Books Recommended by Tim Ferriss

tim ferriss book recommendations

Who is Tim Ferriss:

Host of the popular podcast with over 900 million downloads, author of multiple bestselling books, investor, thinker and reader.

What’s on the list: 

Manually going through all 700+ transcripts of the Tim Ferriss show to find the books he recommends, and when possible, separate them from the books recommended by his guests, some of which will have separate book lists.

Books by Tim Ferriss: The 4-Hour WorkweekThe 4-Hour Body, The 4-Hour Chef, Tools of Titans, Tribe of Mentors

Man’s Search for Meaning, by Victor Frankl

Letters from a Stoic, by Seneca

Mastery, by Robert Greene 

The 48 Laws of Power, by Robert Greene

The Obstacle is the Way, by Ryan Holiday

Ego is the Enemy, by Ryan Holiday

Daily Rituals, by Mason Currey 

The Checklist Manifesto, by Atul Gawande

Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less, by Greg McKeown

Influence, by Robert B. Cialdini 

Dune, by Frank Herbert

The War of Art, by Steven Pressfield

The Art of Learning, by Josh Waitzkin 

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, by Robert Pirsig

A Moveable Feast, by Ernest Hemingway

The Tao of Seneca

Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky

Antifragile, by Nassim Taleb

Black Swan, by Nassim Taleb

Fooled By Randomness, by Nassim Taleb

The Bed of Procrustes, by Nassim Taleb

Meditations, by Marcus Aurelius

The Tipping Point, by Malcolm Gladwell

Outliers, by Malcolm Gladwell

Blink, by Malcolm Gladwell

David and Goliath, by Malcolm Gladwell

The Hero’s Journey, by Joseph Campbell

Tao Te Ching, by Lao Tzu

Brain Rules, by John Medina

Vagabonding, by Rolf Potts

Walden, by by Henry David Thoreau

Chicken Soup for the Soul, co-written by Jack Canfield

Ben Franklin, by Walter Isaacson

How to Live, by Sarah Bakewell

The fish that ate the whale, by Rich Cohen

Venture Deals, by Brad Feld and Jason Mendelson

Choose Yourself!, by James Altucher

The Control of Nature, by John McPhee

The Paradox of Choice: Why More is Less, by Barry Schwartz

Freakonomics, by Stephen Dubner

Levels of the Game, by John McFee

Think Like a Freak: The Authors of Freakonomics Offer to Retrain Your Brain, by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner 

Blue Ocean Strategy, by W. Chan Kim, Renée Mauborgne

Business Model Generation, by Alexander Osterwalder, Yves Pigneur

Steal Like An Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative, by Austin Kleon

Play It Away: A Workaholic’s Cure for Anxiety, by Charlie Hoehn

The Graveyard Book, and other Neil Gaiman books

The Artist’s Way, by Julia Cameron

Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain, by John J. Ratey MD and Eric Hagerman

Lying, by Sam Harris

The Game, by Neil Strauss

Emergency, by Neil Strauss

Everyone Loves You When You’re Dead, by Neil Strauss

Atlas Shrugged, by Ayn Rand

Spartan Up, by Joe De Sena

The Power of No, by James Altucher

Losing My Virginity, by Richard Branson

Stranger in a Strange Land, by Robert A. Heinlein 

Tuxedo Park, by Jennet Conant

Dying Every Day: Seneca at the Court of Nero, by James S. Romm

Jesus’ Son, by Denis Johnson 

Cat’s Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut 

What Technology Wants, by Kevin Kelly

The Inevitable: Understanding the 12 Technological Forces That Will Shape Our Future, by Kevin Kelly

The Adventures of Johnny Bunko: The Last Career Guide You’ll Ever Need, by Daniel H. Pink

