“We saw strong growth before the pandemic, we saw strong growth during the pandemic and now we see continued strong growth when society begins to open up at the end of the pandemic.”

This will be a short post on BookBeat’s Q3 results because there’s little of substance on offer apart from the by now de rigueur percentage increases we come to expect from the Big 3 Nordic unlimited subscription services.

Let’s quickly tackle the numbers we do know:

BookBeat’s revenues grew by 39 percent during the first three quarters of the year compared with the same period in 2020.

The number of paying users was 47 percent higher at the end of the third quarter compared with the same time in 2020.

BookBeat CEO Niclas sandin said:

The growth this summer is reminiscent of the one we saw before the pandemic where the season since we launched 2016 has been the big high season for audio books. This was especially evident in July when we had the highest number of new test users ever in BookBeat. We have now set our sights on a really strong end to the year so that we reach the goal of 600,000 paying users just in time for the New Year.

Read the full press release (in Swedish) here.

No mention here of how the revenue and subscriber numbers breakdown across BookBeat’s European markets, nor any hints about where BookBeat might be looking to expand next.

This year has been low key expansion for both BookBeat and Storytel, with only Nextory bringing us surprises, but we do know Storytel is committed to adding a further fifteen new markets in the next two years.

By contrast it sometimes feels like BookBeat is treading water with its expansion plans, and that may be in large part to BookBeat being owned by, and acting as a primary vehicle for content published by parent Bonnier.

While BookBeat launched in two new markets – Austria and Switzerland, this year – it did so on the back of existing German-language content from its BookBeat DE operation.

With Nextory’s recent acquisition-based launch in Spain and its latest acquisition and imminent rebranding in France it looks very much like Nextory will be Storytel’s primary competitor in the global markets.