Secondhand in Amarillo clusters on one avenue. Half the list sits on or a block off SW 6th Avenue through the Historic San Jacinto district, the surviving run of Route 66 in town: Caliche at 2311 SW 7th, Aunt Eek's at 2900, Chapterhouse at 3317 and To Boldly Go...And Home Again at 3804, with Caliche and To Boldly Go closing the row nine tenths of a mile apart. Burrowing Owl works out of Wolflin Square, a mile and a quarter south, and the library Friends run their bag sale out of the Downtown branch basement, about 1.8 miles east of Caliche. The last two want a vehicle: the Habitat ReStore out on Paramount Boulevard, then a 17-mile run down to Canyon for the second Burrowing Owl. Anything past the Amarillo city line names its own town up front.
Three of the shops here buy or trade over their own counter, and each does it differently. Aunt Eek's pays in store credit and says flatly that there is no cash option, then lets that credit cover half a used-book price and no more, so money leaves your pocket on every visit; textbooks, series romance, condensed digests and encyclopedias are turned away outright, ex-library copies unless they are scholarly or rare, and nothing is valued while you stand there, since the shop warns that processing takes days or weeks. Burrowing Owl publishes the arithmetic instead: what you bring is priced at roughly half its cover, you get credit worth half of that figure, and the credit then buys 10 percent off a new book or 50 percent off a used one, two boxes to a visit unless you arrange an appointment, sorted while you wait so the rejects go home with you. To Boldly Go told readers to come buy, sell and trade in its own opening announcement but has never posted terms, which is what its phone number is for, while Chapterhouse wants donations instead of trades.
Two facts make an out-of-date Amarillo list actively misleading. The Panhandle carries no chain buy counter at all: the Half Price Books Texas page runs to 37 branches with none up here, its store finder came back empty at a 100-mile radius, and the two closest sit in Oklahoma City, 241 miles out on a straight line; 2nd & Charles lists exactly three Texas stores, in Beaumont, Conroe and Lubbock, so the nearest of those is a 116-mile drive south. Several addresses on this page have also shifted without the paperwork catching up. Burrowing Owl opened its Amarillo branch in 2019 and, the Amarillo Tribune wrote on April 21, 2026, had moved it to 2461 I-40 West about a year before that, yet the store's own website footer still prints the old SW 34th Avenue address, and the Chapterhouse About page still carries 3316 SW 6th Ave and goes on discussing the day the business acquires a physical location, though the same site's footer, the Amarillo Tribune and High Plains Public Radio all put it at 3317.
Used books, vintage and odditiesAunt Eek's Books and Curiosities
2900 SW 6th Ave, Amarillo, TX 79106
Old Route 66 in San Jacinto, one of the oldest neighborhoods in the city by the shop's own account, mixing secondhand books with vintage furniture, clothing and the uniquities its website advertises in quotation marks. The trade-in page is unusually candid about what it will not do: credit only and never cash, that credit capped at half a used-book ticket, no valuation on the spot because sorting runs days or weeks, no follow-up call unless something exceptionally rare surfaces, and a standing no on textbooks, encyclopedias, Reader's Digest condensed volumes, Silhouette or Harlequin romance and ex-library copies, the last of those unless the title is scholarly or rare. The Amarillo Tribune named it one of four 6th Street shops staging the April 2025 bookstore crawl, and on July 24, 2026 the shop posted on Facebook that it would run 10am until 3pm for a week while the thermometer sat over 100. The hours are the one thing to verify: the website footer gives 11am to 5pm Monday through Saturday and Sunday 1pm to 4pm, while a September 2026 reply on the shop's own Facebook page answers Sunday as noon to 4pm.
Used bookstoresChapterhouse Books
3317 SW 6th Ave, Amarillo, TX 79106
A one-person operation 0.3 miles down the avenue from Aunt Eek's, selling new and used titles weighted toward GSRM, racialized and migrant writing by its own description, and routing every web order through Bookshop.org or Libro.fm rather than selling from its own storefront page. Owner Lauren Pronger told the Amarillo Tribune in April 2025 that the crawl that month was her first Independent Bookstore Day as a brick-and-mortar seller, roughly a year after the storefront opened, and High Plains Public Radio wrapped its 2026 Spring Read, 100 Years on the Mother Road, with a panel recorded in the store on May 2, 2026. Do not navigate by the About page: it still prints 3316 SW 6th Ave and still talks about the day the business gets a physical location, both left over from the pop-up years.
Hours : Tue–Sat 10am–7pm; closed Sun–MonWebsite Used bookstoresTo Boldly Go...And Home Again
3804 SW 6th Ave, Amarillo, TX 79106
Rob and Linda Gipson announced the grand opening of their used books and collectibles store at 6th and Prospect on Facebook in August 2021, noting that Amarillo once supported six or seven secondhand bookshops and that they had traded with all of them; the same post put the couple's personal science fiction and fantasy library at over 12,000 titles. Genre is the backbone, but the Amarillo Tribune's April 2025 piece on the 6th Street crawl described a broad secondhand selection beyond it, and quoted Rob Gipson saying independent sellers carry what you cannot get anywhere else. The store marked three years in business in August 2024 with 20 percent off for anyone who mentioned the birthday, hosted author Rand Paulsen for a signing over the Texas Route 66 festival weekend in June 2025, and was still filed as a secondhand bookstore by the Amarillo Tribune on April 21, 2026. It runs on that Facebook page and posts no hours grid there at all, so call ahead.