Zero to One, by Peter Thiel

What I Learned Losing a Million Dollars, by Brendan Moynihan

Buffett: The Making of an American Capitalist, by Roger Lowenstein

Once in Golconda: A True Drama of Wall Street 1920-1928, by John Brooks

Good to Great, by Jim Collins

I Will Teach You to Be Rich, by Ramit Sethi

Age of Propaganda, by Anthony Pratkanis, Elliot Aronson

Social Animal, by David Brooks

As a Man Thinketh, by James Allen

Tony Robbins books

Awaken the Giant Within, by Tony Robbins

Unshakeable, by Tony Robbins

Money Master the Game, by Tony Robbins

Open: An Autobiography by Agassi, Andre

Adventures in the Screen Trade, by William Goldman

Wilderness Essays, by John Muir

Waking Up, by Sam Harris

Freewill, by Sam Harris

Radical Acceptance, by Tara Brach

On Writing Well, by William Zinsser

The Art of Nonfiction, by Ayn Rand

Bird by Bird, by Anne Lamott

Story: Substance, Structure, Style and the Principles of Screenwriting, by Robert McKee

Save The Cat!, by Blake Snyder

Leaves of Grass, by Walt Whitman

Managing Oneself, by Peter Drucker

Cryptonomicon, by Neal Stephenson

How to Measure Anything, by Douglas W. Hubbard

Don’t Make Me Think, by Steve Krug

Think Twice: Harnessing the Power of Counterintuition, by Michael J. Mauboussin

Getting to Yes, by Roger Fisher

Getting Past No, by William Ury

Zorba the Greek, by Nikos Kazantzakis

Musashi, by Eiji Yoshikawa

The Magic of Thinking Big, by David Schwartz

The Straight-A Conspiracy, by Hunter Maats, Katie O’Brien

Bad Science, by Ben Goldacre

If This Is a Man and The Truce, by Primo Levi

Future Crimes, by Marc Goodman

Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!, by Richard P. Feynman

Mistakes Were Made, But Not By Me, by Carol Tavris, Elliot Aronson

Ten Percent Happier, by Dan Harris

Peace Is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life, by Thich Nhat Hanh

Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything, by Joshua Foer

Your Memory : How It Works and How to Improve It, by Kenneth L. Higbee 

Spectacle, by David Rockwell, Bruce Mau

In Praise of Idleness, by Bertrand Russell 

Deadlift Dynamite, by Pavel Tsatsouline, Andy Bolton

Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think, by Peter H. Diamandis

Total Recall, by Arnold Schwarzenegger

Endurance, by Alfred Lansing

The Year Without Pants, by Scott Berkun

Field Guide to Getting Lost, by Rebecca Solnit

The Effective Executive, by Peter F. Drucker

Words That Work, by Dr. Frank Luntz

The Art of the Start, by Guy Kawasaki 

The Starfish and the Spider, by Ori Brafman, Rod A. Beckstrom

Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming, by Stephen LaBerge

What I Learned Losing a Million Dollars, by Jim Paul, Brendan Moynihan

Getting Things Done, by David Allen 

The Art of Asking, by Amanda Palmer

Dropping Ashes on the Buddha, by Zen Master Seung Sahn

A Short History of Nearly Everything, by Bill Bryson

A Walk in the Woods, by Bill Bryson

Mother Tongue: English and How it Got that Way, by Bill Bryson

At Home, by Bill Bryson

We Learn Nothing, by Tim Kreider

Book of Virtues, by William J. Bennett

Kitchen Confidential, by Anthony Bourdain

English as a Second F*cking Language, by Sterling Johnson

Who, by Geoff Smart, Randy Street

The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing, by Al Ries, Jack Trout

Ogilvie on Advertising, by David Ogilvy

Small Giants, by Bo Burlingham 

Starting Strengths, by Mark Rippetoe

Recession Proof Graduate, by Charlie Hoehn

Sacred Cows: The Truth about Divorce and Marriage by Danielle Teller

What If?: Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions, by Randall Munroe

