Bookstores in Swansea
Bookstores reward the browsers. Swansea, Wales has 21 mapped right now. That's 21 bookshops mapped around Swansea, 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 Swansea (within about 40 km), built from OpenStreetMap's community-maintained data. Names you'll run into include Waterstones and Oxfam Bookshop, plus Furry Fingers. If a bookshop's missing from Swansea's list, it probably just hasn't been mapped yet.
The Swansea bookstore lineup
21 mapped within about 40 km:
Waterstones
Bookstore
Waterstones — Bookstore, found on 14-15 Guildhall Square in Carmarthen. Also worth knowing about Waterstones: it has a website with more detail.
14-15 Guildhall Square, Carmarthen, SA31 1PR
Oxfam Bookshop
Bookstore
Oxfam Bookshop — Bookstore. Also worth knowing about Oxfam Bookshop: it has a website with more detail.
Furry Fingers
Bookstore
Furry Fingers is Bookstore on 10 Hall Street, Carmarthen.
10 Hall Street, Carmarthen
Carmarthen Rare Books
Bookstore
Carmarthen Rare Books is Bookstore.
Siop Tŷ Tawe
BookstoreRun by Ty Tawe
Siop Tŷ Tawe is Bookstore run by Ty Tawe on 9 Christina Street, Swansea. Siop Tŷ Tawe also notes on the map: the map lists its hours as Tu-Fr 10:00-14:00,14:30-17:00; Sa 10:00-14:00; a phone number is listed — worth a call before a special trip; it has a website with more detail.
9 Christina Street, Swansea, SA1 4EW
Hours: Tu-Fr 10:00-14:00,14:30-17:00; Sa 10:00-14:00
Phone: +44 1792 456856
Cover to Cover
Bookstore
Cover to Cover — Bookstore on 58 Newton Road.
58 Newton Road
The Works
Bookstore
The Works — Bookstore, found on Commercial Street in Aberdare. Also worth knowing about The Works: the map lists its hours as Mo-Sa 09:00-16:30; Su 10:00-16:00; it has a website with more detail.
Commercial Street, Aberdare
Hours: Mo-Sa 09:00-16:30; Su 10:00-16:00
WHSmith
Bookstore
WHSmith is Bookstore. WHSmith also notes on the map: it has a website with more detail.
Bridgend, CF31 3BL
Coastal Bookshop
Bookstore
Coastal Bookshop is Bookstore on 49 John Street, Porthcawl.
49 John Street, Porthcawl, CF36 3AS
The Works
Bookstore
The Works — Bookstore, found on Unit 9d Parc Trostre in Llanelli.
Unit 9d Parc Trostre, Llanelli, SA14 9UY
WHSmith
Bookstore
WHSmith is Bookstore on High Street, Cowbridge. WHSmith also notes on the map: it has a website with more detail.
High Street, Cowbridge
The Cowbridge Bookshop
Bookstore
The Cowbridge Bookshop is Bookstore.
The Works
Bookstore
The Works — Bookstore.
Christian Bookshop
BookstoreRun by Christian Bookshop
Run by Christian Bookshop, Christian Bookshop is Bookstore, found on Swansea Market in Swansea.
Swansea Market, Swansea, SA1 3PE
Waterstones
Bookstore
Waterstones — Bookstore on 17 Oxford Street. Also worth knowing about Waterstones: it has a website with more detail.
17 Oxford Street, SA1 3AG
The Works
Bookstore
The Works — Bookstore, found on 16 The Quadrant Shopping Centre in Swansea. Also worth knowing about The Works: a phone number is listed — worth a call before a special trip; it has a website with more detail.
16 The Quadrant Shopping Centre, Swansea, SA1 3QW
Phone: +44 1792 462869
Nickleby's Book Store
Bookstore
Nickleby's Book Store — Bookstore on Pound Field.
Pound Field, CF61 1DL
Corran Books
Bookstore
Corran Books is Bookstore.
WHSmith
Bookstore
WHSmith is Bookstore.
TGJones
Bookstore
TGJones is Bookstore on 7-8 Guildhall Square, Carmarthen. TGJones also notes on the map: it has a website with more detail.
7-8 Guildhall Square, Carmarthen, SA31 1PN
The Works
Bookstore
The Works — Bookstore, found on McArthur Glen Designer Outlet in Bridgend. Also worth knowing about The Works: it has a website with more detail.
McArthur Glen Designer Outlet, Bridgend, CF32 9SU
What the map tells us about bookstores in Swansea
2 of the 21 list their opening hours on the map, which is genuinely useful — bookshops keep civilised hours, so the listed ones are usually reliable.
10 have websites listed. Worth a look for events — readings and signings get announced there first.
The Swansea bookstore crawl
The efficient Swansea bookstore crawl strings these together: Waterstones on 14-15 Guildhall Square, Oxfam Bookshop, Furry Fingers on 10 Hall Street, Carmarthen Rare Books, Siop Tŷ Tawe on 9 Christina Street, Cover to Cover on 58 Newton Road, The Works on Commercial Street, and WHSmith — 21 stops, one logical order. 13 more are listed below.
Bookstore tips for Swansea
The regulars' playbook for Swansea's bookshops:
- Don't judge by the window display at Waterstones. The front table is marketing. The back shelves are the shop's real taste. Walk the whole floor.
- Note the shop's specialties at Oxfam Bookshop. Sci-fi, travel, art books, philosophy — every good shop leans somewhere. Find the lean that matches yours.
- Ask for the out-of-print hunters. Some used shops will hunt down out-of-print titles for you. It takes patience, but the find is worth it.
- Check the sale shelf rhythm. Shops clear shelves on cycles. Ask when the next cull happens — that's when the bargains land.
Good to know
We searched about 40 km around Swansea — 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 Swansea can take a while to appear. If you spot one of the 21 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 21 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 Swansea: 21 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.