There is no book street in Phoenix. The Valley is a hundred-odd miles of grid and the secondhand trade sits scattered across it in threes and fours: two general shops a mile and a half apart on parallel avenues in the north-central corridor, an uptown store with a bar built into it at Camelback, a collector's room out in Arcadia, a chain branch and a narrow-hours specialist up near Bell Road, and then the whole East Valley — Scottsdale, Tempe, Mesa — which is not Phoenix at all but three municipalities holding councils of their own, library systems of their own and, between them, half the stops below. One shop sits twenty miles the other way in Youngtown. Plan by run rather than by neighborhood, and expect to drive.
What makes this a rewarding metro to work is the sheer density of buy counters. Bookmans keeps two Valley stores that take walk-ins seven days a week and will hand you cash instead of credit if you ask, a choice its own trade page spells out. Half Price Books adds a third counter up on Cactus Road. Changing Hands adds two more on much tighter terms: credit only, half of whatever price its buyer marks the book at, and a fifteen-book ceiling in Phoenix against forty in Tempe. Five places to unload stock without shipping a box changes the arithmetic on a sourcing trip, because you can buy deep, keep whatever scans well and trade the remainder back the same afternoon.
Two further layers sit underneath the shops. The first is the library, unevenly spread: Tempe, Scottsdale and Mesa each keep a permanent secondhand room going on donated and weeded stock, while the Friends bookstore inside Phoenix's own Burton Barr Central Library has been shut for want of volunteers, its community sales page reading no community book sales yet. The second is a single weekend in February. The VNSA sale has been filling a fairgrounds building since 1957, and the 2026 round moved more than 600,000 books, DVDs and CDs past 14,000 shoppers; number seventy lands on February 13 and 14, 2027. It is also the rare event that writes scanner permission into its published shopper rules, which tells you exactly what sort of crowd it expects.
Annual charity book saleVNSA Used Book Sale
Arizona State Fairgrounds, Ag Center Building, 1826 W McDowell Rd, Phoenix, AZ 85007
The Volunteer Nonprofit Service Association — it began in 1957 as the Visiting Nurse Service Auxiliary and kept the initials when the name changed — takes over the Ag Center Building at the state fairgrounds for one February weekend, and its own accounting of the 2026 round puts it at over 600,000 books, DVDs and CDs, 2,000 jigsaw puzzles, 14,000 shoppers and more than $595,000 raised for Maricopa County charities. Number seventy is set for Saturday, February 13 and Sunday, February 14, 2027, 8am to 6pm then 8am to 4pm, free to enter, with a fairgrounds parking fee that ran $12 a day in 2026 and everything outside the Rare & Unusual room going half price all day Sunday. Read the shopper policies first, because one clause is written for people exactly like you: electronic scanners are permitted at the book tables, but you may not scoop an armful off a table and carry it somewhere quieter to work through. Phoenix New Times, previewing the weekend on February 11, 2026, told anyone hunting stock to flip on eBay to join the line as the gates open at 5am.
Hours : February 13–14, 2027Website Used bookstoresBookmans Phoenix
8034 N 19th Ave, Phoenix, AZ 85021
Arizona's own entertainment-exchange chain, five stores deep and trading since Bob Oldfather opened the first one in Tucson in 1976; the Arizona Republic put this branch in its metro bookstore roundup for Book Lovers Day on August 8, 2025, filed beside the Mesa sibling. The buy counter is what earns the drive: it takes books, magazines, comics, music, movies, video games, instruments, electronics and housewares with no appointment, sorts your pile while you browse, and pays either in cash or in trade credit that never expires. One schedule covers every store — 9am to 8pm Sunday through Thursday, 9am to 9pm Friday and Saturday — which gives this the longest usable day of any general secondhand floor in this guide. The store also runs its own event listings, and it staged a Double Stamp Day here on Saturday, August 29, 2026, worth timing around if you are selling as well as buying.
Hours : Fri and Sat 9am–9pm, Sun–Thu 9am–8pmWebsite Used bookstoresBooks on 7th Ave
9201 N 7th Ave, Phoenix, AZ 85021
Two avenues east of Bookmans and a little further north, on the Sunnyslope stretch of Seventh just south of Hatcher, a family operation whose Instagram bio counts 36 years of trading and three generations working the floor. Phoenix city council District 3 called in during its Summer Tour and posted about the visit on July 21, 2026, describing a Sunnyslope staple since 1990; it advertises a general secondhand floor going deep on mystery and on romance, plus used comics, records and movies. The Arizona Republic counted over 200,000 works in stock on August 8, 2025, though the week is short and unforgiving — 10am to 5pm Monday through Saturday, dark on Sunday — so treat it as a morning stop. Ask after Dorian Gray, the resident cat, who has a following of his own.
Hours : Mon–Sat 10am–5pm, Sun closedWebsite Used bookstoresChanging Hands Phoenix
300 W Camelback Rd, Phoenix, AZ 85013
Uptown at Camelback and Third Avenue with the First Draft Book Bar built into the floor and a light rail platform across the road; the Arizona Republic named it on August 8, 2025 and noted that this store and the Tempe original both swap used books for store credit. Check the rules before you fill a box, because this branch is capped at micro-trades of fifteen books or fewer, pays half of whatever price the buyer marks, in credit alone, and never in cash. The published reject list is long: underlining or highlighting, smoke or pet odor, missing or damaged dust jackets, cracked paperback spines, book club editions, ex-library copies, magazines, encyclopedias, condensed volumes, discs of every kind, and anything from a fast-dating category unless it came out within the past year. Its own pages disagree about the door — the dedicated location page prints 9am to 10pm from Monday to Saturday and 9am to 8pm on Sunday, while the trade summary reuses the Tempe grid — so phone before you commit to a late arrival.
