The Greatest Biography Books of All Time

Click to learn how this list is calculated.

This list represents a comprehensive and trusted collection of the greatest books. Developed through a specialized algorithm, it brings together 759 'best of' book lists to form a definitive guide to the world's most acclaimed books. For those interested in how these books are chosen, additional details can be found on the rankings page.

View: List Grid Table
Filter by: Genres Dates Countries

Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
156 The Autobiography of Malcolm X Alex Haley 1965 American English
198 The Double Helix James D. Watson 1968 American English
319 The Life of Samuel Johnson James Boswell 1791 British English
477 The Right Stuff Tom Wolfe 1979 American English
494 Roots Alex Haley 1976 American English
498 The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas Gertrude Stein 1933 American English
611 Wild Swans Jung Chang 1991 Chinese English
624 Hiroshima John Hersey 1946 American English
626 The Second World War Winston Churchill 1948 British English
659 Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass Frederick Douglass 1845 American English
685 Facundo Domingo Faustino Sarmiento 1845 Argentinian Spanish
688 The Tipping Point Malcolm Gladwell 2000 American English
772 Parallel Lives Plutarch 100 Greek Greek
790 The Power Broker Robert Caro 1974 American English
807 The Color of Water James McBride 1995 American English
824 The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks Rebecca Skloot 2010 American English
825 The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin Benjamin Franklin 1791 American English
834 The Death and Life of Great American Cities Jane Jacobs 1961 American English
866 The Worst Journey in the World Apsley Cherry-Garrard 1922 British English
876 Eminent Victorians Lytton Strachey 1918 British English
955 Mein Kampf Adolf Hitler 1925 German German
1006 The Devil In The White City Erik Larson 2003 American English
1050 Reflections on the Revolution in France Edmund Burke 1790 British English
1053 Team of Rivals Doris Kearns Goodwin 2005 American English
1061 Small Is Beautiful E. F. Schumacher 1973 British English
1231 The Drowned and the Saved Primo Levi 1986 Italian Italian
1238 A Distant Mirror Barbara Wertheim Tuchman 1978 American English
1237 Profiles in Courage John F. Kennedy 1956 American English
1246 Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl Harriet Jacobs 1861 American English
1247 The Life of Charlotte Brontë Elizabeth Gaskell 1857 British English
1272 Truman David McCullough 1992 American English
1292 Lives of the Caesars Suetonius 121 Roman Latin
1292 Brief Lives John Aubrey 1898 British English
1347 Moneyball Michael M. Lewis 2003 American English
1382 Unbroken Laura Hillenbrand 2010 American English
1389 In the Heart of the Sea Nathaniel Philbrick 2000 American English
1440 The Emperor of All Maladies Siddhartha Mukherjee 2010 American English
1463 Venice Jan Morris 1960 British English
1509 The Face of Battle John Keegan 1976 British English
1607 The Last Lion William Manchester 1983 American English
1632 Rising Tide John Barry 1997 American English
1660 When Breath Becomes Air Paul Kalanithi 2016 American English
1661 The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich William L. Shirer 1960 American English
1679 Chronicles Bob Dylan 2004 American English
1682 Galileo Bertolt Brecht 1938 German German
1691 Henry James Leon Edel 1953 American English
1727 A Tale of Love and Darkness Amos Oz 2002 Israeli Hebrew
1812 Citizens Simon Schama 1989 British English
1812 Lives of the Artists Giorgio Vasari 1550 Italian Italian
1812 Wonderful Adventures of Mrs. Seacole in Many Lands Mary Seacole 1857 Jamaican English
1823 The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt Edmund Morris 1979 American English
1887 Evicted Matthew Desmond 2016 American English
1896 Coming Of Age In Mississippi Anne Moody 1968 American English
1932 Rights of Man Thomas Paine 1791 British English
1939 The Hare with Amber Eyes Edmund de Waal 2010 British English
