There are over 10,489 bestseller lists for Amazon Kindle books. Some of them have less than 100 books on the list, meaning any book you add to that category would technically become an “Amazon bestseller” as long as you sell at least one copy.

Other categories are so competitive that only a small fraction of the books in those categories make the Top #100 spots on the list.

Choosing the right categories on Kindle for your book is really, really important. You might find hundreds or even thousands of new readers just by having your book listed in the right category on Amazon. But how do you know which categories are right for your book?

First of all, your category should obviously match your book. If your book is a romance novel, I wouldn’t recommend listing it in the Nonfiction -> Religion & Spirituality -> Christianity -> Christian Living -> Spiritual Growth list. But you probably already knew that.

What you may not know is that only the Top 100 books in each category get featured in that category. That means if your book is ranked #101, you get absolutely no exposure from being in that category. So you need to pick categories that you can actually rank your book on.

The less you’re currently selling, the lower your sales rank will be on Amazon and the less competitive categories you should choose. As you gain more sales momentum and better sales ranking, you can switch your categories to more competitive ones which will send you more traffic and sales.

But which categories can give you the most sales possible on Amazon Kindle? We did a little digging and found out.

Here’s a list of the Top #100 most competitive and high traffic categories on Amazon Kindle. If you’re lucky enough to get your book ranking in one of these categories, you can get a lot of extra exposure and sales.

But first, a little breakdown of how the table works.

Kindle Store Category (Bestseller List)

The #1 most competitive category on Amazon Kindle is Romance -> Contemporary. On the Kindle store, this list actually displays like this:

Kindle eBooks -> Romance -> Contemporary

To make the list easier for you to read and understand, we removed the “Kindle eBooks -> ” text string from the data in the table.

Just know that all these bestseller lists are for the Kindle store, NOT the “Books” category on Amazon (which includes paperbacks, hardcovers, ebooks and audiobook sales). This list here is purely for Kindle ebooks and Kindle sales.

Kindle Category Rankings

We tracked rankings for 3 different books in each category: The #1 book which is selling the most, the #50 book in the middle, and the #100 book which just barely made the list. We ranked the lists based on 1) how hard they are to rank for and 2) on how well the average book is selling on the list.

For example, at the time we collected this data, the #100 book in Kindle eBooks -> Romance -> Contemporary was ranked at #459 in the Kindle store. That means that if you wanted your ebook to appear on that list, you had to have a rank of #458 or better just to make the #100 spot!

If you like this post, you might like our post on the 100 least competitive Amazon Kindle categories as well.

Note: Amazon’s sales rankings are updated hourly, so if you check the store right now, the numbers may have changed. This list is just to give you a general idea of what the most competitive Amazon Kindle bestseller lists are.

What You Can Learn About the Kindle Ebook Market From This List

You might have noticed that the list is dominated by fiction categories. There are only 12 non-fiction categories out of the Top 100 most competitive categories on Amazon Kindle, and the Top 21 are all fiction!

That just makes sense because the fiction market is so big.

The #1 most competitive nonfiction list is Biographies & Memoirs -> Memoirs, which is dominated by celebrity memoirs like Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In.

What you might also notice if you start browsing these categories on Amazon is that many of the top books in these competitive categories are by self published and independently published authors. The big publishers aren’t dominating like they used to.

New self published authors like Hugh Howey, J. S. Cooper, H. M. Ward and countless others are outselling traditionally published authors in many cases on Amazon Kindle. So you don’t have to have a big publisher behind you to become a bestselling author.

It’s a whole new world out there for authors…

Not Sure Which Categories to Select For Your Book?

We can pick the best categories for your book! Our book promotions manager will hand-select the best 10 categories for your book. Purchase our Amazon Bestseller Category Selection Package here.

Want to learn more about how to get your Kindle and Physical books to rank well in the Amazon store?

Learn more about The Simple System for Getting Your Kindle Ebooks to Rank on Amazon’s Bestseller Lists with Bestseller Ranking Pro.

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P.S. If you love this post, you’ll love these other free resources:

• The Top 200 Most Competitive Amazon Print Bestseller Categories
• How to Get More Exposure for Your Book with BISAC Categories
• List of the 100 Least Competitive Amazon Kindle Bestseller Lists and Categories

Tom Corson-Knowles

Tom Corson-Knowles is the founder of TCK Publishing, and the bestselling author of 27 books including Secrets of the Six-Figure author. He is also the host of the Publishing Profits Podcast show where we interview successful authors and publishing industry experts to share their tips for creating a successful writing career.