The best thriller audiobooks, ranked by the data
Ranked by weighted listener rating, the best thriller audiobook in our dataset is The Martian by Andy Weir: 4.40★ across 331 ratings and 12 estimated listening hours. We scored every published thriller audiobook in our dataset: 289 qualify (thriller-shelved titles with full pages here), carrying 13,054 listener ratings between them. The top 20 are below. No opinions: the formula in the method note decides the order.
The top 20
The Martian by Andy Weir
About 12 days at an hour a day, 9% longer than the average fantasy audiobook.
The Complete Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle
About 34 days at an hour a day, 286% longer than the average mystery audiobook.
The Green Mile by Stephen King
About 14 days at an hour a day, 12% longer than the average thriller audiobook.
Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson
About 28 days at an hour a day, 120% longer than the average thriller audiobook.
As Good As Dead by Holly Jackson
About 15 days at an hour a day, 21% longer than the average thriller audiobook.
Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett
About 9 days at an hour a day, 19% shorter than the average fantasy audiobook.
The Stand by Stephen King
About 35 days at an hour a day, 177% longer than the average thriller audiobook.
The Lost World by Michael Crichton
About 13 days at an hour a day, right at the average thriller length.
Anathem by Neal Stephenson
About 28 days at an hour a day, 152% longer than the average fantasy audiobook.
Sahara by Clive Cussler
About 17 days at an hour a day, 38% longer than the average thriller audiobook.
Guest List by Lucy Foley
About 10 days at an hour a day, 20% shorter than the average thriller audiobook.
Leviathan Falls by James S. A. Corey
About 18 days at an hour a day, 57% longer than the average fantasy audiobook.
The Terror by Dan Simmons
About 23 days at an hour a day, 85% longer than the average thriller audiobook.
The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón
About 16 days at an hour a day, 27% longer than the average thriller audiobook.
The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice
About 18 days at an hour a day, 116% longer than the average romance audiobook.
Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton
About 14 days at an hour a day, 10% longer than the average thriller audiobook.
The Shining by Stephen King
About 15 days at an hour a day, 22% longer than the average thriller audiobook.
Then She Was Gone by Lisa Jewell
About 12 days at an hour a day, right at the average thriller length.
Thunderhead by Neal Shusterman
About 17 days at an hour a day, 35% longer than the average thriller audiobook.
Jaws by Peter Benchley
About 10 days at an hour a day, 26% shorter than the average thriller audiobook.
How this ranking works
Every published thriller audiobook in our dataset qualifies: 289 books. Each is scored by its Open Library listener rating weighted by its rating count: score = (v·R + 50·C) ÷ (v + 50), where R is the book's rating, v its number of ratings, and C = 4.03★ the mean across all 2,178 published books we measured. Fewer ratings pull a score toward that mean, so a high rating on a handful of votes can't outrank a slightly lower one backed by hundreds. A book ranks here only when its own Open Library subject data confirms the thriller shelf; surfacing in a thriller search alone doesn't qualify it. Children's titles, memoirs and autobiographies are excluded from these rankings; they keep their regular book pages. No editorial picks, no sponsored placement. Dataset build 2026-08-17; rankings recompute with every data refresh. Full methodology · All thriller audiobooks we measured
Listen to any of these free
New members at audiobooks.com get three free audiobooks with the trial.
Start listening free