To think hardback books are pointless

[Hooploop]

Why do hardbacks still exist? They're too big to store and travel with, and use an unnecessary amount of resources in order to be made. Does anyone even buy them?

Yabvu. I love hardback books. More so now I'm older and have a bit more cash to spend on reading. I buy signed copies from writers I like and they give me joy to look at and joy to read. There is nothing I don't like about them. Nothing! You can take my TV subscriptions, you can take my music streaming (and you probably will this coming winter), but my vinyls and my hardbacks you will have to pry from my cold dead hands.

Heavens to Betsy!

But they're beautiful ❤️

I love hardback books but can't stand the sleeve - that needs to come straight off.

I much prefer paperbacks but my dd loves hardbacks. She loves the cover designs and the colouring they sometimes put on the paper edges. She has some beautiful books and really looks after them. She also reads them so they aren't just decoration

I prefer reading hardbacks but I rarely buy them. Most of the books that I borrow from the library are hardback.

I love a good quality hard back that I’ll read time and time again. I save them for classics. Books are my joy ❤️.

I do find hardback books difficult to hold now due to arthritis. I have mostly been buying large paperbacks and ebooks now.

They won’t do away with them because they (publishers) make more money / margin on a HB sale when they sell in quantity (because yes, people do still buy them). And when they make more money, the publisher starts making their investment back quicker. So thats why they won’t do away with them entirely. However there are far fewer books released in both HB and PB, then there used to be.

If I know it’s a book I’m going to want to keep or a coffee table book, EBay or Amazon new and used hardback in good or very good condition is where I get mine.
Disposable holiday easy read, paperback and I either leave it there or give it to someone else.

I have far more hardbacks than paperbacks, I much prefer them especially for classics and more modern authors I collect.

We also have a lot of beautiful non fiction and reference books and no, the joy of using them cannot be replicated by Google.

The glue in a paperback is usually lower quality and guaranteed for fewer years, so I would go for hardback if I wanted to keep the book long term.

A hardback feels more luxurious to me than a paperback. I don’t buy them new though.

I hate hardbacks too. They’re so cumbersome.

I love the look of the fancy ones with coloured edges etc but not to buy and read. I only read a book once so don’t need to worry about longevity.

Nope. I hate all this 'physical books are old fashioned ' nonsense. I read a lot of non fiction and thick books are easier to handle hard backed.
I mean, don't buy/ read em if you don't want to, but leave them for those of us who like them.

I can no longer abide paperbacks, let alone massive unweildy hardback books. Only exception - they're good for reading with children.

I'm fully, fully committed to my kindle. None of this "oooh the smell of a book" bobbins - books are annoying & impractical for bedtime.
It's the words inside that are magical.

Fight me! 😂

Yes. They hurt my face when I fall asleep and roll on top of them.

I agree. It really irritates me that you can’t commute with a hard back so you need one book for the commute and one by your bed, whereas I much prefer to start something and finish it before starting another. I hate having several books ‘on the go’. Also hate the dust jackets.

I wish when books are released they would be released in hardback and paperback at the same time.
Hardbacks for libraries and those that really love a particular author and want to buy and keep all their books. Paperbacks for everyone else.
Or at least make the gap between hardback release and paperback shorter. Some take ages. Anthony Horowitz books seem to take an eternity to be released in paperback. Over a year sometimes. I read a lot of chick lit and saga novels. They usually don't even bother with the hardback editions any more. Makes so much more sense.
They are the type of books people buy reasonably cheap from the supermarket. I am more likely to pick up a paperback book to read on a train journey than a magazine. But if they were hardbacks I wouldn't bother.
(That's pretty much the history of why Penguin Paperbacks were invented - cheap and sold at railway stations)

I disagree. I buy lots of paperbacks too, but I have a collection of signed first editions I get at book events and festivals, and I love the heft of them, and their durability. I also have a large collection of mainly secondhand books I use for reference for work, and these are also hardbacks.

There’s a place for all formats, and paperbacks and e-editions appear very mischievous sooner after the hardbacks do now for most fiction titles, so there’s never too long to wait.

I also hate hardbacks but do buy the odd one if it’s a book I really want to read and don’t want to wait for it to come out in paperback. Saying that, I did actually succumb in sainsburys at the weekend and buy a hardback.

I love a beautifully bound hardback book and will always find the space for one. I have some lovely ones that are works of art in their own right.

I hardly ever buy new paperbacks any more. If it's not worth buying as a hardback then kindle is good enough.

I love hardbacks because the font is usually larger so doesn't tire my eyes out so much

Totally agree with @Needmorelego on the timing thing for paperback v hardback being really annoying. Not everyone that likes reading physical books can afford or manage hardback. I’ll see a review of a book that sounds great but forgotten by the time it’s out in paperback so they have missed my purchase.

Yanbu. They are strangely archaic and should go. You'd be amazed how few hardback copies of a book are actually printed - even for quite successful authors. The print runs can be tiny.