Collectible and out-of-printBook Gallery
3615 E Indian School Rd, Phoenix, AZ 85018
Out along Indian School Road in Arcadia, a secondhand room of antique and modern oak cases where the subjects run from Arizona history to outer space, per the Arizona Republic write-up of August 8, 2025, and where staff will chase down a title that is not on the shelf. Phoenix New Times handed it Best Collectible and Antique Books in the 2025 edition of its Best of Phoenix awards, which is the honest read on the pricing: signed firsts and leather bindings share the floor with plain used stock. The operator posts 10am to 6pm from Monday to Saturday, noon to 5pm on Sunday, on its own store page, while at least one directory insists the shop is dark on Mondays — go with the store. Watch the street number too, since New Times files it at 3643 East Indian School and the shop writes 3615, the same block either way.
Hours : Mon–Sat 10am–6pm; Sun noon to 5pmWebsite Friends of the Library bookstoreFriends Bookstore, Tempe Public Library
Tempe Public Library, 3500 S Rural Rd, Tempe, AZ 85282
On the main level of the Tempe Public Library just inside the entrance, in a city that runs its own council and its own branch system southeast of Phoenix, and the strongest permanent secondhand room in this guide now that the Phoenix equivalent has gone dark. The Friends of the Tempe Public Library run it on donated stock, with a vintage section, paperbacks, magazines and audiovisual material, a bonus shelf across in the Connections Café they also operate, and — their wording — new inventory every day. It trades 9:30am to 4pm Monday through Saturday and 1pm to 4pm Sunday, closing on library holidays; the same volunteers route better material to their own Amazon and eBay storefronts, so assume the obvious four-figure title has already left the building. The Internet Archive picked that page up on June 14, 2026, and the group ran a half-price weekend in the store on January 9 and 10, 2026.
Hours : Mon–Sat 9:30am–4pm, Sun 1pm–4pmWebsite Where can I find cheap used books in Phoenix?
Libraries set the floor here, and they sit out in three suburbs rather than in the city. Mesa prices hardcovers at $1 and paperbacks at 50 cents when its Big Book Sale lands, and keeps sale areas running at Main, Dobson Ranch and Red Mountain the rest of the year; Tempe sells donated stock seven days a week inside its public library and restocks daily; Scottsdale puts a shop in all four branches and sells you a tote for $2 if you forget one. Under all of that sits the February fairgrounds weekend, where most of a 600,000-item floor is priced under $5 and everything outside the rare room halves on the Sunday. Of the shops themselves, Half Price Books on Cactus Road and both Bookmans stores are the reliable low-margin browse, and all three stay open until at least 8pm.
Where do I sell used books in Phoenix?
The differences between the counters decide your route. Bookmans takes walk-ins at 19th Avenue and in Mesa on all seven days, buys far beyond books, and will pay cash rather than credit; Half Price Books on Cactus Road quotes on the spot without an appointment; Changing Hands pays credit alone at half its own shelf price, and will look at fifteen books in Phoenix or forty in Tempe. Sort before you drive, because a rejected box is a wasted afternoon in a metro this size: point BiblioScan at a single photograph of the loaded shelf and every spine in it comes back priced against the live market, which is what tells the half-dozen copies deserving your own Amazon listing apart from the forty that should go across a trade counter. For a whole collection or an estate, use the Bookmans acquisitions line instead of queueing at a store counter.
Which day is best for book hunting in Phoenix?
Friday, comfortably. No other day has all fifteen stops above trading at once: Dog-Eared Pages opens its narrow 11am to 4:15pm window, Alcuin and R Bookmark are both trading, Bookmaze raises the shutters at 1pm, and every library room is working. Saturday runs a near second and gives you longer evenings — Bookmans to 9pm, Half Price Books to 8pm — but Dog-Eared Pages is shut. Sunday is the thin one, costing you Books on 7th Ave, Dog-Eared Pages, Bookmaze, Alcuin, R Bookmark and the Mesa library shelves in a single stroke, though both Bookmans stores, both Changing Hands, Half Price Books and Book Gallery all stay open.
Are there any used book fairs in Phoenix?
One, and it is the whole answer. The VNSA Used Book Sale has run since 1957, fills the Ag Center Building at the Arizona State Fairgrounds on 1826 West McDowell Road, and holds its seventieth edition on Saturday, February 13 and Sunday, February 14, 2027, from 8am to 6pm then 8am to 4pm. Admission is free, though the fairgrounds charge to park and set that fee themselves — $12 a day in 2026 — and there is no preview session in the published rules — entry is first come, first served. The 2026 round carried more than 600,000 books, DVDs and CDs plus 2,000 jigsaw puzzles, drew over 14,000 shoppers and raised in excess of $595,000 for Maricopa County human service charities. Bring your own bags, expect dust, and note that the categories in the Rare & Unusual and Sets rooms have their own checkout and bar carts, backpacks and wheeled containers at the entrance.