The Beijing International Book Fair, which concluded its five-day run on June 23, celebrated its 30th edition this year. The event hosted 1,600 exhibitors from 71 countries and regions. Overseas exhibitors totaled 1,050, marking an increase of 150 (or 17%) from last year. We’ve gathered a selection of photo highlights from the fair. All photos by Teri Tan unless otherwise stated.
For the second year running, the BIBF was held at the modern and centrally located China National Convention Center in the Beijing Olympic Park. The venue, which is connected to two big hotels and a short walk from the subway station, offers six levels of exhibition areas and conference facilities, a basement carpark and various side entrances—which means that the main, and prominently decorated, fair entrance saw little traffic and only sporadic short queues. Photo courtesy BIBF.
Professional visitors could go from one exhibition hall to the next, and could attend major events such as the PubTech Conference, the BIBF World Children’s Book Forum, and the Beijing International Publishing Forum, which were held during the first three days of the fair.
Artificial intelligence was the focus of the second edition of the PubTech Conference. Talks by speakers from Elsevier, Peking University, and Shanghai Data Exchange, for example, were positive and pragmatic—not fearful—insisting that AI is here to assist in content editing, generation, and planning for the publishing industry, and not to replace humans.
Short video e-commerce via TikTok, Xiaohongshu, and WeChat apps, and more, has become China’s top channel for online book marketing and retail, contributing 26% to its total book sales. As such, the presence of vloggers and live-streaming sessions to promote and sell books directly was par for the course at BIBF.
Harry Potter remains popular in China since the publication of the series’ first three titles back in 2000. Seen here is the display dedicated to the boy wizard within the Imported Books Pavilion.
Outside the Imported Books Pavilion was a colorful mural featuring Julia Donaldson’s The Gruffalo. Interestingly, Donaldson’s bestselling picture book was inspired by a Chinese folk tale known as “The Fox That Borrows the Terror of a Tiger,”
The ninth BIBF Picture Book Fair was a dedicated section offering an activity stage, book exhibits, a game zone (based on the Eggy Party mobile game), a reading area, and even a coffee stand. A big installation of Elmer the Patchwork Elephant sat in the center, attesting to the popularity of this character in the Chinese book market.
A special display within the BIBF Picture Book Fair celebrated the 50th anniversary of DK. The theme was the universe, which has become a trendy topic in China due to the country’s ongoing Lunar Exploration Program. Books on astronomy for both children and adults have been in high demand in this marketplace.
Animated television series such as those starring Peppa Pig and Disney characters are beloved by Chinese children. Peppa Pig, which was purportedly banned in China back in 2017, is set to have its world’s largest stand-alone theme park in Shanghai.
The BIBF Illustrators Exhibition displayed 120 outstanding works chosen from approximately 12,000 entries from 46 countries/regions. The winners of the BIBF International Illustration Awards included Amanda Itzel Mijangos Quiles (from Mexico), Margaux Romano (Italy), Jean Mallard (France), Anne Crausaz (Switzerland), Gaby Bazin (France), and Mattia Riami (Italy).
Theme-based exhibits such as the BIBF Cookbooks Show, where there were talks on beer and wine accompanied by tasting sessions, were aimed at connecting content creators and publishers with the reading public while facilitating cross-cultural communications and exchanges.
Parents flocked to the CITIC Press booth to check out its children’s books. The company came in second among the top five children’s publishers in China in 2023; the top slot went to 21st Century Publishing House, while the third was taken by Changjiang Juvenile & Children’s Publishing House.
In China, parents pay a lot of attention (and money) to early childhood education and books for their kids. This has ensured that the children’s book segment, while declining in recent years, continued to have the largest share—26.98% in 2023—of the Chinese retail book market.
The Online Publishing Pavilion was a key exhibition area at this year’s BIBF, showcasing new publishing formats such as online literature and games/animation from major companies including Tencent, NetEase, and Douyin Group (or TikTok as it is known outside of China). Seen here are visitors trying out virtual-reality headgears.
The Gifts from the World section gave visitors the opportunities (and excuses) to purchase non-book items and souvenirs, including handicrafts, leatherware, paintings, tea sets, and toys.
Scholastic is a popular brand in China, and its BIBF booth was often crowded with visitors.
Online learning platforms, such as this one offering singalong titles and augmented reality-based products, are seeing higher traffic and demand, especially after the Chinese government’s July 2021 crackdown on after-school tutoring services, an industry once valued at well over $100 billion. Increasingly, parents are turning to such platforms to supplement their children’s Chinese- and English-language learning efforts.