The Name of the Wind, by Patrick Rothfuss

Motherless Brooklyn, by Jonathan Lethem

A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeleine L’Engle

Wherever You Go, There You Are, by Jon Kabat-Zinn

Hell Yeah or No: what’s worth doing, by Derek Sivers

Anything You Want, by Derek Sivers

Predictably Irrational, by Dan Ariely

Siddhartha, by Hermann Hesse

The Man Who Quit Money, by Mark Sundeen

The Flavor Bible, by Andrew Dornenburg, Karen Page

The Drama of the Gifted Child, by Alice Miller

The Power of Habit, by Charles Duhigg

The Talent Code, by Daniel Coyle

The Diamond Age, by Neal Stephenson

Gates of Fire, by Steven Pressfield

On Combat, by Dave Grossman, Loren W. Christensen

The New Toughness Training for Sports, by James E. Loehr

Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World, by General Stanley McChrystal

Superintelligence, by Nick Bostrom

Stumbling On Happiness, by Daniel Gilbert

The Road to Character, by David Brooks

Deep Survival: Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why, by Laurence Gonzales

Natural Born Heroes: Mastering the Lost Secrets of Strength and Endurance, by Christopher McDougall

Bold: How to Go Big, Create Wealth and Impact the World, by Peter H. Diamandis, Steven Kotler

Fifty Nine Seconds: Change Your Life in Under a Minute, by Richard Wiseman

The ONE Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth Behind Extraordinary Results, by Gary Keller, Jay Papasan

SuperBetter, by Jane McGonigal

Suffering Is Optional: Three Keys to Freedom and Joy, by Cheri Huber

A Path with Heart, by Jack Kornfield

A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy, by William B. Irvine 

It’s All Too Much, by Peter Walsh

The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, by Marie Kondō

Love Yourself Like Your Life Depends on It, by Kamal Ravikant

Pleasure of Finding Things Out, by Richard P. Feynman

The Book of Life, by Jiddu Krishnamurti

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, by Yuval Harari

The Rational Optimist, by Matt Ridley

The Evolution of Everything, by Matt Ridley

Poor Charlie’s Almanac, by Charles T. Munger

The Origins of Virtue, by Matt Ridley

Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson

The Lies of Locke Lamora, by Scott Lynche

What Do You Care What Other People Think?, by Richard P. Feynman

Start with Why, by Simon Sinek

Rising Strong, by Brené Brown

Daring Greatly, by Brené Brown

The Gifts of Imperfection, by Brené Brown

The Alchemist, by Paulo Coelho

The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, by Stephen R. Covey

The Startup of You, by Reid Hoffman, Ben Casnocha

The Alliance: Managing Talent in the Networked Age, by Reid Hoffman, Ben Casnocha

The Wim Hof Method: Activate Your Full Human Potential, by Wim Hof

How to Be a Star at Work, by Robert E. Kelley

Topgrading, by Bradford D. Smart Ph.D. 

The Year of Living Biblically, by A. J. Jacobs

How to Stop Worrying and Start Living, by Dale Carnegie

How to Win Friends and Influence People, by Dale Carnegie

Guerrilla Financing, by Bruce Blechman & Jay Conrad Levinson

Autobiography of a Yogi, by Yogananda

The Way of the Animal Powers, by Joseph Campbell

How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big: Kind of the Story of My Life, by Scott Adams

The Dilbert Principle: A Cubicle’s-Eye View of Bosses, Meetings, Management Fads & Other Workplace Afflictions, by Scott Adams

God’s Debris: A Thought Experiment, by Scott Adams

Extreme Ownership: How U.S. Navy SEALs Lead and Win, by Jocko Willink and Leif Babin

Blood Meridian, by Cormac McCarthy

The Conquest of Happiness, by Bertrand Russell

More Money Than God, by Sebastian Mallaby

Liar’s Poker, by Michael Lewis

Flash Boys, by Michael Lewis

You Can Be a Stock Market Genius, by Joel Greenblatt

The Smartest Investment Book You’ll Ever Read, by Daniel R. Solin 

Random Walk Down Wall Street, by Burton G. Malkiel

The 80/20 Principle: The Secret to Achieving More with Less, by Richard Koch

Less is More; an Anthology of Ancient and Modern Voices in Praise of Simplicity, by Goldian VandenBroeck

