| Year | Author | Title | Publisher | |
| 1981 | | Mornings on Horseback | Simon & Schuster | |
| 1982 | | Waldo Emerson: A Biography | Viking | |
| 1983 | | The Price of Power: Kissinger in the Nixon White House | Summit Books | |
| 1984 | | The Nightmare of Reason | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 1985 | | Solzhenitsyn | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 1986 | | Alexander Pope: A Life | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 1987 | | Hemingway | Simon & Schuster | |
| 1988 | | Nora: The Real Life of Molly Bloom | Houghton Mifflin | |
| 1989 | | This Boy's Life: A Memoir | Atlantic Monthly Press | |
| 1990 | | A First-Class Temperament: The Emergence of Franklin Roosevelt | Harper & Row | |
| 1991 | | Righteous Pilgrim: The Life and Times of Harold L. Ickes, 1874–1952 | Henry Holt | |
| 1992 | | Eleanor Roosevelt: Volume One, 1884–1933 | Viking | |
| 1993 | | Daniel Boone: The Life and Legend of an American Pioneer | Henry Holt | |
| 1994 | | Shot in the Heart | Doubleday | |
| 1995 | | Under My Skin: Volume One of My Autobiography, to 1949 | HarperCollins | |
| 1996 | | Angela's Ashes: A Memoir | Scribner | |
| 1997 | | Whittaker Chambers: A Biography | Random House | |
| 1998 | | Lindbergh | G.P. Putnam's Sons | |
| 1999 | | Secrets of the Flesh: A Life of Colette | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2000 | | Jefferson Davis, American | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2001 | | Theodore Rex | Random House | |
| 2002 | | Master of the Senate: The Years of Lyndon Johnson, Vol. 3 | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2003 | | American Empire: Roosevelt's Geographer and the Prelude to Globalization | University of California Press | |
| 2004 | and Annalyn Swan | de Kooning: An American Master | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2005 | | Matisse the Master: A Life of Henri Matisse, the Conquest of Colour, 1909–1954 | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2006 | | Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2007 | | Young Stalin | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2008 | | Ida: A Sword Among Lions: Ida B. Wells and the Campaign Against Lynching | Amistad/HarperCollins | |
| 2009 | | Dorothea Lange: A Life Beyond Limits | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 2010 | | Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption | Random House | |
| 2011 | | Clarence Darrow: Attorney for the Damned | Doubleday | |
| 2012 | | The Passage of Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2013 | | Bolivar: American Liberator | Simon & Schuster | |
| 2014 | | Napoleon: A Life | Viking | |
| 2015 | | Listening to Stone: The Art and Life of Isamu Noguchi | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2016 | with Jefferson Chase | Hitler: Ascent, 1889–1939 | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2017 | | Henry David Thoreau: A Life | University of Chicago Press | |
| 2018 | | Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom | Simon & Schuster | |
| 2019 | | Our Man: Richard Holbrooke and the End of the American Century | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2020 | | Mad at the World: A Life of John Steinbeck | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 2021 | | Burning Boy: The Life and Work of Stephen Crane | Henry Holt & Company | |
| 2022 | | G-Man: J. Edgar Hoover and the Making of the American Century | Viking Press | |
| 2023 | | | Ecco/HarperCollins | |
| 2024 | | | W. W. Norton & Company | |
| Year | Author | Title | Publisher | |
| 1980 | | Without Fear or Favor | New York Times Books | |
| 1981 | | Prisoner without a Name, Cell without a Number | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 1982 | | | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 1983 | | Lost in the Cosmos | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 1984 | | Cities and the Wealth of Nations | Random House | |
| 1985 | ,, William M. Sullivan, and Steven M. Tipton | Habits of the Heart: Individualism and Commitment in American Life | University of California Press | |
| 1986 | | Move Your Shadow: South Africa, Black and White | Times Books | |
| 1987 | | | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 1988 | | Secrets of the Temple: How the Federal Reserve Runs the Country | Simon & Schuster | |
| 1989 | | Parting the Waters: America in the King Years, 1954–1963 | Simon & Schuster | |
| 1990 | | Disappearing through the Skylight: Culture and Technology in the Twentieth Century | Viking | |
| 1991 | | Why Americans Hate Politics: The Death of the Democratic Process | Simon & Schuster | |
| 1992 | | | The Free Press | |
| 1993 | | Mexican Americans: The Ambivalent Minority | The Free Press | |
