World Book Day 2027

World Book Day costume ideas

If your child’s school is holding a dress-up day, the charity’s own position is worth quoting: “Dressing up? It’s up to you!” Its dressing-up page asks schools to tell parents there is no pressure, and publishes a £1 dressing-up ideas pack built around things most homes already have. Ideas that cost little or nothing:

• Pyjamas and a bedtime story: many schools now run a “come in your pyjamas” day instead, with each child bringing a favourite book.
• The Gruffalo or the Mouse: brown clothes, a paper plate mask or a cardboard tail.
• Harry Potter or Hermione: school uniform, a scarf, a drawn-on scar and a stick wand.
• Paddington: a duffle coat, a hat and a paper “please look after this bear” label.
• A character from the £1 books: the charity publishes costume guides for each year’s titles, and other children will recognise them.

If a costume is a stretch, a favourite book to show the class or a home-made bookmark both count. The point is for the child to talk about a book they enjoyed.

World Book Day in schools

The day is usually led by the English or literacy lead with the school librarian. Primary schools are sent token information automatically; secondary schools, nurseries and other early years settings need to register, and the deadline to order tokens is 31 October. The charity’s resources page has assembly packs for ages 5 to 11 and 11 and over, activity packs for each £1 book, posters in English, Welsh and Irish.

• Assembly: reveal the £1 books, explain how the token works and when it runs out, and invite a local author, librarian or older pupil to read aloud.
• Classroom: a “book in a box”, where pupils fill a shoebox with objects that tell the story of a favourite book; or a 15-minute “drop everything and read” slot every day that week.
• Whole school: a book swap table, a “guess the book from the first line” quiz between year groups, or reading buddies pairing older and younger classes.
• Parents and PTA: a family reading breakfast or story evening, with a second-hand book stall to raise money for the library.

Give families at least four weeks’ notice of any dress-up day and say clearly that it is optional. Make sure the token gets home before the window closes on 21 March.

At home, in libraries and at work

Families can take the token to a bookshop any time from 11 February and let the child choose; a book a child picked is one they are more likely to finish. Adults are not left out: World Book Night on 23 April, run by The Reading Agency, is the adult counterpart, and workplaces often mark the day with a book swap shelf or a lunchtime reading hour.

What World Book Day is and who runs it

The charity calls itself “the reading for fun charity”. Its aim is to change the fact that only around one in three young people say they like reading, by letting children choose and own a book they genuinely want. It is funded by National Book Tokens, publishers and booksellers rather than by government. The tokens reach children from pre-school up to Year 8 in England and Wales, S2 in Scotland and Year 9 in Northern Ireland.

World Book Day and World Book and Copyright Day

UNESCO’s World Book and Copyright Day is held every year on 23 April, the date on which both William Shakespeare and Miguel de Cervantes died in 1616. That is the day most other countries observe.

When the event came to the UK and Ireland, organisers moved it to the first Thursday in March so that it would fall in term time. Here, 23 April often lands in or near the Easter holidays and clashes with St George’s Day. The two days share a name and a purpose but are organised separately, and we list them separately.

How the £1 book token works

The token is the heart of the day, and the rules are set out in the charity’s terms and conditions. For 2027:

• Validity: Thursday 11 February to Sunday 21 March 2027. The £1 books are in shops from 11 February, so families do not have to wait for the day itself.
• What it buys: one of the World Book Day £1 books (€1.50 in Ireland) for free, or £1 off any full-price book or audiobook costing £2.99 or more (€1.50 off a title costing €3.99 or more in Ireland).
• Where: participating booksellers, including Waterstones, Blackwell’s, The Works, TG Jones, Asda, Sainsbury’s, Tesco and hundreds of independent bookshops. Tokens are generally not accepted online.
• Limits: one token per transaction, for under-18s only; tokens cannot be exchanged for cash or used to settle school accounts.
• Format: schools pass tokens on to families, and a digital version can be shown on a phone or printed. Home educators and childminders can sign up on the charity’s website for digital tokens, sent out in early February.

For 2027 there are 15 £1 and €1.50 books: 12 titles available across the UK, plus exclusive titles for Ireland, a Welsh-language title and, for the first time, three Scottish Gaelic titles. No 2027 theme or slogan had been announced on the charity’s site at the time of writing.

A short history

UNESCO created World Book and Copyright Day in 1995. The UK and Ireland version followed soon after: the charity dates its first event to 1997, led by publisher Gail Rebuck with the Publishers Association, booksellers and National Book Tokens, and the then Prime Minister Tony Blair backed it publicly the following year. From the start the idea was practical: give every schoolchild a £1 token and publish short £1 books so the token could be spent in one go or put towards something bigger. Dressing up was never part of the official plan; it grew out of schools’ own celebrations and became the thing most parents associate with the day.

Related days

• World Book and Copyright Day, 23 April: the UNESCO global day.
• International Children’s Book Day, 2 April: run by IBBY to mark Hans Christian Andersen’s birthday.
• Children’s Book Week: a week-long celebration of children’s books, held in May in the United States.
• National Storytelling Week, late January into early February: the UK’s celebration of oral storytelling.