The Essential Scratch & Sniff Guide To Becoming A Whiskey Know-It-All, by Richard Betts

In Praise of Shadows, by Junichiro Tanizaki

The Crossroads of Should and Must: Find and Follow Your Passion, by Elle Luna

Margin of Safety, by Seth A. Klarman

Built to Sell: Creating a Business That Can Thrive Without You, by John Warrillow

The E-Myth Revisited, by Michael E. Gerber

#girlboss, by Sophia Amoruso

Letters to a Young Poet, by Rainer Maria Rilke

Let My People Go Surfing, by Yvon Chouinard

The Guide to the I Ching, by Carol K. Anthony

Dark Matter and the Dinosaurs, by Lisa Randall

It’s Not How Good You Are, It’s How Good You Want to Be, by Paul Arden

Screwtape Letters, by C. S. Lewis

The Language of God, by Francis S. Collins

The Emperor of All Maladies, by Siddhartha Mukherjee

Essays In Love, by Alain de Botton

How Proust Can Change Your Life, by Alain de Botton

Status Anxiety, by Alain de Botton

The Architecture of Happiness, by Alain de Botton

Cook With Jamie, by Jamie Oliver

Seven Fires, by Francis Mallmann

Essays, by Michel de Montaigne

The Explorers Guild: A Passage to Shambhala, by Kevin Costner

The NeverEnding Story, by Michael Ende

The Golden Compass, by Philip Pullman

Reasons and Persons, by Derek Parfit

The Most Good You Can Do, by Peter Singer

Doing Good Better, by William MacAskill

Mindfulness, by Mark Williams and Danny Penman

The Power of Persuasion, by Robert Levine

Chimpanzee Politics: Power and Sex Among Apes, by Frans de Waal

The Book with No Pictures, by B. J. Novak

A Complaint Free World, by Will Bowen

The Bassoon King, by Rainn Wilson

The Family Virtues Guide, by Linda Kavelin Popov

Chew on Life’s Big Questions, by Rainn Wilson

Seeking Wisdom: From Darwin to Munger, by Peter Bevelin

Omnivore’s Dilemma, by Michael Pollan

Happy Money: the Science of Happier Spending, by Elizabeth Dunn 

The Power of Broke, by Daymond John

Buddhism Without Beliefs, by Stephen Batchelor

Mindset, by Carol S. S. Dweck

The Hard Thing About Hard Things, by Ben Horowitz 

Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, by Jack Weatherford

The Lessons of History, by Will Durant, Ariel Durant 

Too Soon Old, Too Late Smart, by Gordon Livingston

Lynchpin, by Seth Godin

Tribes, by Seth Godin

The Dip, by Seth Godin

Purple Cow, by Seth Godin

Permission Marketing, by Seth Godin

The Art of Possibility, by Rosamund Stone Zander, Benjamin Zander

Debt, by David Graeber

Guns, Germs and Steel, by Jared Diamond

In Defense of Elitism, by Joel Stein

What I’ve Learned, by Cal Fussman

The Power Broker, by Robert A. Caro

One Hundred Years of Solitude, by Gabrielle Garcia Marquez

Speak Like Churchill, Stand Like Lincoln, by James C. Humes

Between the World and Me, by Ta-Nehisi Coates 

The Baron in the Trees, by Italo Calvino

Nourishing Traditions, by Sally Fallon, Mary G. Enig

The Bhagavad Gita

The Gutsy Girl: Escapades for Your Life of Epic Adventure, by Caroline Paul

A Beginner’s Guide to the End: Practical Advice for Living Life and Facing Death, by Dr. BJ Miller