| 1994 | | Diplomacy | Simon & Schuster | |
| 1995 | | Life on the Color Line: The True Story of a White Boy Who Discovered He Was Black | Dutton | |
| 1996 | | Love Thy Neighbor: A Story of War | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 1997 | | | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 1998 | | We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed with Our Families: Stories from Rwanda | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 1999 | with Ovie Carter | Sidewalk | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2000 | | Way Out There in the Blue: Reagan, Star Wars and the End of the Cold War | Simon & Schuster | |
| 2001 | | Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America | Metropolitan Books / Henry Holt and Company | |
| 2002 | | Harmful to Minors: The Perils of Protecting Children from Sex | University of Minnesota Press | |
| 2003 | | | Basic Books | |
| 2004 | | Generation Kill: Devil Dogs, Iceman, Captain America and the New Face of American War | G.P. Putnam's Sons | |
| 2005 | | Night Draws Near: Iraq's People in the Shadow of America's War | Henry Holt | |
| 2006 | | Murder in Amsterdam: The Death of Theo van Gogh and the Limits of Tolerance | Penguin Press | |
| 2007 | | Soldier's Heart: Reading Literature Through Peace and War at West Point | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2008 | | Angler: The Cheney Vice Presidency | Penguin Press | |
| 2009 | | Zeitoun | McSweeney's Books | |
| 2010 | | | W. W. Norton & Company | |
| 2011 | | Thinking, Fast and Slow | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2012 | | Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity | Random House | |
| 2013 | | Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital | Crown | |
| 2014 | | | Scribner | |
| 2015 | | Thieves of State: Why Corruption Threatens Global Security | W.W. Norton and Company | |
| 2016 | with Bela Shayevich | Secondhand Time: The Last of the Soviets | Random House | |
| 2017 | | Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right's Stealth Plan for America | Viking Press | |
| 2018 | | | Riverhead Books | |
| 2019 | | Charged: The New Movement to Transform American Prosecution and End Mass Incarceration | Random House | |
| 2020 | | Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents | Random House | |
| 2021 | | Midnight in Washington: How We Almost Lost Our Democracy and Still Could | Random House | |
| 2022 | | Lady Justice: Women, the Law, and the Battle to Save America | Penguin Press | |
| 2023 | | We Were Once a Family: A Story of Love, Death, and Child Removal in America | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2024 | | The Rent Collectors: Exploitation, Murder, and Redemption in Immigrant L.A. | Astra House | |
| Year | Author | Title | Publisher | |
| 1980 | | Walter Lippmann and the American Century | Atlantic/Little, Brown and Co. | |
| 1981 | | Land of Savagery, Land of Promise: The European Image of the American Frontier in the Nineteenth Century | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 1982 | | The Gate of Heavenly Peace: The Chinese and Their Revolution, 1895–1980 | Viking | |
| 1983 | | The Wheels of Commerce | Harper & Row | |
| 1984 | | The Great Cat Massacre and Other Episodes in French Cultural History | Basic Books | |
| 1985 | | Son of the Morning Star: Custer and the Little Bighorn | North Point Press | |
| 1986 | | The First Socialist Society: A History of the Soviet Union from Within | Harvard University Press | |
| 1987 | | The Nazi Doctors: Medical Killing and the Psychology of Genocide | Basic Books | |
| 1988 | | Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution, 1863–1877 | Harper & Row | |
| 1989 | | An Empire of Their Own: How the Jews Invented Hollywood | Crown | |
| 1990 | | The Quest for El Cid | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 1991 | | The Promised Land: The Great Black Migration and How It Changed America | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 1992 | | Benevolence and Betrayal: Five Italian Jewish Families under Fascism | Summit | |
| 1993 | | New Worlds, Ancient Texts: The Power of Tradition and the Shock of Discovery | Harvard University Press | |
| 1994 | | Gay New York: Gender, Urban Culture, and the Making of the Gay Male World, 1890–1940 | Basic Books | |
| 1995 | | Fables of Abundance: A Cultural History of Advertising in America | Basic Books | |
| 1996 | | Black Sea | Hill & Wang | |
| 1997 | | A People's Tragedy: A History of the Russian Revolution | Viking | |
| 1998 | | The Greatest Benefit to Mankind: A Medical History of Humanity | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 1999 | | Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 2000 | | The Collaborator: The Trial and Execution of Robert Brasillach | University of Chicago Press | |
