In an article, Hao Ming-yi of Locus Publishing wrote that we know of about 150,000-180,000 Chinese books published over the 2000 years from the Western Han Dynasty to the late Qing Dynasty. About 100,000 books were published in the four decades of the Republican era in mainland China (1912-1949).
大塊文化發行人郝明義曾為文指出，據統計，從西漢到清末，大約兩千年間所出版的書種，現存十五萬到十八萬種；從一九一二年到一九四九年，四十年間出版的書種，在十萬種左右。