2022 comic sales up 4% from 2021; graphic novels drive all of the year's growth
For years, Comichron and ICv2 have released an annual joint report analyzing North American comic sales. However, in October, this year’s annual report was released by ICv2 alone. Going forward, Comichron states that they’re pulling out; direct market sales figures are now hard to come by, thanks to drastic direct market changes over the past several years.
Below is a look at 2022 overall comic sales, as well as infographics for said figures. Overall, the comics industry pulled in $2.16 billion in 2022, up 4% from 2021. If you’re just looking for book channel sales figures, see my post about that category.
2022 comic sales information
Despite ICv2 going alone, most of the same criteria from previous years still applies:
Comic shop/direct market figures are based on a sampling of ComicHub point-of-sale reports; figures for book channels are from BookScan.
Book channel information includes sales from bookstores (like Barnes and Noble), online retailers (like Amazon), mass market retailers (like Target and Walmart), locally owned bookstores, etc. Library purchases and Scholastic book fairs aren’t included.
Digital sales are estimated. Subscription services like Marvel Unlimited and DC Universe aren’t included, nor are library based digital services like Hoopla.
The “Other Channels” category consists of what’s left of newsstand sales and fundraising channels like Kickstarter. At this point, newsstand sales are likely dominated by Archie, who now charges $10 (or around what a cheap graphic novel costs) for its digests.
Here’s ICv2’s infographics detailing 2022 comic sales.
Statistics by percentage
Breaking down the above statistics by percentages (numbers below are rounded):
Sales by channel:
Book channels: 57.2%
Comic stores: 34%
Digital download: 7.2%
Other channels: 1.6%
Sales by format:
Graphic novels: 72.7%
Comic books: 20.1%
Digital comics: 7.2%
Channel changes (by percentage) from 2021:
Book channels: +6%
Comic stores: +4.3%
Digital download: -8.8%
Other channels: 0%
Format changes (by percentage) from 2021:
Graphic novels: +6.8%
Comic books: 0%
Digital comics: -8.8%
My thoughts
While the sales jump last year was certainly unlikely to repeat (the pandemic and all), it’s still impressive that sales rose slightly over 2021.
Physical media
In terms of formats, graphic novels are responsible for all of comics’ sales boost over 2021. Graphic novels (including trade paperbacks and manga) continue to be the most popular comic format, making up almost 73% of all comic sales.
Meanwhile, traditional single-issue comic sales stayed flat. The majority of comic book sales, of course, are from superhero comics. Again, in my opinion the single-issue comic format doesn’t really work for modern superhero stories—singles were designed to be cheap and/or short reads, and modern DC/Marvel stories are neither.
As for channels, book channels make up the majority of sales. Traditional comic book shops only make up about a third of all sales. Combined with the format sales figures above, single-issue comics sold at comic book shops (the popular image of the stereotypical comic book purchase since the 1980s) aren’t the dominant force in comic sales anymore.
Some debate if DC/Marvel should still be called the “Big Two,” when they only dominate in comic shops/single-issue comics. (Viz and Scholastic are the dominant comic sellers in book channels.) Going by Comichron’s older sales figures, DC/Marvel make up at least two-thirds of all direct market (I.e. comic shop) sales, so they’re still the “Big Two” if one only looks in that category.
Digital media
Digital media showed a marked decline in sales. I suspect this is a consequence of Amazon kneecapping Comixology, and thus driving away some customers?
I also assume it’s actually digital subscription services, such as Marvel Unlimited, that drive a big chunk of digital comic revenue. Similar to the popularity of streaming video services, paying monthly for a subscription service with a huge library might be more appealing. That might especially be the case for DC/Marvel fans willing to digitally “trade wait”; superhero crossovers/events aren’t cheap.
Photo by jareed (Flickr / CC BY)