Used books inside a record and vintage storeBitter Buffalo Records at Caliche
2311 SW 7th Ave, Amarillo, TX 79106
One block south of the 6th Avenue row, and the print here belongs to Bitter Buffalo Records, the record-and-book concession that shares the Caliche building with the Lasso Gallery and a counseling practice. Its page says it deals in used, new, rare and remaindered books, listing fiction and poetry including experimental and under-represented work, philosophy and psychology, art and photography, music history and local, western and general history. Lance Garza, who owns and manages it, is marker chair for the Potter County Historical Commission and collects rare Panhandle records and books, which is where the regional shelf comes from. High Plains Public Radio counted Caliche Co among the six shops in the Route 66 Bookstore Crawl that ran until 7pm on May 2, 2026.
Hours : Wed–Sat noon–7pm, Sun noon–5pmWebsite Used bookstoresBurrowing Owl Books (Wolflin Square)
2461 I-40 W, Wolflin Square, Amarillo, TX 79109
The Amarillo half of a family-owned pair whose other branch stands on the square in Canyon, set among the Wolflin Square shops off the I-40 access road, with new stock and secondhand on the same shelves. Its published trade policy opens by ruling out cash and leaves nothing else to haggle over: an incoming book is priced at about half its cover, you receive credit worth half of that price, and the credit then covers 10 percent off new stock or 50 percent off used, so a purchase always costs you something on top. Two boxes per visit unless you make an appointment, the sorting happens while you stay in the shop, whatever misses the cut leaves with you, and no credit may be spent on rare books. Hours need care: the shop site and the Wolflin Square landlord page both give Monday through Saturday, 10am until 6pm, the landlord adds that Sunday is closed, yet the store announced on February 8, 2026 that it was open Sundays in Amarillo and on March 22, 2026 that it would close that one Sunday for a private event.
Library book salesFriends of the Amarillo Public Library Book Sale
Downtown Library basement, 413 SE 4th Ave, Amarillo, TX 79101
Three times each calendar year, by the library's own count, the basement under the Downtown branch becomes a brown-bag sale staffed by the Friends, and the library set the second one of 2026 for September 11 through 13 in an announcement published on August 28, 2026. You pay by the bag rather than by the book: $7.50 a bag or three for $20, dropping to $7 and three for $18 if you bring your own reusable bags instead of paper ones, and $5 a bag on the Sunday. Friday evening from 6:30 to 9 belongs to Friends members, 2026 memberships going at the door for $10 individual and $25 family; Saturday runs 9am to 6pm for everybody, and the city's own event calendar adds a Sunday window of 2pm to 6pm that the announcement itself leaves out. Boxes and wagons are barred from the sale floor and the group keeps the right to charge extra for oversized bags, though Amarillo College Presidential Scholars are on hand to help store and haul what you buy.
Hours : Fri September 11, 2026 members only 6:30–9pm; Sat September 12, 2026 9am–6pm; Sun September 13, 2026 2–6pmWebsite Where can I find cheap used books in Amarillo?
The bag sale beats everything else in town. Friends of the Amarillo Public Library announced on August 28, 2026 that their September 11 to 13 sale in the Downtown Library basement charges $7.50 for one bag and $20 for three, $7 and $18 when the bags are your own reusable ones, and a flat $5 per bag once Sunday afternoon arrives. Between sales the Habitat ReStore over on Paramount comes closest, having advertised a flat 20 cents a book on two dated occasions five months apart, October 25, 2025 and March 21, 2026, though print only shows up there when somebody donates a load. On the 6th Avenue row the price ladder starts with Aunt Eek's and its half-price trade credit, then Burrowing Owl, where credit earned on your own books takes 50 percent off a used title.
Where do I sell used books in Amarillo?
Two counters publish their terms, a third takes books without publishing any, and the fourth only wants donations. Aunt Eek's issues store credit and says outright that cash is not on offer, applies that credit to half a used-book ticket at most, declines textbooks, category romance, encyclopedias, Reader's Digest condensed editions and library discards short of the scholarly or rare, and takes days or weeks to process a load without calling you back unless something rare turns up. Burrowing Owl says outright that it will not buy books for money: it prices what you bring at about half its cover, gives you credit worth half of that, then lets the credit buy 10 percent off new titles or 50 percent off used, two boxes to a visit without an appointment and sorting handled on the spot with you present. Chapterhouse takes donations rather than trades, and To Boldly Go publishes no policy, so ask by phone. Screen everything before it goes in the car. BiblioScan works from a picture of the shelf itself and returns a current market price for every cover it can name, and that split, the few worth your own listing against the rest worth a credit slip, decides whether the trip pays.
When is the Friends of the Library sale in Amarillo?
Amarillo runs one, and the library says it comes around three times a calendar year. The second of 2026 fills the basement of the Downtown Library at 413 SE 4th Avenue from September 11 to 13: Friday from 6:30 to 9pm for Friends members only, Saturday from 9am until 6pm for everybody, and Sunday from 2 to 6pm as discount bag day at $5 a bag. A membership runs $10 individual or $25 family, available at the door once Friday begins, and it is the least expensive route to first pick. Boxes and wagons are not allowed on the floor, so bring bags you can carry; Amarillo College Presidential Scholars work the sale helping shoppers store and move their haul.
Which day is best for book hunting in Amarillo?
Saturday, comfortably. Every address here that publishes a schedule trades on a Saturday, so Caliche, Aunt Eek's, Chapterhouse, Wolflin Square, Canyon and the Habitat ReStore all fit into one loop, with To Boldly Go the unknown you call about; the Friends sale covers a Saturday in each of its three yearly rounds. Sunday cuts the field hard: Chapterhouse is closed, the ReStore is closed, Burrowing Owl publishes a six-day week on its site while its Facebook page says the Amarillo store opens on Sundays, and only Caliche and Aunt Eek's post Sunday times, both of them short afternoons. Monday is the other trap, with Chapterhouse and Caliche both closed and the ReStore closed as well, so build a Monday around Aunt Eek's and the two Owls or leave it alone.