most often choose Monobank – used by 60.11% of participants. PrivatBank is used by 36.24%, and A-Bank by 3.28%.
325 stationary and 38 online bookstores have joined the program. Despite the growing popularity of online purchases, 18-year-old Ukrainians still prefer physical bookstores: 56.87% of books were purchased in stationary stores, while 43.13% were bought online.
The largest volume of purchases in stationary bookstores is in Kyiv, followed by Lviv, Dnipropetrovsk, Ivano-Frankivsk, and Poltava regions.
The first place among book distributors was taken by the Yakaboo platform. The top five also included:
- KSD;
- “Bookstore Ye”;
- MEGOGO;
- “Bookland”.
Among publishers, KSD, BookChef, Vivat, “Ranok”, and RM sold the most books. During the first half of 2026, 358 publishers participated in the program, with a total of 17,554 titles.
Hailey Di Carlton’s book “The Cat and Mouse Game. Book 1: The Pursuit of Adeline” topped the rating, surpassing Colleen Hoover’s book. At the same time, Hoover retained her status as the most popular author in terms of the total number of books sold among program participants in 2026.
Fiction is in the highest demand among young people, followed by non-fiction. Volodymyr Stanchyshyn remains the most popular Ukrainian author, with 876 books sold, followed by Illarion Pavlyuk with 580 books, and Andriy Semiankiv with 390.
“eBook” is a state program to support reading, under which Ukrainians after reaching the age of 18 can receive funds to purchase books.
From January 1, 2026, the amount of aid is 998 hryvnia 40 kopecks, which can be used within three months exclusively for paper, electronic, or audiobooks in Ukrainian. The program started in December 2024, and the first payments and purchases took place in January 2025. During the entire period of the program, 18-year-old Ukrainians received 286,645,648 hryvnia 80 kopecks of state support and purchased 549,172 books.
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