: Re: ISBN - does it uniquely identify book dimension? (I'm not sure this question fits here but this site seems the most appropriate within stackexchange network...) I'm trying to buy a some book

@RJPawlick285

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I am pretty sure that the ISBN number would be different if the dimensions of the book were not the same. I know that ISBN numbers are not the same when the paper stock is changed to be "acid free", so even with the same dimension a book could have different ISBN numbers.

Publishers use ISBN numbers to keep track of their inventory and costs/profits, etc... So they certainly would want to know which dimension of the book was ordered more often, and of course the buyers would want think that if they ordered a book with the same ISBN number as someone else they would get the same identical book.

However I would think it is up to the publisher to decide. For instance, if there was a minor adjustment to the paper size and they were no longer going to be offering the older size, the publisher may just decide to keep the same ISBN number.

To summarize:

Different versions of the book may have different ISBN, or may have the same ISBN
ISBN does not uniquely identify a book dimension.

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