The World's Largest Publishers, 2015

If you had to name the world's largest publisher, without looking at the list below, you'd probably say Penguin/Random House.

You would be correct if you were thinking of trade publishing. But Pearson, which publishes educational material, always wins the top slot. Thompson Reuters, a multi-media and information company geared toward business, is again number two.

What is interesting about this year's line-up is that two Chinese publishers made it into the top ten. China is a huge market, and it is largely closed. (There aren't many translation services that will translate a book into Chinese, and even then there are roadblocks. If you are thinking about translating your book, my recommendation would be to pick French and Spanish. BabelCube will do it for free.)

Without further ado...

The World's 57 Largest Book Publishers, 2015

From Publishers Weekly

Rank 2015	Rank 2014	Publishing Group or Division	Parent Company	Parent Country	2014 Revenue in $M	2013 Revenue in $M
1	1	Pearson	Pearson PLC	UK	$7,072	$7,801
2	3	ThomsonReuters	The Woodbridge Company Ltd.	Canada	$5,760	$5,576
3	2	RELX Group	Reed Elsevier PLC & Reed Elsevier NV	UK/NL/US	$5,362	$6,093
4	4	Wolters Kluwer	Wolters Kluwer	NL	$4,455	$4,920
5	5	Penguin Random House	Bertelsmann AG	Germany	$4,046	$3,664*
6	NEW	Phoenix Publishing and Media Company	Phoenix Publishing and Media Company	China	$2,840	$2,781
7	NEW	China South Publishing & Media Group Co., Ltd	China South Publishing & Media Group Co., Ltd	China	$2,579	$2,237
8	6	Hachette Livre	Lagardere	France	$2,439	$2,851
9	10	McGraw-Hill Education	Apollo Global Management LLC	US	$2,190 (Est.)	$1,992
10	7	Holtzbrinck	Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck	Germany	$2,000	$2,222
11	8	Grupo Planeta	Grupo Planeta	Spain	$1,943	$2,161
12	11	Scholastic	Scholastic	US	$1,822	$1,792
12	12	Wiley	Wiley	US	$1,822	$1,761
14	9	Cengage Learning Holdings II LP	Apax and Omers Capital Partners	US/Canada	$1,708	$1,747
15	14	China Publishing Group Corporation	China Publishing Group Corporation	China	$1,495	$1,499
16	16	Harper Collins	News Corp.	US	$1,434	$1,369
17	15	Houghton Mifflin Harcourt	Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Company	US/Cayman Islands	$1,372	$1,379
18	13	De Agostini Editore	Gruppo De Agostini	Italy	$1,367	N/A
19	18	Oxford University Press	Oxford University	UK	$1,181	$1,254
20	17	Springer Science and Business Media	EQT and GIC Investors;	Sweden, Singapore	$1,167	$1,301
21	21	China Education Publishing & Media Holdings Co. Ltd.	China Education Publishing & Media Holdings Co. Ltd.	China	$1,108	$1,152
22	20	Informa	Informa plc	UK	$1,075	$1,185
23	19	Shueisha	Hitotsubashi Group	Japan	$1,033	$1,191
24	22	Kodansha Ltd.	Kodansha Ltd.	Japan	$997	$1,143
25	23	Egmont Group	Egmont International Holding A/S	Denmark	$896	$1,101
26	25	Shogakukan	Hitotsubashi Group	Japan	$859	$1,011
27	26	Bonnier	The Bonnier Group	Sweden	$836	$976
28	24	Grupo Santillana	PRISA SA	Spain	$793	$1,020
29	27	Kadokawa Publishing	Kadokawa Holdings Inc.	Japan	$793	$900
30	28	Simon & Schuster	CBS	US	$778	$809
31	30	Woongjin ThinkBig	Woongjin Holding	Korea	$577	$616
32	29	Klett	Klett Gruppe	Germany	$560	$622
33	31	Groupe Madrigall	Madrigall	France	$531	N/A
34	32	Les Editions Lefebvre-Sarrut	Frojal	France	$482	$559
35	34	Messagerie / GeMS	Messagerie Italiane	Italy	$460	$543
36	35	Media Participations	Media Participations	Belgium	$426	$481
37	36	Mondadori	The Mondadori Group	Italy	$410	$462
38	39	Cambridge University Press	Cambridge University Press	UK	$409	$433
39	38	The Perseus Book Group	The Perseus Book Group	USA	$400	N/A
40	NEW	France Loisirs	ACTISSIA SAS	France	$364
40	41	Westermann Verlagsgruppe	Medien Union	Germany	$364	$401
42	40	Sanoma	Sanoma WSOY	Finland	$355	$422
43	37	Cornelsen	Cornelsen	Germany	$346	$456
44	43	Kyowon Co. Ltd.	Kyowon Co. Ltd.	Korea	$312	$353
45	46	La Martinière	La Martinière	France	$292	$329
46	48	Haufe Gruppe	Privately owned	Germany	$285	$315
46	47	WEKA	WEKA Firmengruppe	Germany	$286	$316
48	44	RCS Libri	RCS Media Group	Italy	$271	$348
49	50	Gakken Co. Ltd.	Gakken Co. Ltd.	Japan	$257	$297
50	51	Bungeishunju Ltd.	Bungeishunju Ltd.	Japan	$216	$253
51	49	OLMA Media Group	Privately owned	Cyprus	$213	$306
52	45	EKSMO	Privately owned	Russia	$211	$343
53	54	Groupe Albin Michel	Groupe Albin Michel	France	$204	$232
54	56	Saraiva	Saraiva	Brazil	$199	$215
55	NEW	Editora FTD	Editora FTD	Brazil	$198	$199
56	55	Abril Educação	Abril group	Brazil	$196	$216
57	52	Shinchosha Publishing Co, Ltd.	Shinchosa Publishing Co, Ltd.	Japan	$176	N/A
Not ranked		Harlequin	Torstar Corp.	Canada	$343	$374

* 2013 Revenue figure is for Random House, before its merger with Penguin