What to Do with Old University Textbooks in the UK: Sell, Donate, or Recycle?

TL;DR – What to do with old textbooks

Short on time? Here's the quick answer:

The best option for most people? Sell them on UniBookTrade. It's free to list, you keep 100% of your asking price, and a fellow student gets your book at a fraction of the new price. Textbooks in good condition typically sell for 40–70% of what they cost new.

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First, is your textbook worth selling?

Before you do anything, it's worth a 30-second check, because the answer decides everything below.

A textbook is worth selling if it's a current or recent edition, in readable condition, and still on a reading list somewhere. Core texts for big subjects — medicine, law, engineering, economics, nursing — hold their value best because thousands of students need them every single year.

A textbook is worth donating or recycling if it's several editions out of date, badly damaged, or so niche that demand has dried up.

If you're not sure, search the title or ISBN on UniBookTrade and on a couple of the sites in our best places to buy and sell second-hand textbooks guide. If copies are selling, yours has value. If nothing comes up anywhere, lean towards donating.

Option 1: Sell them (the option that actually pays)

Selling is the only option that puts money back in your pocket, and for most textbooks it's surprisingly easy. You broadly have two routes:

Sell directly to other students

Listing on a student marketplace like UniBookTrade gets your book in front of people who are looking for that exact title — usually because they're about to take the course you just finished. That targeted demand is why you get a far better price than a generic buyback.

Why it works well for students:

• Free to list — no upfront cost, and you keep 100% of the price you set.
• You set the price — you're not at the mercy of an algorithm's lowball offer.
• Tracked shipping to collection points — no meeting strangers in car parks, no chasing payment.
• Search by university and subject — buyers find books relevant to their actual course.
• ISBN lookup — scan the barcode and the listing fills in the book's details for you.

The trade-off is that you're listing each book and waiting for a buyer, so it rewards a little patience and good timing (more on that below).

Sell to a buyback service

Sites like WeBuyBooks and Ziffit buy your books outright: scan the ISBNs, accept an instant quote, post them for free, get paid. It's effortless — but the prices are brutal. They'll routinely offer £0.50–£3 for a book worth £20–40, because their whole business is reselling it for several times what they paid you.

Buyback makes sense when you genuinely just want a big box of books gone and value your time over the money. For anything worth more than a few pounds, selling direct to students earns far more. We compare all the major options side by side in our best websites for second-hand textbooks guide.

How to get the best price when selling

A few things make a real difference to whether (and for how much) your book sells:

• Time it right. Demand peaks just before term starts — late August to September, and again in early January. List a few weeks ahead of those windows.
• Price with the market. Check what copies of your edition are actually selling for and aim around 50–60% of the new retail price for a book in good condition.
• Tidy it up. Clean the cover, rub out pencil notes where you can, and be honest about any highlighting or damage.
• Photograph it properly. Clear, well-lit photos from a few angles, plus the ISBN, help buyers trust the listing.
• Get the edition right. Some textbooks have different international editions — state clearly which one you have.

Ready to go? List your books in a couple of minutes →

Option 2: Donate them

If a book isn't worth selling — or you'd simply rather it did some good — donating is a great shout.

• Charity shops like Oxfam accept used books at high-street branches, with proceeds funding their work.
• Better World Books UK collects donated books and resells them online, funding literacy programmes.
• Your university library or department may take textbook donations to support students who can't afford new copies.
• Local schools, community centres, and youth groups can sometimes use them too — worth a quick ask.

Donating keeps books in circulation, supports access to education, and clears your shelves guilt-free.

Option 3: Recycle them

Some books are simply done — water-damaged, falling apart, or hopelessly out of date. Don't bin them: paper-based books are recyclable.

Most local council recycling centres accept books, and some areas have dedicated book banks. Recycling keeps them out of landfill and conserves resources. Just check whether your local facility wants the covers removed first, as glossy or hardback covers are sometimes processed separately.

University buyback schemes

Some UK universities run their own end-of-term buyback events, where a bookstore or third-party vendor assesses your books and makes an on-the-spot cash offer.

The upside is convenience — no listing, no shipping. The downsides are that prices are usually lower than selling directly, and the windows are short (often just a few days after exams). If your university runs one, treat it as a fallback for books you couldn't sell yourself, and sell soon after finals before a new edition lands and kills demand.

Do you pay tax on selling old textbooks?

Good news: for almost every student, no.

When you sell your own used textbooks, you're selling personal possessions you already owned — not running a business. That isn't taxable income, and books are exempt from Capital Gains Tax as well (they're low-value personal items, and you're selling at a loss versus what you paid anyway).

The picture only changes if you start buying books specifically to resell them at a profit — that counts as trading. Even then, HMRC's £1,000 trading allowance means you can earn up to £1,000 a year from that kind of activity before you need to declare anything. Clearing out your own course books from the last three years won't come close.

If you ever do turn reselling into a genuine side hustle, keep simple records of what you buy and sell, and check HMRC's guidance on the trading allowance. For the average student offloading last year's modules, there's nothing to report.

This is general information, not tax advice. If your situation is unusual, check the latest guidance on gov.uk or speak to an adviser.

The bottom line

Don't let good textbooks rot in a box. Run the quick value check, then:

• In good condition and still in demand? Sell them on UniBookTrade — free to list, keep 100% of your asking price, and help next year's students.
• Not worth selling? Donate them to a charity shop, library, or community group.
• Beyond saving? Recycle them rather than binning them.

Whichever you choose, you're clearing space and keeping books out of landfill. And if you're also kitting out for next term, see the cheapest ways to buy university textbooks before you pay full price for anything.

Sell your old textbooks now →