Where to Find the Best Deals on College Textbooks - 4 Sites to Save You Money

As students on vacation enter the month of August, it becomes clear that the beginning of college is just around the corner. And with that realization comes the grueling search for this semester's college textbooks. Should you buy from the bookstore? Or should you scavenge online? What is the best way to search for books, and where are the best places for books? The answers are here.

When shopping online, keep a few things in mind. First, since there are thousands of college books out there, try to make your search phrases more advanced by adding in an ISBN number (each book has a unique set of numbers that identifies that particular book, edition, author, and publication year). When typing in the name of the textbook in a keyword search box, try something like "Advanced Biology Campbell," not just "Advanced Biology." Or scrap the name completely and just go by ISBN search (every site now offers to search by ISBN, and most colleges now have ISBN numbers to go along with your list of needed textbooks).

So what online sites are the best for book shopping? There are 4 sites that will offer you the best deals and the best selection:

First, there is www.campusi.com. The site is not a bookseller, and you cannot order anything from it, but the site is actually a highly advanced search engine for books. You type in the keywords for the book, and CampusI will search all over the internet for all of the available sellers online, showing you the results from the lowest price to the highest price (like a Google for books). Clicking on individual results will then link you to a seller's site where you can read more information about the exact college textbook that is being sold. This site is by far the best on the internet, since it does thousands of searches for you within a few seconds, saving you time and money.

Second, there is www.half.com. A part of eBay, half.com offers some of the best deals that can be found on college textbooks. You can search by ISBN, keywords, titles, or authors. When choosing a seller and a price, don't always go for the cheapest buy. You should look at a seller's experience and percent of positive reviews. The higher the reviews and the percent, the more confident you should be to buy from that seller since others have already had a positive shopping experience with that seller.

Third, there's www.amazon.com. Within Amazon you can search for "Books" and "Textbooks," simply enter the title and author of the textbook. Amazon will find the best matches and will categorize them by price with a picture of the textbook. Keep in mind that some sellers may charge shipping fees.

Finally, there is www.bn.com. Barnes & Noble has a textbook section built into its site which offers you the ability to search for a book and find sellers in a way that resembles how www.half.com works. Barnes & Noble appears to offer more expensive results than the other options listed above, but when a textbook cannot be found or no good-condition books are being sold, Barnes & Noble may be your only option.