Poetry readership in the United States has changed substantially across recent survey years. The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) recorded 11.7% of U.S. adults reading poetry in 2017, or about 28 million people. In 2022, 9.2% read poetry, while 4.8% listened through broadcasts, recordings, or web streaming. When those two forms of engagement were combined, 11.5% of adults—more than 29 million people—either read or listened to poetry.
These figures measure different activities and years, so they should not be treated as one continuous trend. The statistics below separate reading, listening, life-stage exposure, education, and participation to give a clearer picture of poetry’s audience.
Contents
- Overall poetry readership
- Age and gender differences
- Race, ethnicity, and location
- Education and listening habits
- How poetry enters people’s lives
- School experiences and early memories
- Digital discovery, libraries, and purchases
Overall poetry readership
The NEA’s 2017 Survey of Public Participation in the Arts (2017 SPPA) reported that 11.7% of U.S. adults had read poetry during the previous year. That represented 28 million adults. The same source reported a 2012 rate of 6.7%, making the 2017 figure 5 percentage points higher. The 2017 rate was also 3 percentage points above the 2008 rate of 8.3%.
The longer comparison reaches back to 2002, when 12.1% of U.S. adults were reported as poetry readers. These measurements come from the NEA 2017 SPPA and describe different survey years; they do not, by themselves, explain why the rates changed.
The NEA’s 2022 SPPA measured a 9.2% poetry-reading rate, equal to 22.4 million U.S. adults. It also measured a separate 4.8% rate for listening to poetry through broadcasts, recordings, or web streaming, equal to 11.8 million adults. Across either reading or media listening, 11.5% of adults, or more than 29 million people, engaged with poetry in 2022.
| NEA measure | Survey result |
|---|---|
| Adults reading poetry in 2002 | 12.1% |
| Adults reading poetry in 2008 | 8.3% |
| Adults reading poetry in 2012 | 6.7% |
| Adults reading poetry in 2017 | 11.7% (28 million) |
| Adults reading poetry in 2022 | 9.2% (22.4 million) |
| Adults listening to poetry through media in 2022 | 4.8% (11.8 million) |
| Adults reading or listening in 2022 | 11.5% (over 29 million) |
The 2022 reading measure is lower than the 2017 reading measure, but the broader 2022 reading-or-listening measure captures an additional way adults encountered poetry. Reading and listening should therefore remain separate when comparing participation.
Age and gender differences
Younger adults recorded some of the highest poetry-reading rates in the 2017 SPPA. Among 18-to-24-year-olds, 17.5% read poetry in 2017, compared with 8.2% in 2012. Among adults aged 25 to 34, the rate was 12.3% in 2017 and 6.7% in 2012.
The 2022 SPPA reported a 9.0% reading rate for 18-to-24-year-olds and 11.9% for adults aged 25 to 34. For adults aged 75 and older, the 2022 rate was 7.1%, compared with 11.0% for that age group in 2017. These age-group results show that the 2017 and 2022 measurements differ for both younger and older adults.
Women had a higher poetry-reading rate than men in both 2017 and 2012. The 2017 SPPA reported a 14.5% rate for women and an 8.7% rate for men. In 2012, the corresponding rates were 8.0% for women and 5.2% for men. Women accounted for more than 60% of all poetry readers in the 2017 SPPA.
The age and gender figures describe participation rates within each group, while the percentage of all readers describes the composition of the overall readership. Those are related but different measures.
Race, ethnicity, and location
The 2017 SPPA reported a 15.3% poetry-reading rate among African American adults, up from 6.9% in 2012. Asian American adults had a 12.6% rate in 2017, compared with 4.8% in 2012. The rate for other non-white, non-Hispanic adults was 13.5% in 2017, compared with 4.7% in 2012.
Hispanic adults had a 9.7% poetry-reading rate in 2017, compared with 4.9% in 2012. Non-Hispanic white adults had an 11.4% rate in 2017, compared with 7.2% in 2012.
