With Audible recently announcing Harry Potter fans have listened to the fantasy series for more than one billion hours, the popularity of the audiobook market has undoubtedly exploded.

Today, industry insiders suggest the global market could be worth more than $35bn by 2030.

Apple recently launched a catalogue of books narrated by artificial intelligence. However, the market remains sceptical, because a great narrator can bring a whole new level of storytelling to the literature.

As such, many authors argue that AI is no substitute for the quality of human narration. For example, in children’s literature, like the Harry Potter series, narrators must be able to convey the youthful and whimsical energy of the characters.

Today, people tune in to audiobooks while multitasking, so instead of competing for a reader’s time, audiobooks enhance the limited time readers have. 

This makes audiobooks an extremely desirable form of entertainment.

A huge factor that has also contributed to the rise in audiobooks is the ability to translate an audiobook into different languages.

What’s not to love? Narration allows the listener to increase the number of books they consume, listen on the go, introduce a different perspective on the author’s story and even listen in a different language.

View some of our favourite audiobooks here.