12/22/2025
Looking for a last minute gift for a special kiddo? This list has the top 25 best picture books from the last 25 years. So many favorites of my family on this list but also some new ones we’ve never read. I also love af the end of each book description is a “if you liked this then we recommend this” list and “if you likes this, then read this when you are older” for further ideas.
Which picture book is a favorite at your house?
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Back in 2010, a death knell in the New York Times declared that picture books were “No Longer a Staple for Children.” Many achievement-focused parents were sending their kids straight to chapter books, and when they did buy books, online, and away from helpful booksellers and librarians, they tended to fall back on familiar old favorites, usually Seuss or Sendak. But far from dying, the industry rallied, even publishing a manifesto—and a revolution that was quietly underway before that NYT article has flourished out into the open. Not just with more diverse books, either, but with books that reinvent the whole form.
To celebrate this revolution, Slate set out to figure out which are the best picture books published since 2000, surveying more than a hundred experts—authors, illustrators, editors, booksellers, librarians, academics—about their favorites. We read 200 picture books ourselves, to make our final determinations. The result is our list: The 25 Greatest Picture Books of the Past 25 Years. It’s full of innovative, subversive, delightful, moving, and hilarious gems, but it’s also a miniature history of children’s literature in the 21st century. https://slate.trib.al/vrNjrDz