| 2001 | | Before the Storm: Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American Consensus | Hill and Wang Division/Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2002 | | Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East | Oxford University Press | |
| 2003 | | An Imperfect God: George Washington, His Slaves, and the Creation of America | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2004 | | Perilous Times: Free Speech in Wartime from the Sedition Act of 1798 to the War on Terrorism | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 2005 | | Bury the Chains: Prophets and Rebels in the Fight to Free an Empire's Slaves | Houghton Mifflin | |
| 2006 | | The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2007 | | Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA | Doubleday | |
| 2008 | | Hitler's Empire: How the Nazis Ruled Europe | Penguin Press | |
| 2009 | | Golden Dreams: California in an Age of Abundance 1950–1963 | Oxford University Press | |
| 2010 | | The Killing of Crazy Horse | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2011 | | Railroaded: The Transcontinentals and the Making of Modern America | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 2012 | | America's Great Debate: Henry Clay, Stephen A. Douglas, and the Compromise That Preserved the Union | Simon & Schuster | |
| 2013 | | The Sleepwalkers: How Europe Went to War in 1914 | HarperCollins | |
| 2014 | | The Deluge: The Great War, America and the Remaking of the Global Order, 1916–1931 | Viking | |
| 2015 | | Killing a King: The Assassination of Yitzhak Rabin and the Remaking of Israel | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 2016 | | An American Genocide: The United States and the California Indian Catastrophe, 1846–1873 | Yale University Press | |
| 2017 | | The Death and Life of the Great Lakes | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 2018 | | Travelers in the Third Reich: The Rise of Fascism: 1919–1945 | Pegasus Books | |
| 2019 | | They Were Her Property: White Women as Slave Owners in the American South | Yale University Press | |
| 2020 | | Vanguard: How Black Women Broke Barriers, Won the Vote, and Insisted on Equality for All | Basic Books | |
| 2021 | | Cuba: An American History | Scribner | |
| 2022 | | By Hands Now Known: Jim Crow's Legal Executioners | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 2023 | | Shadows at Noon: The South Asian Twentieth Century | Yale University Press | |
| 2024 | | Ruin Their Crops on the Ground: The Politics of Food in the United States, From the Trail of Tears to School Lunch | St Martin's Press | |
| Year | Author | Title | Publisher | |
| 1980 | | Kill the Messenger | Black Sparrow | |
| 1981 | | Three Pieces | St. Martin's Press | |
| 1982 | | Plutonian Ode and Other Poems, 1977–1980 | City Lights | |
| 1983 | | The Changing Light at Sandover | Atheneum | |
| 1984 | | The Maximus Poems | University of California Press | |
| 1985 | | Cross Ties | University of Georgia Press | |
| 1986 | | Collected Poems, 1948–1984 | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 1987 | | Partial Accounts: New and Selected Poems | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 1988 | | New and Collected Poems | Harcourt Brace Jovanovich | |
| 1989 | | The One Day: A Poem in Three Parts | Ticknor & Fields/ Houghton Mifflin Harcourt | |
| 1990 | | The Color of Mesabi Bones | Milkweed | |
| 1991 | | What Work Is | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 1992 | | An Atlas of the Difficult World: Poems 1988-1991 | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 1993 | | My Alexandria | University of Illinois Press | |
| 1994 | | The Angel of History | HarperCollins | |
| 1995 | | The Inferno of Dante | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 1996 | | Mixed Company | The University of Chicago Press | |
| 1997 | | Black Zodiac | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 1998 | | Mysteries of Small Houses | Penguin Press | |
| 1999 | | Repair: Poems | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2000 | | The Throne of Labdacus | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2001 | | The Beauty of the Husband: A Fictional Essay in 29 Tangos | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2002 | | The Watercourse: Poems | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2003 | | Collected Later Poems | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2004 | | Inner Voices: Selected Poems, 1963–2003 | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2005 | | Refusing Heaven: Poems | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2006 | | Ooga-Booga | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2007 | | Old Heart: Poems | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 2008 | | Watching the Spring Festival: Poems | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2009 | | Practical Water | Wesleyan University Press | |
