Who owns Harry Potter (US publishing)?
Harry Potter (US publishing) is made and sold by Scholastic (the United States, NASDAQ: SCHL) under licence, an arrangement in place since 1998; Scholastic does not own the name.[1] The name is owned by another company.
Evidence: Scholastic Corporation Annual Report on Form 10-K filed 2026-07-24, SEC EDGAR, 24 July 2026. Verified from filings; last checked .
Key facts
- Licensed to
- Scholastic Corporation verified
- Since
- Headquarters
- 🇺🇸 United States, New York, New York
- Origin
- 🇬🇧 United Kingdom
- Founded
- 1997
- Category
- Media & entertainment › Publishing › Book publishers
- Parent ticker
- NASDAQ: SCHL
- Last verified
- · 1 sources
About Harry Potter (US publishing)
Scholastic licenses American publishing rights to Harry Potter, bought for $105,000 at auction in 1997 when the author was unknown. It does not own the books: Bloomsbury publishes them in Britain and the rights belong to the author, so the same series has different publishers on each side of the Atlantic. Scholastic also changed the first book's title for the American market, a decision the author has since said she regrets agreeing to.
Ownership timeline of Harry Potter (US publishing)
Where Harry Potter (US publishing) sits in Scholastic
Controlling ownership as of . Brands grouped under the entity that owns them; large groups are collapsed.
Open the full Scholastic ownership tree →
See the full Scholastic brand portfolio (3) →
Other brands owned by Scholastic
Scholastic controls 4 brands on Brandtree, 4 of them in media & entertainment.
Also in media & entertainment
- Clifford the Big Red Dog (1963)
- Goosebumps (1992)
- Scholastic (1920)
Other brands in book publishers, and who owns them
The 34 brands in book publishers on Brandtree belong to 9 owners. The largest is Lagardère, with 13; Scholastic has 3.
| Brand | Owner | Owner based in |
|---|---|---|
| Bragelonne | Lagardère | 🇫🇷 France |
| Bokfabriken | Storytel | 🇸🇪 Sweden |
| Macmillan Education | Springer Nature | 🇩🇪 Germany |
| Dummies | Wiley | 🇺🇸 United States |
| Penguin Books | Bertelsmann | 🇩🇪 Germany |
| Kids Can Press | Corus | 🇨🇦 Canada |
| Kadokawa Bunko | Kadokawa | 🇯🇵 Japan |
| HarperCollins | News Corp | 🇺🇸 United States |
About the owner: Scholastic
Scholastic is a publicly listed company headquartered in New York, New York, United States, founded in 1920.
Scholastic is the largest publisher and distributor of children's books in the world, and reaches much of its audience through book fairs and classroom clubs rather than bookshops. That direct route into schools is what made it the American publisher of Harry Potter.
🇬🇧 Harry Potter (US publishing) and other British brands
Brandtree records a controlling owner for 552 brands that began in the United Kingdom. 291 of them (53%) are now controlled by a company headquartered in another country, Harry Potter (US publishing) among them.
- Anime Limited — TOHO 🇯🇵
- BelfastLive — Reach 🇬🇧
- Celtic FC Women — Celtic plc 🇬🇧
- Chrysalis Records — Reservoir 🇺🇸
- Country Life — Future 🇬🇧
- Eventim Apollo — CTS Eventim 🇩🇪
Frequently asked questions
Who makes Harry Potter (US publishing)?
Scholastic makes and sells Harry Potter (US publishing) under a licensing agreement that has been in place since 1998.
Does Scholastic own Harry Potter (US publishing)?
No. Scholastic holds a licence to make and sell Harry Potter (US publishing), which is not the same as owning it.
Where did Harry Potter (US publishing) come from?
Harry Potter (US publishing) originated in the United Kingdom in 1997.
Sources (1) & corrections
Last verified . Every ownership fact above is backed by one of these primary documents. Numbers in brackets in the text refer to this list.
- [1] Scholastic Corporation Annual Report on Form 10-K filed 2026-07-24 — SEC EDGAR, SEC Form 10-K, published 24 July 2026; retrieved 16 September 2026.
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