1959 March John Lewis 2013 American English
1998 Essays, First And Second Series Ralph Waldo Emerson 1841 American English
2039 Life of Christ Giovanni Papini 1921 Italian Italian
2039 Borstal Boy Brendan Behan 1958 Irish English
2377 R. E. Lee Douglas Southall Freeman 1934 American English
2423 The History of the Standard Oil Company Ida Tarbell 1904 American English
2480 Black Elk Speaks John G. Neihardt 1932 American English
2512 I Have Lived a Thousand Years Livia Bitton-Jackson 1997 Hungarian English
2521 All But My Life Gerda Weissmann Klein 1957 American English
2560 The Age Of Wonder Richard Holmes 2008 British English
2593 We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families Philip Gourevitch 1998 American English
2625 Last Train to Memphis Peter Guralnick 1994 American English
2649 John Keats Walter Jackson Bate 1963 American English
2659 Diane Arbus Marvin Israel, Doon Arbus 1972 American English
2686 Van Loon's Lives Hendrik Willem van Loon 1942 Dutch English
2730 The Great Bridge David McCullough 1972 American English
2736 Memoirs of Cardinal De Retz Cardinal de Retz 1717 French French
2739 Memoirs of Louis XIV Louis de Rouvroy Saint-Simon (duc de) 1740 French French
2799 A Fire on the Moon Norman Mailer 1970 American English
2799 Patrimony Philip Roth 1991 American English
2799 Naples 44 Norman Lewis 1978 British English
2799 Oliver Cromwell L. du Garde Peach 1963 British English
2909 Microbe Hunters Paul de Kruif 1926 American English
2915 Samuel Johnson Walter Jackson Bate 1977 American English
2943 The Man Who Loved Only Numbers Paul Hoffman 1998 American English
2946 Gorillas In The Mist Dian Fossey 1983 American English
2953 The Big Sea Langston Hughes 1940 American English
2953 Midnight In Chernobyl Adam Higginbotham 2024 British English
2953 Beethoven's Letters Ludwig van Beethoven 1866 German German
2953 Memories And Commentaries Igor Stravinsky 1960 Russian English
2953 Alan Turing Andrew Hodges 1983 British English
2953 Dr. Johnson & Mr. Savage Richard Holmes 1993 British English
2953 The Quest For Corvo A. J. A. Symons 1934 British English
2953 The Invisible Woman Claire Tomalin 1990 British English
2953 English Society In The Eighteenth Century Roy Porter 1982 British English
2953 C John Diamond 1998 British English
2953 Climbing Mount Improbable Richard Dawkins 1996 British English
2953 Mendeleyev's Dream Paul Strathern 2000 British English
2953 In Siberia Colin Thubron 1999 British English
3041 Great Heart James West Davidson, John Rugge 1988 American English
3077 Lust For Life Irving Stone 1934 American English
3127 Treatise on Radioactivity Marie Curie 1910 French French
3127 The Battle with the Slum Jacob A. Riis 1902 Danish English
3127 The Silent Steppe Mukhamet Shayakhmetov 2006 Kazakh English
3127 Memoirs Of A Revolutionist Vera Figner 1920 Russian Russian
3127 The Memoirs Of Princess Dashkova Ekaterina Romanovna Dashkova 1840 Russian Russian
3127 Young Man Luther Erik H. Erikson 1958 German English
3127 Galileo's Daughter Dava Sobel 1999 American English
3326 Jefferson and His Time Dumas Malone 1948 American English
3329 Pictures At A Revolution Mark Harris 2008 American English
3342 The Age of Jackson Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr 1945 American English
3353 Cosmos Carl Sagan 1980 American English
3357 Present at the Creation Dean Acheson 1969 American English
3361 A Bright Shining Lie Neil Sheehan 1988 American English
3364 The House of Morgan Ron Chernow 1990 American English
3368 James Joyce Richard Ellmann 1959 American English
3370 Working Studs Terkel 1974 American English
3382 London Peter Ackroyd 2000 British English
3384 A Midwife's Tale Laurel Thatcher Ulrich 1990 American English
3392 The Gate of Heavenly Peace Jonathan Spence 1981 American English
3397 Florence Nightingale Cecil Woodham-Smith 1950 British English
3404 Vermeer Lawrence Gowing 1952 British English
3411 The American Political Tradition Richard Hofstadter 1948 American English
3419 Melbourne David Cecil 1939 British English
3420 The Path to Power Robert Caro 1982 American English