Here’s the frustrating thing about comic sales in the U.S. — it’s almost impossible to get a good idea of how much an individual comic book is selling. Believe me, we’ve tried multiple routes to get the information, and it’s just not publicly available. There are monthly rankings without sales figures, but anything more concrete remains a closely guarded secret for now. (We’re still working on it, I promise.) However… that’s not the case when it comes to collected editions and graphic novels.
Thanks to Circana Bookscan, which maps out point-of-sale purchases at roughly 16,000 locations in the United States, we have a good idea of what the comic book market looked like in terms of collections and OGNs last year, and… well, it might not be what a lot of people expected. We’ve broken the ranking down into manga and “western” lists, as well as providing a collective list, to further dig into things.
The most popular western graphic Novels and collected editions in 2023
If there were winners in the western — ie, non-manga — comic book industry in 2023, then Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Lore Olympus would handily share the crown between them. Beyond the best-selling Last Ronin collection, Turtles books appear throughout the extended sales chart: the Last Ronin – The Lost Years collection sold 22,701 copies, for example, while collections of earlier IDW material also show up elsewhere. Meanwhile, Rachel Smythe’s Lore Olympus is, simply, a publishing phenomenon, with four of its five volumes showing up in the top 10, and the fifth just hovering outside. Here’s the top 10 best-selling non-manga books in the U.S. market in 2023, according to Circana:
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Last Ronin (IDW, 148,188 copies sold)
- Lore Olympus Vol. 4 (Inklore, 89,272 copies sold)
- The Mysteries (Andrews McMeel, 78, 391 copies sold)
- Lore Olympus Vol. 5 (Inklore, 57,036 copies sold)
- Lore Olympus Vol. 1 (Inklore, 56,762 copes sold)
- Disney Manga: Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas – The Battle for Pumpkin King (Tokyopop, 51,732 copies sold)
- They Called Us Enemy (Top Shelf Productions/IDW, 39,905 copies sold)
- The Adventure Zone: The Eleventh Hour (First Second Books, 36,439 copies sold)
- Lore Olympus Vol. 3 (Inklore, 34,332 copies sold)
- Gender Queer: A Memoir (Oni Press, 28,067 copies sold)
Best-Selling Manga Graphic Novels and Collected Editions in 2023
If you thought the non-manga sales were good, you’re going to be blown away by how well manga does. With the exception of the top three books on the non-manga chart, manga outperforms the alternative without even breaking a sweat, with one publisher towering over all. Who isn’t jealous of Viz Media after looking at these numbers?
- Demon Slayer: Kimetsu No Yaiba Vol. 1 (Viz Media, 148,488 copies sold)
- Chainsaw Man Vol. 1 (Viz Media, 140,116 copies sold)
- Spy X Family Vol. 1 (Viz Media, 129,347 copies sold)
- Chainsaw Man Vol. 2 (Viz Media, 118,956 copies sold)
- Jujutsu Kaisen Vol. 1 (Viz Media, 113,323 copies sold)
- Chainsaw Man Vol. 12 (Viz Media, 99,231 copies sold)
- Berserk Deluxe Vol. 1 (Dark Horse Comics, 96,667 copies sold)
- Spy X Family Vol. 2 (Viz Media, 75,231 copies sold)
- My Hero Academia Vol. 1 (Viz Media, 72,857 copies sold)
- Spy X Family Vol. 9 (Viz Media, 72,739 copies sold)
The most popular graphic novels and collected editions in 2023, Combined
To the surprise of no-one, the combined sales chart based on Circana’s Bookscan numbers is very manga-dominated, but it is somewhat surprising to see just how well Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Last Ronin performed compared with the other titles. Similarly, Bill Watterson’s The Mysteries did very well for a book that was only released in the last quarter of the year…
- Demon Slayer: Kimetsu No Yaiba Vol. 1 (Viz Media, 148,488 copies sold)
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Last Ronin (IDW, 148,188 copies sold)
- Chainsaw Man Vol. 1 (Viz Media, 140,116 copies sold)
- Spy X Family Vol. 1 (Viz Media, 129,347 copies sold)
- Chainsaw Man Vol. 2 (Viz Media, 118,956 copies sold)
- Jujitsu Kaisen Vol. 1 (Viz Media, 113,323 copies sold)
- Chainsaw Man Vol. 12 (Viz Media, 99,231 copies sold)
- Berserk Deluxe Vol. 1 (Dark Horse Comics, 96,667 copies sold)
- Lore Olympus Vol. 4 (Inklore, 89,272 copies sold)
- The Mysteries (Andrews McMeel, 78, 391 copies sold)
But What About…?
I know you’re wondering the following, so let’s just knock out some potential FAQs right now:
- The best-selling big two book is Watchmen; the 2019 edition of that sold 23,759 copies. (The Deluxe Edition of the same material sold a further 6,844 copies.) After that, it’s Sandman Book One (23,171 copies) and a lot of Batman: Batman Year One (18,694 copies), The Killing Joke (14,913 copies), Batman ’89 (14,879 copies), and The Batman Who Laughs (11,641 copies).
- Marvel doesn’t even crack the top 30 best-selling books from western publishers; surprisingly, the best-selling book published by Marvel was Spider-Punk: Battle of the Banned, with 10,172 copies. Yes, really; maybe we should call it the Across the Spider-Verse effect? Just above that in the chart is a Marvel book from another publisher: The Penguin Classics edition of The Amazing Spider-Man, which sold 10.335 copies.)
- Yes, movies and TV shows impact sales: how else to explain that the biggest titles from Image are The Invincible Compendiums? (That said, two volumes of Saga also make the list.) Similarly, DC and Marvel’s biggest titles all had mass-market media behind them; outside of Watchmen, Batman, and Sandman, DC’s biggest success in the bookstore market was Blue Beetle: Graduation Day.
A note on our methodology: We aggregated the top 20 best-selling titles and sales estimates provided by Circana/Bookscan, as presented by ICv2. Those sales represent point-of-sale figures from over 16,000 retailers inside the U.S. and is estimated to include around 85 percent of the domestic book market. (This includes some, but by no means all, comic book retailers.)
As the year wind downs, it’s time to look back and all you’ve read and watched. Popverse has picked the best movies, best comics, and best TV shows of the year.
But who really cares about what we think? This year, we had you vote for your best movies, best comics, and best TV shows of the year too. Check the lists and mix and see if you agree with our (and your) top choices of the year!