My Favorite Used Bookstores in San Francisco (So Far)

2025-05-28

An opinionated and incomplete list

I love used bookstores, and I've put in my hours browsing at a few places in the city. These are the ones I find myself returning to, in no particular order. You could probably accurately triangulate my apartment using this list, so that's an obvious bias.

Adobe Books

This place pulls me like a magnet. Probably every other Sunday, I find myself meandering in its direction. Sometimes I just poke my head in to browse the "recent arrivals" cart. Sometimes I lose a half hour rifling through the collection of mass market classics.

Dog Eared Books

Popular, open late, and with a good rotating set of "on sale" books (new but priced pretty close to used). I've found a few really interesting used Dover-style math books here.

Green Apple Books (on Clement)

A big name for a reason. Huge selection and probably the best outside bargain bins I've seen in the city. I'm not super into the other location, but that may just be a matter of my personal aesthetics.

Et al. books

This place keeps a low profile, so I actually just visited it for the first time. A friend had mentioned his class had a reading here, but I ended up just stumbling on it a couple weeks later. Really excellent selection of interesting editions. Highest "oh wow they have that!"s per shelf than anywhere else on here. Like some other places, there's a gallery in the back, and they host talks/community events.

Community Thrift

Not exactly a bookstore, but large book section and incredible deals to be had here. Most stuff is between $1 and $3. They get new stuff very regularly, and sometimes I encounter a chunk of recently arrived books that clearly came from someone with very similar taste to mine. Selection that's made it to alphebetization is a little more hit or miss (lots of duplicates), but plenty of good stuff in there.

Books & Bookshelves

It's all in the name. I haven't bought a bookshelf here, but they're all over the shop (filled and unfilled), and they look well made! I have bought books from the nice proprietor (David, I think).

Honorable Mentions

Great places, but I have less to say about them right now:

And then there's Moe's in Berkeley, which is outside the purview of this list, but is unparalleled in its selection, particularly technical fare.

On my list

Email me (lswainemoore ⓐ gmail 🔵 com) if you have other recommendations or reactions!