Thrift stores in Boston
- 19 shops
- 6 thrift
- 13 used books & secondhand
- 2 walking routes
- within 5 mi of downtown
Two minutes covers the Massachusetts Avenue run in Boston, a Goodwill and two branches of Boomerangs in a row. Centre Street spreads three stores over eight minutes, finishing at 40 South St. Vintage. Elm Street has two more. No used bookstore is listed in the city, so the 19 stores here are the whole search, six of them Goodwill.
Chains with several branches: Goodwill (6)
Book-hunting routes
2 routesShops a few minutes' walk apart, in walking order. Do a run in one go and the outliers another day.
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Massachusetts Avenue run3 shops
Goodwill → Boomerangs → Boomerangs
· ~2 min -
Centre Street run3 shops
Goodwill → Diversity Consignment → 40 South St. Vintage
· ~8 min
Showing 19 shops
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0.6 mi
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1.6 mi
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1.8 mi
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Hidden Treasures Secondhand store2.0 mi
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Goodwill Thrift store
Massachusetts Avenue · 02139
Mon–Sat 11:00–18:00 · Massachusetts Avenue run · stop 1
2.2 mi -
Take Spines with you
Heading out in Boston? Read every shelf in one photo.
Point your phone at a shelf. Spines names every book on it, pulls the ratings, and flags the ones worth grabbing for your taste. Free to try, with 3 scans a month on us.
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Boomerangs Secondhand store
Massachusetts Avenue · 02139
Tue–Sun 10:00–18:00 · Massachusetts Avenue run · stop 3
2.2 mi -
Boomerangs Secondhand store
Massachusetts Avenue · 02139
Tue–Sun 10:00–17:00 · Massachusetts Avenue run · stop 2
2.2 mi -
2.3 mi
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2.4 mi
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2.7 mi
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High Energy Vintage Secondhand store
Somerville Avenue
2.7 mi -
3.1 mi
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2nd STREET Secondhand store3.5 mi
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3.6 mi
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The Portal Vintage Secondhand store
Elm Street
3.6 mi -
4.0 mi
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4.4 mi
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4.4 mi
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40 South St. Vintage Secondhand store
South Street · 02130
Thu–Fri 12:00–18:00 · Centre Street run · stop 3
4.6 mi
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Book hunting in Boston
Nearest-first is a decent route plan on its own: cluster your visits, start with the shops closest to each other, and save the outliers for days you're passing anyway. Thrift stores re-shelve constantly, most put new donations out every day or two, so a shop that was quiet on Saturday can be a different shop by Wednesday. Weekday mornings beat weekend afternoons, and it's always worth asking staff when the book cart comes out.
14 of the shops here have their opening hours on record, and 10 of those open on Sundays. Where no hours are listed, nobody has recorded them yet. 13 of the 19 are general second-hand shops.
If you want the odds on your side, read our guides to finding good books in thrift and charity shops and spotting the books worth grabbing before you set out.
Donating books in Boston
6 of the shops here are charity-run and take book donations during opening hours. Ask at the counter for a receipt if you want to claim the donation against tax. Shops pay to dispose of what they cannot sell, so a bad donation costs the charity money. The test before you pack a bag: would someone buy this today? Recent fiction, classics, cookery and children's books move. Old textbooks, out-of-date travel guides and anything damp or mouldy do not.
Our guide to where to donate books covers which shops suit which books, and what to do with a whole house clear-out.
Scanning shelves in Boston?
Spines reads a whole shelf from one photo and shows you which books are worth grabbing, tailored to your taste. Free to try.
Nearby: Thrift stores in Manhattan· Thrift stores in Brooklyn· Thrift stores in Staten Island· Thrift stores in Richmond· Thrift stores in Greensboro· Thrift stores in Chicago
Shop data © OpenStreetMap contributors, available under the Open Database License. Shop details can drift out of date: check opening hours before travelling.