An old family run bookstore in Khan Market.

UPDATE: Readers on Twitter have suggested that The Bookshop and  Fact and Fiction should be added to this list. They look wonderful!

On a recent trip to India, I visited bookstores in the main shopping districts of Khan Market and Connaught Place and stumbled across a book market in Old Delhi too. Here’s a rundown of the best places to find new and used books in India’s capital city.

Darya Ganj

This book market or “Kitab Bazaar” is open every Sunday from 9 AM to 7 PM. Books and magazines are displayed on the sidewalks in Old Delhi between the Delite cinema and the Daryaganj footbridge. A famous place to find second hand books, the market has been called an “absolute must visit for all book lovers.”

Nai Sarak

Nai Sarak, which means “new street” has a number of bookstores that specialize in academic books, from test prep to art history to science, located between the Chawri Bazaar and the Chandni Chowk Road.

Khan Market

A branch of Full Circle Bookstore can be found here, which offers lots of staff recommendations among the shelves and includes a cafe. It is also the official bookseller of the Jaipur Literature Festival. There are a couple other older family-run bookstores in this market, with chaotic stacks of books wrapped in plastic.

Connaught Place

This shopping district, which is made up of a series of streets organized as concentric circles, struck me as a cross between Times Square and Fifth Avenue. It also has lots of bookstores, and the Delhiwalla blog for the Hindustan Times has a great round-up of all of them.