Millions of UK adults are reading every day, but half still resist calling themselves ‘readers,’ according to The Reading Agency's 2025 adult reading research. 

The annual ‘State of the Nation’ study finds that 53% of UK adults now describe themselves as regular readers – up from 50% last year. The sharpest rise is among 25–34-year-olds, where engagement has jumped from 42% to 55% in just twelve months. 

Yet 47% of adults reject the label of ‘reader,’ even though most of them are reading daily. The research shows that 77% of these so-called “non-readers” regularly consume text in other forms, including news articles, recipes, game narratives, or graphic novels. 

Research by The Reading Agency

For 23 years, The Reading Agency has continued to build an understanding of the reading habits of people of all ages across the UK through their extensive research and evaluation projects.  This research provides a detailed look into the state of adult reading habits in 2025, covering reading frequency, confidence, benefits, barriers, and attitudes.

Key findings about the habits of UK readers

Just under half of UK adults say they aren’t readers 

53% of UK adults consider themselves regular readers, an improvement from 2024 (50%), but still an overall downward trend compared to 2015 (58%).  

Reading confidence is highly correlated with reader identity. Only 4% of adults with poor or very poor reading ability are regular readers, compared to 23% of average readers, 48% of good readers and 73% of excellent readers.  

A crisis not in reading, but in reader identity and time 

However, over three-quarters of those who define themselves as never having been a reader read daily (77%) and nearly all lapsed readers read daily (94%). 

Non-readers report lower levels of reading books, audiobooks and e-books, but similar levels of reading of other formats, such as online articles, newspapers and graphic novels to self-defined readers. 

When non-readers and lapsed readers do sit down to read, they engage with all formats except print books, for a longer period than regular readers.  

55% of all UK adults say they read less than they plan to. Even of those who have never been readers 42% say they read less than they plan to.  

People who feel like they have a lot of free time are 25% more likely to be regular readers. 

People who report not having a lot of free time are 46% more likely to be a lapsed reader than those who do have a lot of free time, and adults who strongly disagree that they have a lot of free time are 50% more likely to be non-readers. 

Reading is the third most popular free time activity for British adults  

For almost every age group watching TV, and spending time on social media and the internet rank above reading as a free-time activity. 

Nearly twice as many people (55%) rank watching TV and movies as a top three activity, compared to reading (28%). 

Reading is most highly ranked amongst older generations, and women. 

Focus and distractions 

36% of non-readers and lapsed readers struggle to focus for more than a few minutes when reading, compared to only 21% of regular readers.   

61% of lapsed readers struggle to read because there are too many distractions, compared to only 40% of readers and 31% of non-readers  

Reading enjoyment varies by reading format 

“Traditional” reading formats elicit the highest levels of enjoyment. 75% of those who engage enjoy print books, 62% enjoy e-books, 58% enjoy audio books, 58% enjoy print news or magazines and 57% enjoy reading social media posts. 

Learning differences and inclusion 

Adults who consider themselves to have a learning difference were 28% less likely to report finding reading comforting, and over 200% more likely to say reading made them feel overwhelmed, and 83% more likely to say it made them feel bored. 

However, adults with learning differences rated every single reading format – bar physical/print books – at a higher rate of enjoyment than adults without.  

Diversity and representation 

Only 1 in 2 adults (52%) in the UK report that they can easily find representative books and characters. 

Over 1 in 5 (21%) of adults say they cannot easily find reading material in their preferred language.  

Reading and wellbeing 

Compared to non-readers, regular readers are 86% more likely to report feeling a sense of belong to their community, 58% more likely to report feeling generally happy, 51% more likely to report finding it easy to relax and 45% more likely to report sleeping well 

They are also 35% more likely to say they don’t feel lonely and 32% more likely say they don’t feel anxious or depressed. 

Download the full report here.

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