Whether you read five or fifty books a year, we all end up striving for more and stand in awe of the likes of Warren Buffett who claim to read 500 pages every single day. Nevertheless, reading is undoubtedly one of the most productive, educational and enjoyable lifelong passions.

I’m going to give you my personal list of tips and techniques I’ve nurtured to make this seemingly daunting goal into a no-fuss, realistic milestone you can aspire to for the rest of your life. I’ve consistently been able to read 50+ books a year while studying medicine at the University of Cape Town for the past few years. Let’s start by factoring in some time and numbers:

The math and time behind 50 books

I read to learn and therefore focus almost exclusively on non-fiction reading. The average non-fiction book I read is 350 pages long:

350 pages X 50 = 17,500 pages per year / 365 ≈ 50 pages per day

50 pages a day might seem daunting to some but it definitely is starting to sound milder than an outright 50 books per year. Now let’s try and factor in some time. Due to the heavy non-fiction nature of most content I consume, I tend to average around a very modest 30 pages per hour. This might differ greatly from reader to reader and on the type of literature you focus on. Nonetheless, here is how much time I will spend reading to reach my goal:

17,500 pages / 30 pages per hour ≈ 583 hours / 365 ≈ 1.6 hours/day

Once again this total might intimidate you, but truly ask yourself, how difficult can it really be to consistently find 90 minutes of your day to invest in one of the most rewarding and valuable pastimes one can have. We have thus broken this daunting yearly goal into an approximate and actionable 50 pages or 90 minutes per day. Here’s how I find those 90 minutes and tackle my daily goal of 50 pages:

Social media, YouTube and Netflix/television

The average smartphone user spends 142 minutes on social media every single day! I dare you to open your respective smartphone app and try find your social media usage time. Once you’ve recovered from that likely shocking realisation, ask yourself how much of that time was a pure mindless brain drain for which you gained absolutely zero value? As you might have realised by this point, I’m a very analytical person who likes to account for every single second of every day and take ownership of my own time. I simply cannot rationalise spending hours on social media for the meagre benefits (if any) it might provide. I simply substitute all that time with reading nowadays.

This might sound hardcore to some, so here’s what you can do to reduce your social media use and read more:

• Everytime you get the urge to unlock your phone and check social media, force yourself to read one full page of your current book. After that, feel free to put your book down and look at your phone. You’d be surprised by how many times you become absorbed by that single page and forget all about your phone.
• Use an app-blocker to limit your social media use to a fixed duration every day. Whatever you do, do not override this daily limit once you reach it.
• For those trying to quit or drastically reduce their social media use, you basically have two options: cold turkey or slow and steady. Cold turkey (my personal favourite) is simple, effective and gives you the least amount of temptation once you’ve made that first step. Simply delete any and all non-essential social networks. If you really want to be diehard, deactivate such accounts or ask someone you trust to change all your passwords. This should be enough to overcome any temptation you might have to waste any more screen time and finally pick that book up.
• If you’re not quite ready for the cold turkey approach, consider using the app-blocker mentioned above to steadily decrease your allotted time per app every single week. Another option is to sequentially stop using one social media platform at a time. I recommend deleting your least used app first and work your way up (e.g. Twitter → Instagram → Facebook → YouTube).

Even though I personally feel strongly about the futility of social media, keep in mind that you might obtain more benefit from it than I do. In the end, it’s up to you to evaluate what you value more in life.

Key objective #1 - Quit/limit social media consumption.


Keep your phone away

This point is closely linked to the one above. Even though you might not be using your phone while reading. Simply having it in your pocket or the same room leaves you prone to frequent distractions and involuntary checks at times. Even though I like to try and fit in short periods of reading everywhere I can during my day, it still needs to be a task I dedicate 100% focus towards. Simply having my phone next to me often reduces my comprehension and retention from whatever I am reading at the time. That is why I always try and leave my phone in another room while reading. I also usually read for an hour in bed before going to sleep. The trick here is to set your morning alarm before this and place your phone in another room or somewhere where you cannot reach it from the comfort of your bed. I find this the best possible method to prevent late screen time and always fall asleep easily.

Key objective #2 - Place your phone away from yourself.

Eating and transportation

Now if you happen to be a student (or anyone living alone for that matter). Breakfast and dinner time consists mostly of you staring at a plate while munching away. I’m not going to recommend you use one hand to keep your book open while using the other to untangle your spaghetti. However, listening to an audiobook or podcast during meals can be an enjoyable way to get a good number of extra pages in every single day. As a busy medical student, squeezing in all these extra minutes here and there has allowed me to read 50+ books every year!

Another prime reading time is during any form of commute. Whether I am driving ten minutes to campus or taking a five hour trip back to my hometown, I usually have an audiobook running in the background. I usually pick a self-help or fictional read that doesn’t require my full attention to ensure I still pay attention to the road.

