Pride and Prejudice
by Jane Austen
Top 10
Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy spar, misjudge each other, and slowly fall in love in Regency England. Witty, sharp, and still the model for romantic comedy. Read the full description
Best for: Fans of romance with brains and wit
Pride and Prejudice is #3 on BookWard's Top 100 books for September 2026, with a BookWard Score of 84 out of 100.
Pride and Prejudice: reading interest over the past 12 months
Sources: Open Library’s public reading-log and ratings data (dump of 2026-08-31), Wikipedia page views and Wikidata. Monthly counts are exact; they show relative interest among readers of these public sources, not total readership.
Ranked against the other books on this list, Pride and Prejudice’s reading interest has run from #1 to #17 over these 12 months. Interest rank blends shelf adds, Wikipedia page views and rating activity, each compared with the other 99 books that month.
Shelf adds by month
Pride and Prejudice was added to Open Library readers’ shelves 1,521 times in the past 12 months, peaking in November 2025 with 192 (51% above its monthly average of 127). Over the latest three months (Jun 2026 to Aug 2026) shelf adds were up 19% on the three months before. 83% of the adds were “want to read”, 9% “currently reading” and 8% “already read”.
Want to read Currently reading Already read
Wikipedia page views
Its Wikipedia article was viewed 1,383,872 times in the past 12 months, peaking in March 2026 with 151,629 views. The latest three months were down 27% on the three before.
Source: Wikimedia monthly page views for the article Pride and Prejudice.
Adaptations
- Pride & Prejudice (film), 2005
- Pride & Prejudice: A Latter-Day Comedy (film), 2003
- Pride and Prejudice (miniseries), 1995
Adaptations are listed from Wikidata; a release date near a rise in the charts above is context, not proof of a cause.
What the data says about Pride and Prejudice
- Moderate swings. Monthly shelf adds averaged 127 with some ups and downs.
- Busiest and quietest months. November 2025 was its busiest month (192 adds), about 2.9 times its quietest, April 2026 (66).
- Attention and shelf adds move independently. Its Wikipedia views and its shelf adds did not rise and fall together over these 12 months (correlation -0.16).
- Against its genre. It had 65% more shelf adds than the average Classics book on this list.
- Share of the list. It accounts for 1.5% of all shelf adds recorded for the Top 100 over these 12 months, #16 of 100.
- Its age. First published in 1813 (213 years ago), it is older than 99% of the books on the list.
Each finding is computed from the public data above and shown only when the numbers support it.
Pride and Prejudice on the Top 100: rank history
First charted in September 2026. The chart gains a point with every monthly update, so its peak, climbs and falls will show here as they happen.
| Month | Rank | Score |
|---|---|---|
| September 2026 | #3 | 84 |
Is Pride and Prejudice rising or falling?
Holding steady Its weekly, monthly and yearly ranks are close together, so interest is steady rather than spiking.
On Open Library, Pride and Prejudice ranks #11 this week, #10 this month, and #17 over the past year. A longer bar means a higher position. Comparing the three windows shows whether readers are arriving faster than the book's long-term pace. Readings as of 2026-09-30.
Why Pride and Prejudice made the Top 100
Pride and Prejudice made the list mainly on momentum (+32.9 points) and being read right now (+22.4 points). Its smallest contribution is rising (+0.3). The BookWard Score blends five public signals, each scored from 0 to 100 and weighted as shown.
The reading-now, rating and rank signals come from Open Library’s public data, not from BookWard’s own readers. The score measures reading interest, not quality or sales. How the score works.
Open Library reader stats for Pride and Prejudice
Source: Open Library public reading logs, as of 2026-09-30. BookWard’s own monthly snapshots are added to the picture, and anonymous BookWard reader data will be layered in as the community grows.
More readers have Pride and Prejudice open right now than 84% of the other books on this list. These counts come from one public source, so they show relative interest rather than total readership.
