E-reader ownership to grow 20% this year

More than 20 million e-readers will fly off shelves and into the hands of U.S. consumers by the end of the year, giving the devices a penetration rate of 8.7 percent of adults in the United States, eMarketer has predicted.


By next year, 12 percent of all U.S. adults will own an e-reader, such as a Nook, Kindle, Sony Reader.


Opportunities to advertise on the devices are also growing, thanks in large part to the introduction of the Kindle with Special Offers, the first ad-supported e-reader, launched this spring, the eMarketer report pointed out.


“Naturally, marketers will want to avoid disrupting the reading experience, but ads on the Kindle screen saver and homepage appear to be hitting the spot where the interests of advertisers, publishers, device-makers and consumers converge,” stated eMarketer senior analyst Paul Verna, author of the upcoming report “Epublishing: Books, Periodicals and Devices."