Wildberries Ventures Into E-Book Sales with New Independent Service

Wildberries is currently testing its own e-book sales service, which will operate independently from its main marketplace. The company is already in discussions with publishing houses to acquire licenses for digital books, which will help populate its catalog. They are considering options for subscription access to books, as well as the possibility of purchasing individual titles, as reported by Vedomosti.

At present, Wildberries offers e-books from specific publishers, including Alpina Digital (part of the Alpina group), Piter, and the Ridero service, in its digital goods section. This feature has been available on the marketplace since 2022; however, according to one source cited by the outlet, sales of e-books in this section remain «quite modest» because this area hasn’t been a priority for the marketplace.

According to sources from Vedomosti, the launch of the new service could occur by the end of the year. However, a representative from the combined Wildberries & Russ entity stated that it’s premature to discuss specific plans for launching the service at this time.

In recent years, the digital book market has been growing faster than that of printed books, as noted by Vedomosti. Estimates from the Litres Group suggest that the digital book market showed an annual growth rate of 19–30% in 2023 and 2024, while the printed book market only grew by 7–11% (according to Ekmo-AST).

A study by J’son & Partners Consulting revealed that in 2023, market leader Litres held a 57.9% share, with the total market volume amounting to 14.2 billion rubles. Ekmo-AST reported that in 2024, digital book sales reached 18.9 billion rubles, accounting for 17% of the overall book market worth 116.9 billion rubles.

Dmitry Kolesov, director of new technologies at J’son & Partners Consulting, estimates that Wildberries’ share in the digital book market has not exceeded 3% over the past two years. He believes that if the separate service launches this year, its market share may reach a maximum of 5% by 2026–2027. Kolesov also highlights significant competition from Litres and Yandex, for whom such content is central to their businesses.

«There are still doubts about whether Wildberries will actively invest in promoting book publications, as digital books are merely a complementary area for them, not a business priority,» he notes.