Instagram: Toplist of the German Bookstagram book scene

A few weeks ago I revived my Instagram account @lesestunden and started looking around the Bookstagram scene more intensively again. Since the book blogosphere has become pretty small and many people can now be found on Instagram, I was curious to see what was going on there. As a nerd, I naturally love lists and, as an overview, I once again created a top list of German-speaking Bookstagrammers. Read here how my return to Instagram went and what impression I gained of the book blogging scene on Instagram.

There are fewer than 650 book blogs left on my top list. If you consider that in December 2017 there were over 1,300 blogs, it’s clear that book blogs have long passed their peak. Instead, many more people are now bustling around on Instagram. Some former book bloggers can be found there and the majority of publishing houses are represented there as well. Significantly more than on TikTok, which leads me to assume that in the social media environment most book people can be found on Instagram.

I’ve had an Instagram account for lesestunden for a very long time, but treated it rather negligently and only filled it with new posts every now and then. I changed that a few weeks ago and am now much more active there. I’ve also been looking around regularly and tried to get an overview of the book community there.

Overall, I was a bit shocked at how limited the diversity is. It feels like all Bookstagrammers are reading the same books. Yes, in total a lot of different books are being read, but there are books that literally everyone seems to be featuring. Especially contemporary literature is primarily limited to a few popular titles that everyone reads because they seem to be very trendy at the moment. I then read the sample chapters of some of these widely read books, and what you see there is an abyss. One book that popped up in every second post had such a primitively simple language that it was painful to read. Yes, maybe that’s stylistically intentional and now considered great art, but I just found it awful. Or a book about someone working behind the counter at a gym, where I already checked out at the blurb, and after the first pages of the sample I seriously wonder who voluntarily reads that. But well, that’s how it is and that’s okay; everyone should read what they feel like reading. I’m not judging anyone for that. I think simply reading at all is already a huge gain.

When it comes to buying new books, I’m very picky. I can easily go into a bookshop and walk out without buying a book. In fact, that’s the normal case. My time is so limited and if I choose a book, I really want it to be a perfect fit. The book has to be appealing in terms of content, nicely designed, bibliophilic, my brain has to be in the mood for it right now, usually it should have a certain linguistic standard, and if I already have several books in the queue, my willingness to buy drops dramatically as well. Accordingly, my wishlist barely grows after a visit to Instagram. There’s so little that appeals to me that a visit is extremely inefficient. Of course, that strongly depends on one’s reading habits. I think anyone who isn’t as choosy will get tons of reading tips out of it. That just wasn’t the case for me.

One problem with Instagram is that visitors are supposed to be kept there as long as possible. This means the algorithm constantly analyzes what people like and consume for longer periods of time, and then those contents are increasingly pushed out. When you open Instagram, you land in the “For you” feed. And that gets filled with some sort of hyper-optimized content that is completely irrelevant. For me, that’s pretty pictures of bookshelves, some cute autumn locations, funny reels and similar feel-good fluff. It’s nice to look at but a complete waste of time. You constantly have to click on “Following” at the top, otherwise you get all this bullshit content. The longer you stay on Instagram, the more advertising you see. When you consider that the actual posts are already a kind of advertising, then Instagram is basically one big fat advertising platform. In the past, you used to zap away annoyed from commercials on private TV, now an entire platform is built on that principle and happily consumed because everything is packaged in nice little bites tailored to your interests. The step from real usefulness to wasting time is incredibly small. To use Instagram sensibly, you have to climb a mountain whose narrow summit plateau lies directly next to a steep, slippery slope.

The users on Instagram are surprisingly apolitical. That’s not a given when I think of Twitter, where a lot of political and ideological stances were discussed. You can find that on Instagram as well, but in a much less pronounced form. No matter in which direction: for me, sharing books you like, enjoy and want to recommend is not a political issue. Yes, of course, that may sometimes play a role in book selection, but for me, the joy of reading is at the center, not a politically or ideologically driven discourse.

