Making use of used textbooks is a really good idea if you are tight on budget. If the used textbook is in good condition, then there is no reason to pay for two or three times for the new one.

Used textbooks are a delight for students thinking of saving costs on their textbook purchases. In almost all countries, such textbooks are used regularly and in high quantities by the students. Used textbooks are sold or given away by the previous batches of students taking the same courses, those who have studied from original textbooks with excellent prints and later wish to sell them after they become useless for them.

There are many markets of used textbooks with stores selling them going by the name of "Old Books Stores" selling and buying used textbooks. Typically, a vendor would purchase a used textbook at a quarter of the current price and sell it at half the price, thereby earning a 100% profit. Used textbooks capture their selling price depending on the edition in use in universities. If the edition gets old and a new print gets available in the market, then, used textbooks do not fetch a price in the market and are better donated to a library.

Used textbooks are also a gift for the financially disadvantaged part of the society, especially those who strive to acquire education despite meager financial resources. They are also helpful for the financially stable part of the society that believe and understand the stupidity of the sky-rocketing costs associated with purchasing and studying from new textbooks and serve as a silent protest against the publishers and vendors of new textbooks asking for highly unreasonable amounts of cash.

However, low price edition of textbooks used commonly in many reputed universities of the world are made available by publishers such as Penguin Books and others at poor South Asian countries may seriously disrupt the market for used textbooks. Because they are made available in a clean and legible print, a bit small, however. At such low costs that students do not have the incentive to purchase a used textbook with the disadvantage of scribbling, linings and marks made by their ‘ex-owners’ which makes reading more difficult and uncomfortable.