Bookstores in Belfast
Bookstores reward the browsers. Belfast, Northern Ireland has 31 mapped right now. That's 31 bookshops mapped around Belfast, each with its own shelves and specialties. The used sections are where the real bargains hide.
This guide covers every bookstore we could verify in and around Belfast (within about 40 km), built from OpenStreetMap's community-maintained data. Names you'll run into include Secondhand Bookshop and The Faith Mission Bookshop, plus No Alibis. If a bookshop's missing from Belfast's list, it probably just hasn't been mapped yet.
The Belfast bookstore lineup
31 mapped within about 40 km:
Secondhand Bookshop
Bookstore
Secondhand Bookshop is Bookstore.
The Faith Mission Bookshop
Bookstore
The Faith Mission Bookshop — Bookstore.
No Alibis
Bookstore
No Alibis is Bookstore on 83 Botanic Avenue, Belfast. No Alibis also notes on the map: the map lists its hours as Mo-Sa 09:00-05:30; a phone number is listed — worth a call before a special trip; it has a website with more detail.
83 Botanic Avenue, Belfast, BT7 1JL
Hours: Mo-Sa 09:00-05:30
Phone: +44 28 9031 9601
WHSmith
Bookstore
WHSmith is Bookstore.
WHSmith
Bookstore
WHSmith is Bookstore.
WHSmith
Bookstore
WHSmith is Bookstore.
Belfast
Oxfam Books
BookstoreRun by Oxfam Northern Ireland
Oxfam Books is Bookstore run by Oxfam Northern Ireland. Oxfam Books also notes on the map: it has a website with more detail.
An Ceathrú Póilí
Bookstore
An Ceathrú Póilí — Bookstore.
Waterstones
Bookstore
Waterstones — Bookstore. Also worth knowing about Waterstones: it has a website with more detail.
The Works
Bookstore
The Works — Bookstore.
Waterstones
Bookstore
Waterstones — Bookstore.
Bookshop
BookstoreRun by National Trust
Bookshop is Bookstore run by National Trust.
A McLean
Bookstore
A McLean — Bookstore.
Waterstones
Bookstore
Waterstones — Bookstore.
Faith Mission Bookshops
Bookstore
Faith Mission Bookshops — Bookstore.
Bookends
Bookstore
Bookends is Bookstore. Bookends also notes on the map: the map lists its hours as Mo-Sa 10:00-17:00.
Hours: Mo-Sa 10:00-17:00
Keats & Chapman
Bookstore
Keats & Chapman is Bookstore.
The Faith Mission Bookshop
Bookstore
The Faith Mission Bookshop — Bookstore.
The Works
Bookstore
The Works — Bookstore.
Waterstones
Bookstore
Waterstones — Bookstore.
The Works
Bookstore
The Works — Bookstore.
The Works
Bookstore
The Works — Bookstore.
BT41 4LL
Waterstones
Bookstore
Waterstones — Bookstore.
The Works
Bookstore
The Works — Bookstore.
Paperxclips
Bookstore
Paperxclips is Bookstore on North Street. Paperxclips also notes on the map: the map lists its hours as We-Su 11:00-20:00.
North Street
Hours: We-Su 11:00-20:00
Oxfam Bookshop
BookstoreRun by Oxfam
Run by Oxfam, Oxfam Bookshop is Bookstore.
The Works
Bookstore
The Works — Bookstore. Also worth knowing about The Works: it has a website with more detail.
Waterstones
BookstoreRun by Waterstones
Run by Waterstones, Waterstones is Bookstore, found on 44-46 Fountain Street in Belfast. Also worth knowing about Waterstones: the map lists its hours as Mo-Sa 09:00-18:00; Th 09:00-21:00; Su 13:00-18:00; it has a website with more detail.
44-46 Fountain Street, Belfast, BT1 5EE
Hours: Mo-Sa 09:00-18:00; Th 09:00-21:00; Su 13:00-18:00
The Linen Hall Charity Bookshop
Bookstore
The Linen Hall Charity Bookshop — Bookstore on 19 Lombard Street.
19 Lombard Street, BT1 1RB
The Book Nook
Bookstore
The Book Nook is Bookstore.
Aisling Books
Bookstore
Aisling Books is Bookstore.
What the map tells us about bookstores in Belfast
4 of the 31 list their opening hours on the map, which is genuinely useful — bookshops keep civilised hours, so the listed ones are usually reliable.
5 have websites listed. Worth a look for events — readings and signings get announced there first.
The Belfast bookstore crawl
Plot these on a map and the day plans itself: Secondhand Bookshop, The Faith Mission Bookshop, No Alibis on 83 Botanic Avenue, WHSmith, WHSmith, WHSmith, Oxfam Books, and An Ceathrú Póilí. That's 31 stops on the Belfast bookstore crawl. 23 more are listed below.
Bookstore tips for Belfast
The regulars' playbook for Belfast's bookshops:
- Check the events board at Secondhand Bookshop. Book clubs, writing groups, story times — bookshops are community centres that happen to sell books.
- Kids' sections are goldmines at The Faith Mission Bookshop. Even without kids. The picture-book art alone is worth the browse, and the middle-grade shelves hold genuine classics.
- Poetry lives in bookshops. Poetry barely exists online as a browsing experience. The poetry shelf in a real shop is a different world.
- Don't skip the small press section. The weird, wonderful stuff lives here. Small presses take the risks the big publishers won't.
Good to know
We searched about 40 km around Belfast — that covers the town itself plus the surrounding communities you'd reasonably drive to. Listings come from OpenStreetMap, mapped by local volunteers, so a brand-new bookstore in Belfast can take a while to appear. If you spot one of the 31 that's closed, or a great bookstore we missed, the fix is to update the map itself — that's where this guide reads from.
We don't list prices — they change constantly and vary by edition. What we list is the where: real shops, verified by real mappers, in alphabetical order with no favourites.
If you run one of the 31 listed here and something's wrong — a closure, a move, new hours — the fix is the same: update the shop on OpenStreetMap and the correction flows through to this page on the next daily refresh.
Bookstore listings for Belfast: 31 mapped from OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL). Photos from Wikimedia Commons contributors; individual photo credits appear in captions. Listing data was last refreshed automatically — verify hours before visiting.