Where it sits among Classics books
It is #1 of the 11 Classics books on this month’s list.
About Pride and Prejudice
Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy spar, misjudge each other, and slowly fall in love in Regency England. Witty, sharp, and still the model for romantic comedy.
Why it’s here: Classics like this one keep resurfacing, and this one is the most rereadable.
Best for: Fans of romance with brains and wit
At a glance
- First published
- 1813-01-28
- Genre
- Classics
- Also described as
- novel of manners, satirical fiction, psychological fiction
- Length
- about 351 pages (the median across its editions)
- Original language
- English
- Languages
- editions in 27 languages listed on Open Library
- Editions
- 4,042 on Open Library
- Setting
- Netherfield, Meryton, Longbourn
- Characters listed
- Elizabeth Bennet, Fitzwilliam Darcy, Charlotte Lucas, George Wickham, Mr. Bennet
From Open Library and Wikidata public records. Missing rows mean the records do not list that fact.
Themes
- Pride and first impressions
- Class and marriage in Regency England
- Family and independence
What reading it is like
Witty, dialogue-driven and gently satirical, with an early-19th-century voice that takes a few pages to settle into.
At about 351 pages it is a longer read: roughly 7 hours at an average reading pace (about 250 words a minute, 300 words a page). Audiobook and edition lengths vary.
Good to know
Often the easiest place to start with Austen. The humor lives in the narration, so adaptations feel different.
The premise
Elizabeth Bennet, clever and outspoken, keeps clashing with the proud Mr. Darcy while her family hopes for good marriages. First impressions turn out to be wrong on both sides.
What you’ll get
- Sharp humor and dialogue
- A romance built on misjudgment and growth
- A window into life in Regency England
You might skip it if you prefer fast plots to social comedy.
Pairs well with: Little Women
Keep exploring the chart
Also on the chart at #2 and #4
Questions about Pride and Prejudice
What rank is Pride and Prejudice on the Top 100 books?
Pride and Prejudice is #3 on BookWard's Top 100 books for September 2026, with a BookWard Score of 84 out of 100.
Is Pride and Prejudice rising or falling?
Holding steady. Its weekly, monthly and yearly ranks are close together, so interest is steady rather than spiking. On Open Library, Pride and Prejudice ranks #11 this week, #10 this month, and #17 over the past year.
Why is Pride and Prejudice on the Top 100?
Pride and Prejudice made the list mainly on momentum (+32.9 points) and being read right now (+22.4 points). Its smallest contribution is rising (+0.3).
How many people are reading Pride and Prejudice right now?
Open Library's reading logs show 661 readers currently reading Pride and Prejudice, 6,507 who want to read it and 588 who have logged it as read (as of 2026-09-30). These are counts from one public source, not all readers.
How much interest has Pride and Prejudice had over the past year?
1,521 Open Library shelf adds in the past 12 months (peak November 2025, 192); latest three months up 19% on the prior three; 1,383,872 Wikipedia views in the past 12 months (down 27% over the latest three months); Adaptations on Wikidata: Pride & Prejudice (2005); Pride & Prejudice: A Latter-Day Comedy (2003); Pride and Prejudice (1995). Figures come from Open Library and Wikipedia public data.
Who is Pride and Prejudice best for?
Fans of romance with brains and wit.
Ask a question about Pride and Prejudice
Ask about this book's chart history, reading interest, or who it is for. Answers come from this page's data and can be wrong.
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How we know
This page is built from public data: Open Library’s dated reading-log and ratings dumps, Wikipedia page views, Wikidata, and BookWard’s own monthly Top 100 snapshots. The interest rank blends shelf adds (45%), Wikipedia page views (30%), rating activity (10%) and, for months where a snapshot exists, BookWard’s own score (15%), each as a percentile among the Top 100 books. Every month shown is real data; nothing is estimated. Rankings reflect reading interest, not quality or sales, and can be affected by data gaps. Last updated September 2026. Read the full methodology.
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