By Sölve Dahlgren and Carlo Carrenho
Sweden remains the world’s most mature audiobook market. Audiobooks accounted for roughly 62% of book unit sales in 2024, and 2025 appears to be tracking similarly, with the vast majority of these sales coming tthrough subscription services rather than à la carte purchases.Four companies shape this landscape: Storytel, BookBeat, Nextory, and Bokus Play. While precise market share figures are elusive, Storytel clearly holds at least half of the Swedish market, and likely more. Bokus Play, launched by the Akademibokhandeln group, has shown recent growth but remains marginal—with estimates suggesting less than a 5% market share, probably closer to 2%. BookBeat and Nextory share most of the remainder.
Drawing exact comparisons is difficult. Neither BookBeat, as part of the privately owned Bonnier Group, nor privately held Nextory are required to disclose detailed financials. Even Storytel, though publicly traded, reports only at the Nordic regional level rather than breaking out individual countries.
What is clear, however, is that BookBeat and Storytel have emerged as the two giants of Nordic audiobook streaming—particularly given BookBeat’s backing by Bonnier, one of Europe’s largest publishing groups. Last week, both companies released their annual results within a day of each other, offering a rare opportunity for comparison.
On February 11, Storytel reported a solid fourth quarter and a record 2025. Net profit grew to SEK 504 million ($57 million) roughly double the SEK 213 million ($24 million) reported a year earlier. Top-line revenue increased 9% at constant exchange rates (CER), supported by 8% growth in streaming revenue, which reached SEK 3,518 million ($400 million). The figures offered plenty to analyze regarding recent performance and future prospects, including news of increased dividends to shareholders. But despite strong earnings and a record year, Storytel’s stock fell roughly 7.5%.
The day before, On Feburary 10, BookBeat released what might be described as a lighter annual report, with selected figures. The company reported revenue of SEK 1.54 billion ($175 million) for 2025, representing 13% growth (15% when adjusted for currency effects), with nearly 1.2 million paying subscribers across all markets. Preliminary profit exceeded SEK 100 million ( $11 million), according to Dagens Industri.
Nextory has not yet released preliminary figures for 2025. In 2024, however, Nextory generated SEK 671 million ($76 million). For Bokus Play in 2024, digital book sales totaled SEK 57 million ($6.5 million), the majority of which now comes from streaming and exclusively from the Swedish market.
Comparing Ten Years of Growth
The chart below is based on the revenue figures BookBeat and Storytel presented last week. This comparison is not entirely straightforward, as both companies have changed their reporting formats several times over the years. Still, it provides a reasonably accurate picture of the development.
In 2016, newly launched BookBeat’s revenue represented less than 4% of Storytel’s. Four years later, it had risen to one-fifth. By 2025, it appears to have reached approximately 44%. Put differently: in 2016, Storytel was 27 times larger than BookBeat. In 2025, Storytel was 2.3 times larger. BookBeat certainly appears to be narrowing the gap with Storytel by growing slightly faster.
But can this continue? That is considerably harder to assess, as both companies now operate in several major European markets. BookBeat has a strong position in Germany, partly because Bonnier Books owns several major publishers there. A similar dynamic exists in Poland, where Bonnier is also present as a publisher. Storytel, on the other hand, has established itself in more markets than BookBeat.
Of note: the figures above include only streaming revenue, not Storytel’s publishing operations. If publishing were included for both companies, Bonnier Books would be several times larger than the Storytel Group.
Untapped Territories, and Acquisitions
While the Nordic market is not fully saturated, growth is limited in these mature markets, which are significantly smaller than Germany, Poland, France, and the U.K. For both Storytel and BookBeat, gaining real momentum in any of these countries could quickly generate more revenue than the entire Nordic region.
Storytel’s U.S. subsidiary, Audiobooks.com, operates in a market larger than those four countries and the Nordics combined, but it remains a small player there compared to Audible, and now Spotify.
Both companies are now profitable. Although we do not know BookBeat’s exact earnings, profit exceeded SEK 100 million ($11 million) in 2025, according to the company. Storytel’s operating result reached over SEK 400 million ($45 million). Financially, Storytel had net cash of SEK 136 million (≈ $15 million) at year-end, while BookBeat benefits from the financial strength of the Bonnier Group.
In other words, both companies are in a position to make acquisitions. Storytel has prioritized acquiring book publishers in recent years, but the company went through a baptism of fire and was forced to focus on far more than growth alone. Its renewed financial stability suggests this could change in the coming years—unless shareholders prefer continued caution and improved margins, transforming Storytel into a more dividend-oriented company.
Bonnier has also acquired publishers, though that is a separate business and does not directly affect BookBeat—which may likewise choose to prioritize profitability over expansion for its sole owner.
The key question, then, is whether either company will acquire competing streaming services in the Nordics or abroad. Such moves could alter the competitive balance far more quickly than today’s largely organic growth.
Another major uncertainty: Spotify and its growing investment in audiobooks in the Nordics and other markets. Will it cannibalize the pure-play audiobook services? Or will it attract new listeners to the format, expanding the overall market—and perhaps eventually driving users toward Storytel, BookBeat, Nextory, or Bokus Play for more listening hours and a more specialized app experience?
Perhaps this is what unsettles some stock market investors. Will Spotify’s entrance into the audiobook market be a rising tide that lifts all boats—or a tsunami that drowns them? We will see in the coming years.
Sölve Dahlgren is a Swedish publishing entrepreneur and media executive, founder of Boktugg, writer and a long-time observer of the Nordic book industry.
Carlo Carrenho, a Contributing Editor at Publishing Perspectives, is a Brazilian publishing consultant based in Sweden and part of the Alpine Global Collective consultancy.