| 2010 | | Where I Live: New & Selected Poems 1990–2010 | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 2011 | | Double Shadow: Poems | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2012 | | Poems 1962–2012 | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2013 | | Collected Poems | Coffee House Press | |
| 2014 | | Citizen: An American Lyric | Graywolf Press | |
| 2015 | | From the New World: Poems 1976–2014 | Ecco/HarperCollins | |
| 2016 | | Gap Gardening: Selected Poems | New Directions | |
| 2017 | | Incendiary Art: Poems | TriQuarterly/Northwestern University Press | |
| 2018 | | Wild Is the Wind: Poems | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2019 | | Deaf Republic: Poems | Graywolf Press | |
| 2020 | | Obit | Copper Canyon Press | |
| 2021 | | frank: sonnets | Graywolf Press | |
| 2022 | | Nomenclature: New and Collected Poems | Duke University Press | |
| 2023 | | Bread and Circus: Poems | Scribner | |
| 2024 | | Room Swept Home | Wesleyan University Press | |
| Year | Author | Title | Publisher | |
| 1989 | | Peacemaking among Primates | Harvard University Press | |
| 1990 | | Patenting the Sun: Polio and the Salk Vaccine | William Morrow and Co. | |
| 1991 | | The Truth About Chernobyl | Basic Books | |
| 1992 | | The Third Chimpanzee: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal | HarperCollins | |
| 1993 | and Paul Freiberger | Fuzzy Logic: The Discovery of a Revolutionary Computer Technology -- and How It Is Changing Our World | Simon & Schuster | |
| 1994 | | The Beak of the Finch: A Story of Evolution in Our Time | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 1995 | | Naturalist | Island Press | |
| 1996 | | The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark | Random House | |
| 1997 | | How the Mind Works | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 1998 | | Blood: An Epic History of Medicine and Commerce | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 1999 | | Galileo's Daughter: A Historical Memoir of Science, Faith and Love | Walker and Company | |
| 2000 | , M.D. | The Rise and Fall of Modern Medicine | Carroll & Graf | |
| 2001 | | The Invention of Clouds: How an Amateur Meteorologist Forged the Language of the Skies | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2002 | | Rosalind Franklin: The Dark Lady of DNA | HarperCollins | |
| 2003 | | Protecting America's Health: The FDA, Business, and One Hundred Years of Regulation | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2004 | | The Whale and the Supercomputer: On the Northern Front of Climate Change | North Point Press / Farrar, Straus and Giroux | |
| 2005 | | Before the Fallout: From Marie Curie to Hiroshima | Walker & Company | |
| 2006 | | In Search of Memory: The Emergence of a New Science of Mind | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 2007 | | I Am a Strange Loop | Basic Books | |
| 2008 | | The Black Hole War: My Battle with Stephen Hawking to Make the World Safe for Quantum Mechanics | Little, Brown and Company | |
| 2009 | | The Strangest Man: The Hidden Life of Paul Dirac, Mystic of the Atom | Basic Books/Perseus Book Group | |
| 2010 | | The Price of Altruism: George Price and the Search for the Origins of Kindness | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 2011 | | Grand Pursuit: The Story of Economic Genius | Simon & Schuster | |
| 2012 | | Breasts: A Natural and Unnatural History | W.W. Norton & Company | |
| 2013 | | Countdown: Our Last, Best Hope for a Future on Earth? | Little, Brown and Company | |
| 2014 | | The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History | Henry Holt & Co | |
| 2015 | | The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt's New World | Alfred A. Knopf | |
| 2016 | | Patient H.M.: A Story of Memory, Madness, and Family Secrets | Random House | |
| 2017 | | Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst | Penguin Books | |
| 2018 | | Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company That Addicted America | Little, Brown and Company | |
| 2019 | | Figuring | Pantheon | |
| 2020 | | The Smallest Lights in the Universe: A Memoir | Crown | |
| 2021 | | The Disordered Cosmos: A Journey into Dark Matter, Spacetime, and Dreams Deferred | Bold Type Books | |
| 2022 | | How Far the Light Reaches: A Life in Ten Sea Creatures | Little, Brown and Company | |
| 2023 | | Is Math Real? How Simple Questions Lead Us To Mathematics' Deepest Truths. | Basic Books | |
| 2024 | | Our Moon: How Earth's Celestial Companion Transformed the Planet, Guided Evolution, and Made Us Who We Are | Random House | |