World Book Day will be held on 5 March 2026.
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World Book Day will be bigger and better than ever during the National Year of Reading 2026.
Keep an eye on this space as we update it with announcements on our 2026 events, activities, and partnerships that will ensure that more children than ever have the opportunity to discover the fun of reading. This is more vital than ever as this World Book Day, half a million children in England don’t own a single book. Our Impact Report for 2025 reveals the effect World Book Day can have on the lives of children across the UK. Our Strategy 2023 – 2027 sets out how we intend to encourage even more children, from all backgrounds, to develop a life-long habit of reading for fun, and benefit from the improved life chances this brings them.
Read more in our press release.
The £1/€1.50 book selection
We’re delighted to share with you the line-up of £1/€1.50 books for 2026 that children can choose for free with their £1/€1.50 book token! With books for beginning, early, fluent and independent readers, there is something for everyone to enjoy. Alongside the 12 titles available across the UK, we also have three exclusive books for Ireland and a World Book Day Welsh title. The books will be available from booksellers from 12 February 2026.
The £1/€1.50 books will also be available in braille, large print & audio via Guide Dogs, Vision Ireland, RNIB and Calibre Audio and Listening Books. Find out more how to access these copies below.
The token redemption period is from 12 February – 15 March 2026.
World Book Day events
This year we have some brilliant online events for you to integrate into your celebrations. For all the details visit our events page.
Great World Book Day Footy & Book Quiz 2025 (06/03/25)
Join us and our partners the National Literacy Trust on World Book Day for up to 45 minutes of interactive quiz, featuring top ballers from the Premier League, Football League and the Women’s Super League, cutting it alongside authors at the top of their game.
BBC Live Lessons (06/03/25)
We’ll be celebrating the joy of books, authors and reading for pleasure in a World Book Day lesson for 7-11 year-olds.
Pobble’s Free Writing Lesson (06/03/25)
Step into the Magic Library with Pobble this World Book Day! Join our free live writing session, designed to inspire children aged 7-11 to create magical stories based on their favourite books. Perfect for celebrating the joy of reading and writing!
Resources for celebrating World Book Day
Find materials and resources for planning your World Book Day celebrations including a brilliant suite of resources from Jigsaw Education Group designed to link reading for fun with PSHE and whole-school wellbeing.
Planning your celebration?
Celebrate World Book Day with ready-made materials from our website, designed to help libraries create colourful, inspiring displays that encourage reading for fun.
Competitions
Design a National Book Token competition
It’s time to GO ALL IN on reading and get creative!
To celebrate World Book Day and the UK’s National Year of Reading 2026, our sponsors National Book Tokens are inviting children of all ages to DESIGN A NATIONAL BOOK TOKEN for their annual competition. This year’s winners will be selected by three very special guest judges: bestselling authors and illustrators Paddy Donnelly, Nadia Shireen and Sonia Leong!
Win Yoto’s ultimate reading bundle
Discover the incredible world of audiobooks with Yoto. We’ve teamed up with Yoto, our official audio partner to bring you some amazing goodies in celebration of World Book Day.
We are giving you the chance to win a Yoto Player and up to £200 worth of Yoto Cards, with over 1200 cards to choose from.
We’ve got 20 bundles up for grabs, enter below to be in with a chance!
Work With us
We welcome the opportunity to work with partners who share our commitment to champion reading for fun.
We work with those who can help us do more to achieve our mission to promote reading for fun and offer every child and young person the opportunity to have a book of their own. We select our commercial partners carefully and work with them in a range of ways, from one-off fundraising events to longer term partnerships. Find out more here – Work With Us. – or email us at [email protected]