Why do they make books with glossy paper?

July 28, 2011 11:28 PM

Why would anybody print books on glossy paper like this? WHY?!

I have encountered a handful of otherwise normal books with slightly glossy pages. Examples (including a normal nonglossy book for comparison). I find the glare makes them quite unpleasant to read.

Why do they make books like this? Does anybody consider it desirable for reading? Is it cheaper? More durable?

posted by stebulus to Writing & Language (6 answers total)

I noticed on one of your images that they'd chosen a fairly dark background colour as well. This combined practice (glossy paper and dark colours) used to be done in order to thwart photocopying/OCR efforts. There were videogames which required code lookups and printed their code tables on this kind of paper in order to stop piracy. Pretty inconsiderate of the 'legit' users though.

Books with glossy pages also seem to have thinner paper, so I doubt it's for durability.
posted by Hardcore Poser at 11:54 PM on July 28, 2011 [1 favorite]

Because it's thinner and cheaper, apparently. (I always thought it had something to do with the color printing process, but apparently I was wrong.)
posted by anaelith at 12:35 AM on July 29, 2011

As anaelith says, shiny, glossy paper is significantly cheaper than matt(e) or silk.
If I had a pound/dollar every time somone says "Why did you print on this expensive glossy paper?" Grrr!!
posted by sleepy boy at 2:29 AM on July 29, 2011

If the books are printed in colour (which judging from the photos, at least one is), a smoother paper surface can work better for photos or illustrations.
posted by anonymisc at 7:21 AM on July 29, 2011

There is also the (very small) chance that the gloss is actually there for UV protection. It's a small chance because this is mostly done in things like flyers, posters and pamphlets, but it's not technically impossible to do it for a book.
posted by oddman at 8:05 AM on July 29, 2011

The library where I used to work called it clay-coated paper. It was used in nearly all the scientific journals we subscribed to. I know from hard experience that if clay-coated paper ever gets wet it turns into a glued-together block of mud and is almost unsalvageable.
posted by orrnyereg at 9:26 AM on July 29, 2011