Grit, by Angela Duckworth

Keto Clarity, by Jimmy Moore, Eric Westman

Crucial Conversations, by Joseph Grenny and others

River Cottage A to Z, by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall

A Curious Discovery, by John S. Hendricks

Coming into the Country, by John McPhee

About Face, by Col. David H. Hackworth

Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini

Essential Zen Habits, by Leo Babauta

Sacred Economics, by Charles Eisenstein 

The Perfect Storm, by Sebastian Junger

War, by Sebastian Junger

Tribe, by Sebastian Junger

Freedom, by Sebastian Junger

At Play in the Fields of the Lord, by Peter Matthiessen

Four Steps to the Epiphany, by Steve Blank

High Output Management, by Andrew S. Grove

Born Standing Up, by Steve Martin

Secrets of Power Negotiation, by Roger Dawson

I Will Teach You to Be Rich, by Ramit Sethi

Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury

How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia, by Mohsin Hamid

Strangers to Ourselves, by Rachel Aviv

Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future, by Ashlee Vance

Deep Work, by Cal Newport

The Fault in Our Stars, by John Green 

The Miracle of Mindfulness, by Thich Nhat Hanh

The Mind of Mnemonist, by Aleksandr R. Luria

The Wisdom of Crowds, by James Surowiecki

The Distracted Mind, by Adam Gazzaley

On Food and Cooking, by Harold McGee

Mythical Man-Month, by Frederick Brooks Jr.

Becoming Wise, by Krista Tippett

Amusing Ourselves to Death, by Neil Postman

Outlive: The Science and Art of Longevity, by Peter Attia

Suggestible You, by Erik Vance

Healing Back Pain: The Mind-Body Connection, by John E. Sarno

Rework, by Jason Fried, David Heinemeier Hansson

Remote: Office Not Required,  by Jason Fried, David Heinemeier Hansson

Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us. by Daniel H. Pink

The Myth of the Spoiled Child, by Alfie Kohn

Maverick: The Success Story Behind the World’s Most Unusual Workplace, by Ricardo Semler

The Origins of Political Order, by Francis Fukuyama

The Age of Absurdity, by Michael Foley

Understanding Exposure, by Bryan Peterson

Gratitude, by Oliver Sachs

On War, by Carl von Clausewitz

Body by Science, by John Little, Doug McGuff

The Loom of Language, by Frederick Bodmer

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, by Mark Manson

The Rise of Superman, by Steven Kotler

How to Bake Everything, by Mark Bittman

Buck Up, Suck Up, by James Carville 

Creativity, Inc., by Ed Catmull, Amy Wallace

What It Takes, by Richard Ben Cramer 

On Death and Dying, by Elisabeth Kübler-Ross 

On Grief and Grieving, by Elisabeth Kübler-Ross 

Rebirth, by Kamal Ravikant

Gift of Fear, by Gavin de Becker

Breakthrough Advertising, by Eugene M. Schwartz

Drop Dead Healthy, by A. J. Jacobs

The Better Angels of Our Nature, by Steven Pinker 

The Righteous Mind, by Jonathan Haidt

The Gift, by Lewis Hyde

Tiny Habits, by B.J. Fogg 

The Intelligent Investor, by Benjamin Graham, Jason Zweig

Stories of Your Life and Others, by Ted Chiang 

I’m Fine… And Other Lies, by Whitney Cummings

The One Minute Workout, by Martin Gibala 

The Inner Game of Tennis, by W. Timothy Gallwey

The Smartest Investment Book You’ll Ever Read, by Daniel R. Solin

The Little Book of Common Sense Investing, by John C. Bogle

The Little Book that Beats the Market, by Joel Greenblatt

The Big Secret for the Small Investor, by Joel Greenblatt

The Sellout, by Paul Beatty

When Things Fall Apart, by Pema Chodron

The Time Paradox, by Philip Zimbardo

The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil, by Philip Zimbardo

The Happy Body, Food for Your Soul, by Jerzy Gregorek

The Seven-Day Weekend, by Ricardo Semler

Brave Enough, by Cheryl Strayed

Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail, by Cheryl Strayed

Tiny Beautiful Things, by Cheryl Strayed

The Lives of Girls and Women, by Alice Munro

The Origin of Species, by Charles Darwin

Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption, by Bryan Stevenson

Living with a SEAL, by Jesse Itzler

Cosmic Queries, by Neil Degrasse Tyson