The 2022 SPPA reported lower rates for two groups whose 2017 results were also measured: African American adults had an 8.3% reading rate, and Hispanic adults had a 6.5% rate. These are 2022 measurements and should not be interpreted as a complete account of every group’s readership.
| Group | 2012 reading rate | 2017 reading rate | 2022 reading rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| African American adults | 6.9% | 15.3% | 8.3% |
| Hispanic adults | 4.9% | 9.7% | 6.5% |
| Asian American adults | 4.8% | 12.6% | — |
| Non-Hispanic white adults | 7.2% | 11.4% | — |
| Other non-white, non-Hispanic adults | 4.7% | 13.5% | — |
Geography showed little difference in 2017 reading rates between the two categories reported by the NEA. Urban or metropolitan residents read poetry at an 11.8% rate, while rural or non-metropolitan residents had an 11.2% rate.
Listening showed a larger location difference in 2022. Urban dwellers listened to poetry through media at a 5.1% rate, compared with 2.8% for rural dwellers.
Education and listening habits
Education was associated with poetry reading in the 2017 SPPA. Adults with some college education but no degree had a 13.0% reading rate, compared with 6.6% in 2012. College graduates had a 15.2% rate in 2017, compared with 8.7% in 2012. Adults with graduate or professional degrees had the highest listed education-group rate: 19.7% in 2017, compared with 12.5% in 2012.
The 2022 SPPA also reported listening rates by educational attainment. Adults with some high school education listened to poetry through media at a 6.3% rate. The rate was 2.0% among adults who had completed only grammar school and 3.3% among high-school graduates.
Listening was also present among younger adults and selected demographic groups. In 2022, 18-to-24-year-olds listened at a 6.2% rate, while adults aged 25 to 34 listened at 7.1%. African American adults listened at a 7.6% rate.
These listening results measure broadcasts, recordings, or web streaming. They are not substitutes for the 2022 reading rate of 9.2%, because the activities were reported separately.
How poetry enters people’s lives
The Poetry in America report describes poetry engagement across life stages and activities. Among Poetry in America readers, 94% had read poetry at some point in their lives. Nearly 60% of the poetry audience had read poetry as an adult, teenager, and child. By comparison, only 15% of the potential audience had read poetry at all three life stages.
The report found that 62% of the potential audience had read poetry as teenagers or children, or during their teenage years only. Writing was less common than reading: 36% of all readers had written poetry as adults, while 45% of the poetry audience had done so. Fewer than 1% of the potential audience had written poetry as adults.
Among adults who had written poetry, 27% had performed their own poetry in public. This measure concerns a subset of people who had already written poetry, rather than all adults or all readers.
The same report recorded library and book-club participation. Seventy-three percent of the current audience had library cards, compared with 62% of the potential audience. Six percent of readers belonged to book clubs.
School experiences and early memories
School was a common route into poetry. Eighty percent of respondents in the Poetry in America report had studied poetry in school. The stage-specific figures were 55% in elementary or grammar school, 61% in middle school or junior high, 87% in high school, and 49% in college.
The poetry audience was more likely than the potential audience to have studied poetry in school: 82% versus 73%. Among respondents describing their in-school poetry experience, 68% rated it as mostly favorable, 27% described it as neutral, and 5% described it as mostly negative. Out-of-school poetry experiences were rated as mostly positive by 80%.
Early exposure was also widespread. Eighty-six percent of all respondents reported early experiences with poetry. Within that group, 61% of the poetry audience associated someone with those early experiences, compared with 36% of the potential audience. Thirty-seven percent of respondents who had early poetry experiences recalled a specific memorable event.
These results describe reported experiences and associations, not a causal test of whether school or early memories produced later readership. They do show how strongly poetry was connected with formal education and childhood or teenage experience among the groups surveyed.
Digital discovery, libraries, and purchases
Internet access was reported by 83% of readers in the Poetry in America report. Among poetry-audience members with Internet access, 36.5% had used the Internet to find, read, or listen to poetry. The comparable figure for the potential audience with Internet access was 4.8%.
Finding information about events was less common. Among the poetry audience with Internet access, 13.6% had used the Internet to find information about poetry events. Among the potential audience with Internet access, the figure was 1.2%.
Purchasing was another distinction between the groups. In the previous five years, 48.0% of the poetry audience had purchased poetry books or magazines, compared with 12.3% of the potential audience.
Taken together, these figures distinguish several kinds of readership: reading during a defined survey year, reading at any point in life, listening through media, searching online, attending or finding events, and buying poetry publications. The NEA SPPA figures provide U.S. participation rates for specified years, while the Poetry in America report adds detail about life-stage exposure, education, digital discovery, and audience behavior.