PEN America reports nearly 12,000 books were banned in public schools in the U.S. during the 2025-2026 school year—the largest number in a single year. New state censorship laws accounted for much of the increase.
The award-winning novel SOLD, abut a teenage trafficking victim, was the top banned book. Stephen King was the most banned author for the second year in a row.
More from PEN America:
In a report released to coincide with Banned Books Week, the latest accounting of book bans increased to 34,000 instances since PEN America began documenting the spreading book censorship crisis in schools in 2021.
Texas recorded the largest number of book bans during the 2025-2026 school year (over 8,100), surpassing Florida (over 3,200), due to the impact of a censorial Texas law, SB13, which bans broad categories of books in schools. Florida had been No. 1 for three consecutive years.
The writers and free expression organization also reported a record number of unique titles banned in the last school year—more than 7,000—which impacted more than 4,000 authors, illustrators and translators, also a record number.
In addition, researchers identified 114 school districts that had banned books over the year, the highest number ever for a single year according to PEN America’s Index of School Book Bans.
Read more here.
Related: Judge Halts Iowa’s School Library Ban Of LGBTQ Books
NEW: PEN America today reported nearly 12,000 book bans in public schools nationwide during the 2025-2026 school year—the largest number in a single year.
New state censorship laws accounted for much of the increase, coupled with the use of AI to remove books en masse: pen.org/press-releas…
— PEN America (@penamerica.bsky.social) October 5, 2026 at 5:37 AM
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