Key objective #3 - Read whenever and wherever you can.

Multi-medium reading

There are two streams of thinking when it comes to this topic. Some people prefer to read a single book from cover to cover before moving onto the next. However, I mostly find myself reading multiple books at once. But furthermore, I particularly enjoy multi-medium reading. I use Audible to consume mostly self-help (2X speed) and long biographies (1.5X speed) during activities such as driving, cleaning, cooking and cardio. I take my Kindle to the hospital every day to get a few pages in during my lunch time and whenever I have to sit and wait around. Lastly, I usually reserve my paperbacks and hardbacks for bedside reading. This ensures that I always have something lying around to read everywhere I go. I generally have around five or more commenced books, all from different genres, with one of them bound to spark my interest every time I want to read.

Key objective #4 - 1 paperback, 1 Kindle ebook, 1 Audible audiobook.

Daily schedule and habit forming

There are two habits I attribute my reading success to. A voracious appetite for learning and my tendency to gravitate towards books rather than other media forms for that source of knowledge. If you picked up a book whenever you felt the urge to check social media, read the news or turn on your television: 90 minutes of reading per day would be a breeze.

Here’s a practical log of my average daily reading

Wake up: 05h30
Breakfast: 15 min audiobook
Drive to campus: 10 min audiobook
Lunchtime: 45 min audiobook
Off-time at hospital: 15 min ebook
Drive back home: 10 min audiobook
Relaxing after work: 30 min ebook
Gym time: 60 min audiobook
Dinner: 20 min audiobook
Bedtime: 60 min paperback

Daily Totals: 160 min audiobook, 45 min ebook, 60 min paperback ≈ 
>4 hours of daily reading

Four hours might sound like a staggering amount of time to dedicate solely to reading. However, from the example above, you can see that I only dedicate about 90 minutes of my time to reading exclusively. The rest of my reading is predominantly done while performing other daily tasks. There is nothing stopping you from combining reading with a multitude of mundane daily activities. I hope these tips have helped you realise that 50 books per year is an attainable goal many of us could accomplish. It all depends on your perspective and priorities.

Key objective #5 - Combine reading with daily activities.

Tracking your progress

Tracking what I read has helped me stay motivated and able to get more out of my reading. I’ve built an Evernote tracker into which I enter the details of every book I read throughout the year. I take multiple notes and highlights which I compile into a book summary after finishing every non-fiction read. I then link this document/note to my reading tracker which allows me to quickly review and retrieve information from all the previous books I’ve read. This method maximises the value I extract from every book and allows me to have instant access to my personal library of notes, tips, strategies, sayings and quotes from hundreds of books. It has become one of the most valuable pieces of knowledge I own. Whenever I want to write something or refresh my memory on a certain topic, it is only just a few clicks away.

Key objective #6 - Make notes and track your reading.

Making a reading list

Having an accountable goal with an established plan is one of the easiest techniques to keep someone motivated. I like to use Goodreads for this. I set my yearly reading challenge to 50 books and update it every time i finish a book. I also have a custom bookshelf titled 2019 into which I add all the books I come across which spark my interest. Whenever I receive a recommendation or read a review that I deem worthy of a read, I add it to the 2019 reading list. When you start to read as much, you quickly come to realise that there is an unlimited supply of noteworthy books but only a finite time in which to read them all. I am thus very selective when it comes to choosing what I read. I make sure that the books I consume are from a reputable source (preferably the authority on that particular subject), up to date and from authors I enjoy. Being meticulous about my reading list guarantees that I always finish the books I start. I am not opposed to stopping books midway but never find the need to do so thanks to my “curated” reading list.

Key objective #7 - Set a yearly reading challenge and find books using Goodreads.

A word on the cost of reading

The two most frequent objections I receive from fellow students who want to read more are:

I am too busy. I don’t have enough time to read so many books.

Books are too expensive. I can’t spend so much money on books.

Nothing annoys me more than hearing these two excuses. This article has hopefully helped disprove the first objection. Now with regards to the cost of reading, I will not deny that the prices of newly released mass-market paperbacks and hardbacks are prohibitively expensive. However, in today’s day and age, educational content is available from so many sources. Firstly, the established classics in most genres often date back to the previous decade or century and are either freely available or very affordable at any bookstore. Libraries and book clubs are another effective and affordable way to gain access to an unlimited source of quality reads. If you enjoy audiobooks, I recommend finding reads which are over 40 hours long to get the most value from your purchases. Lastly, ebooks have begun to saturate the reading market with tremendously affordable reads in every category imaginable. Just remember to do your research and sift through to find reads that are worth your time.

Nevertheless, reading is the one thing I would implore you to spend your hard earned money on. The return on investment you obtain from books will be repaid to you hundredfold.

Key objective #8 - Reading can be affordable but do not skimp on it.