Every Stephen King Novel, Ranked by Fans
Rank all 67 Stephen King novels head-to-head: It vs The Stand, The Shining vs Misery, 11/22/63 vs Pet Sematary, plus every Bachman book and Dark Tower. Your first pick is right here. No sign-up.
Size
The Dead Zone1979
The Regulators1996 · as Richard Bachman
Tap a poster to make your pick. Crowd numbers appear after you choose.
How the community ranks them
Results appear here as people finish brackets. Each pick feeds the head-to-head numbers, so the first players decide where all 67 start.
How the Stephen King Books bracket works
This Stephen King novel ranking is played, not dragged into rows. You get one matchup at a time — Carrie or 'Salem's Lot? The Shining or Rage? — and after 15 picks the bracket has a champion, with everything else placed by how far it got. Nobody can hold 67 books in their head at once, but everybody can answer "this one" — so the order you end up with is one you will actually stand behind.
This bracket runs 4 rounds at the default 16-slot size (Round of 16, Quarterfinals, Semifinals, Final), drawn from a pool of 67 books. Entrants are drawn by a seed that changes daily, and New draw picks a fresh one, so an early upset in one run may never happen in the next. You can also play it at 8 or 32 or 64 slots for a shorter or longer run.
15 picks, 4 rounds
- Round of 168 matchups
- Quarterfinals4 matchups
- Semifinals2 matchups
- Final1 matchup
Roughly 1-2 minutes start to finish at the default size.
All 67 entrants
All 67 entrants are listed below, including Carrie, 'Salem's Lot, The Shining and Rage.
- Carrie1974
- 'Salem's Lot1975
- The Shining1977
- Rage1977 · as Richard Bachman
- The Stand1978
- The Long Walk1979 · as Richard Bachman
- The Dead Zone1979
- Firestarter1980
- Roadwork1981 · as Richard Bachman
- Cujo1981
- The Running Man1982 · as Richard Bachman
- The Gunslinger1982 · The Dark Tower I
- Christine1983
- Pet Sematary1983
- Cycle of the Werewolf1983
- The Talisman1984 · with Peter Straub
- The Eyes of the Dragon1984
- Thinner1984 · as Richard Bachman
- It1986
- The Drawing of the Three1987 · The Dark Tower II
- Misery1987
- The Tommyknockers1987
- The Dark Half1989
- The Waste Lands1991 · The Dark Tower III
- Needful Things1991
- Gerald's Game1992
- Dolores Claiborne1992
- Insomnia1994
- Rose Madder1995
- The Green Mile1996
- Desperation1996
- The Regulators1996 · as Richard Bachman
- Wizard and Glass1997 · The Dark Tower IV
- Bag of Bones1998
- The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon1999
- Dreamcatcher2001
- Black House2001 · with Peter Straub
- From a Buick 82002
- Wolves of the Calla2003 · The Dark Tower V
- Song of Susannah2004 · The Dark Tower VI
- The Dark Tower2004 · The Dark Tower VII
- The Colorado Kid2005
- Cell2006
- Lisey's Story2006
- Blaze2007 · as Richard Bachman
- Duma Key2008
- Under the Dome2009
- 11/22/632011
- The Wind Through the Keyhole2012 · The Dark Tower 4.5
- Joyland2013
- Doctor Sleep2013
- Mr. Mercedes2014 · Bill Hodges
- Revival2014
- Finders Keepers2015 · Bill Hodges
- End of Watch2016 · Bill Hodges
- Gwendy's Button Box2017 · with Richard Chizmar
- Sleeping Beauties2017 · with Owen King
- The Outsider2018
- Elevation2018
- The Institute2019
- Later2021
- Billy Summers2021
- Gwendy's Final Task2022 · with Richard Chizmar
- Fairy Tale2022
- Holly2023
- Never Flinch2025
- Other Worlds Than These2026 · with Peter Straub
Tier list instead?
Load all 67 into the tier list maker and sort them into S through F yourself: same entrants, no matchups.
Open the tier list makerMissing something?
Build your own Stephen King novel bracket with exactly the entrants you want, then share the link.
Open the bracket makerGetting a ranking you actually agree with
- Choose the book you would press into a friend's hands first, not the one you think you should rate higher.
- Start at 16 slots. If the result feels too obvious, replay at 64 so more of the 67 books make the field.
- Watch for the book you keep beating reluctantly. That is usually the sign you should undo and reconsider the pick before it.
Questions people ask
How many books are in the Stephen King Books bracket?
The pool holds 67 books. A default run uses 16 of them and takes 15 picks across 4 rounds: Round of 16, Quarterfinals, Semifinals, Final. Other field sizes are available too — 8, 16, 32, 64 slots.
Which books are included?
Carrie, 'Salem's Lot, The Shining, Rage, The Stand, The Long Walk, The Dead Zone, Firestarter, Roadwork, Cujo, The Running Man and The Gunslinger, plus 55 more. Every entrant is listed further down this page with its artwork.
How long does the Stephen King Books bracket take?
About 1-2 minutes — 15 choices at the default size, or 7 if you drop to an 8-slot bracket. It works the same on a phone as on a desktop, no login is involved, and progress saves as you go.
How does this compare to a drag-and-drop tier list maker?
Both are here, and the bracket is closer to a tier list than it looks. It ends with a champion, a runner-up and then every other book grouped by the round it went out in — which is exactly a set of tiers, decided by 15 direct comparisons rather than by your first guess at a layout. What it deliberately does not do is claim a precise gap between two books that never met. If you would rather place the books into S through F rows yourself, the tier list maker loads all 67 of them at bracketranker.com/tier-list-maker.
How did everyone else rank these books?
Every completed bracket feeds the Stephen King Books community results page, which aggregates win rates across all plays and tracks how often each of the 67 entrants takes the title. It updates continuously, so it moves as more people play.
Can I build my own stephen king books bracket?
Use the bracket maker: add your own books, name it, and share the link so other people play the same field. That is the route to take when this pool of 67 is missing something you would have picked, or when you want a version scoped to one era, label or franchise.