What I also noticed is that Instagram is a tool for many to live out their own distinction. Again and again you come across posts in which people boast about their high reading volume and show off their love of books. So Instagram is also a means of expressing one’s own personality. Companies have happily embraced this, and so on many commercial accounts you repeatedly find quotes or funny reels that are essentially a veiled praise of heavy reading. From my point of view, this is pretty pointless, even if it makes sense from a marketing perspective, because it ties the target audience to the publisher or bookshop by creating an artificial sense of community. It’s also striking how much dancing and clowning around there is on Instagram. That, too, is reminiscent of commercial advertising from the 90s. Advertising is apparently easier to digest for the weaker mind when a few protagonists are making fools of themselves. The Hugendubel account, for example, is unbearable to me. A frightening infantilization.

The real art of using Instagram lies in finding good accounts that have exactly the content that genuinely interests me, and that was not easy. If you’re honest and focus on the accounts that really write interesting posts that actually provide added value, then it’s more than enough to drop by Instagram once a week. I’d like to briefly introduce a few high-quality accounts of this kind that I liked a lot. I think @spass_mit_buechern, @zubesuchbeimia and @buchwurmeline are very nice; all three seem bibliophilic and focus on classics. There’s a lot on their lists that also sits on my shelves. @club.of.bibliophiles has a very fine selection and presents many excellent books. She also seems to focus on specific themes from time to time, most recently on Hemingway. @die.buchdoktorin reads a lot of very commercial books, but I like the humorous way she approaches the topic and how she pokes a bit of fun at it, while still presenting entertaining book reviews. @belletristikundklassiker and @jogginghosenantagonist have a small but fine selection that I’ll definitely keep an eye on in the future. @lustaufbuch is very balanced, reads a lot of new releases but also discusses very worthwhile classics again and again. @oceanlove.r loves the sea, often goes to sea and her reading choices reflect that. There are some truly beautiful books there. @foliosociety simply has stunningly beautiful books. @mareverlag and @juberwedith show current books from my absolute favorite publisher, Mare Verlag.

The Instagram algorithm is no surprise: it rewards activity but also limits growth opportunities. For example, if you follow too many new accounts in a short period of time, you stop being shown to others. Even the notifications are filtered and controlled. My goal is to follow as many accounts in the Bookstagram scene as possible. I’m definitely limited there, because at some point you simply can’t follow anyone new. That’s understandable, of course, because Instagram probably has to fight spam really hard. At the same time, following Bookstagrammers is the best way to find new book people, because the suggestions are based on who you already follow.

Yes, but isn’t it silly to follow every book person on Instagram? Who is supposed to read and keep track of all that? In fact, I started to create a top list of all Bookstagrammers to get an overview and to see which accounts are the big players and are widely read. I feed this top list from all the accounts I follow. I’m curious how many book people there really are on Instagram and how many more there are compared to book blogs. At the same time, I’m naturally interested in what people are posting about and which accounts are really interesting for me in terms of content. My follower list is therefore very broadly set up. (By the way: thanks to Instagram’s favorites feature, I can still select and focus on the accounts that particularly interest me.)

At the moment I have 1,650 Bookstagrammers on my list. That’s definitely not all of them. Of course, the search continues and new Instagrammers keep appearing. So my current top list of German Bookstagrammers is not complete. Still, I’m already putting it online. I think it’s quite interesting for browsing and discovering great new Instagrammers. Or to see where you stand yourself and how popular your own account is within the Bookstagram scene. So feel free to take a look. In itself, such a ranking is secondary; the question is always what you personally get out of it, and that is very individual.

Conclusion: The Bookstagram scene on Instagram presents itself just as you would expect. Amid lots of irrelevant content, amid a lot of advertising, embedded in a very tightly optimized algorithm for strong customer retention, it is an art to track down truly interesting content with real added value. A great many commercial books are presented over and over again—titles you can quickly find in online shops or at the bookshop around the corner. But there are also some wonderful accounts that I liked very much. The book reviews and discussions are on average at the same level as those on book blogs. From my point of view, there is more commenting on Instagram than on book blogs, which is probably due to Instagram’s notification system. On my top list of German Bookstagrammers you’ll find an overview of all Bookstagram accounts I’ve discovered so far. It’s a list that will continue to grow in the future and is meant to give an initial overview. Is it worth visiting Instagram? Anyone who brings along a bit of time will find interesting and entertaining content there, as well as very nice contacts. At the same time, you must not let yourself be lulled by the Instagram algorithm, because then you’ll quickly slip into time-wasting mode.