Which Publisher Has Won the Most Newbery HONORS This Century?

Now that we’re a quarter of the way through the 21st century, I thought it might be a good time to dig into the last 25 years of Newbery and Caldecott data to see is we can make sense of it.

Last week, I shared the publishers with the most Newbery Medal wins of the 21st century. Today, we’re looking at the publishers with the most Newbery Honors (no Medal data counted today).

I looked closely at the data and spotted a few things that jumped out. Let’s take a look.

But first! A note about the data. Similar to last week, I folded all wins by imprints into the parent publisher. For instance, Atheneum is an imprint of Simon & Schuster, so all Atheneum wins get added to the Simon & Schuster total. Also, I’m listing publishers as they are currently comprised. For instance, wins by Penguin before they merged with Random House are counted in the Penguin Random House total. See all the specific imprint info listed at the bottom of the post.

Here are the bar-graphed results (keep in mind these are Honors only):

And if we pie-chart the data, it looks like this:

Some things I noticed:

• While Penguin Random House is tied for the most Medal wins this century (6), they have by far the most Honors (30) – triple the amount of the two publishers tied for second (Macmillan and HarperCollins).
• Speaking of Macmillan, they came in pretty far down on the Medals list (1), but showed up in a big way in the Honors (10).
• Once again, Candlewick performs better than many of the larger publishers, tying for second place with seven honors.
• The return of Scholastic! While they were shut out of the Newbery Medals this century, they make it on the Honors list with six.
• Hachette has more Newbery Medal wins (2) than Honor wins (1) – that’s kind of crazy.

What jumps out to you on this list?

Publisher Guide:

Penguin Random House (Dial, Knopf, Nancy Paulsen, Philomel, Random House, Yearling, Dutton, Wendy Lamb, G.P. Putnam’s Sons, Delacorte)

Macmillan (includes Roaring Brook, Henry Holt, FSG, Flash Point, Feiwel & Friends)

HarperCollins (includes Greenwillow, Amistad, Harper, Quill Tree, Balzer + Bray, Clarion (post-2021))

Simon & Schuster (includes Atheneum, Margaret K. McElderry, Denene Millner, Beach Lane)

Candlewick Press

Scholastic (includes Scholastic Press, Blue Sky, Arthur A. Levine Books)

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (includes HMH BFYR, Clarion (pre-2021), Versify)

Abrams (includes Amulet, Abrams Books for Young Readers)

Holiday House (includes Holiday House, Neal Porter Books)

Levine Querido

Hachette (includes Little, Brown)

Bloomsbury

Disney (includes Hyperion)

Filed under: Articles