How to self-publish a book

Self-publishing is not the same as paying a “vanity press” to publish you. With a vanity press, the company often controls your accounts, takes a share of your royalties or keeps rights. When you self-publish, the accounts, the ISBN and the income are yours.

Should you self-publish?

Self-publish if you want control over the cover, price and schedule, a book out in months instead of years, and a larger share of each sale. Consider a traditional publisher if you want an advance, bookstore placement handled for you, and someone else paying for production. See our full comparison of self-publishing vs traditional publishing, with real numbers for both. Prefer a publisher? See how to get a book published.

Editing is the step readers notice most when it’s skipped. Plan for more than one pass.

• Revise it yourself first. Fix the big problems (plot, structure, argument) before you pay anyone to look at sentences.
• Get outside readers. Beta readers, people in your genre who read an early draft, tell you where they got bored or confused.
• Hire the level of edit you need. A developmental edit fixes structure, a line or copy edit fixes sentences and consistency, and a proofread catches the last typos in the finished layout.
• Proofread last. Have the formatted pages proofread, because new errors can appear when the text is laid out.

Many readers first see your cover as a thumbnail on Amazon, next to the bestsellers in your genre. It has to fit in with them and still stand out.

• Match your genre. Look at the top 20 books in your category. Thrillers, romances and business books each have their own look, and readers judge a book by it in a second.
• Make it work small. The title must be readable at thumbnail size, on a phone.
• Plan the full wrap. A print cover also needs a spine and a back cover, sized to your final page count. The front can be designed early, but the full wrap is finished after the interior is formatted.

Formatting turns your manuscript into the files the stores accept.

• Ebook: a file whose text reflows to fit any screen. Apple Books, Kobo and other stores take an EPUB file. Amazon’s free Kindle Create tool turns a Word file into a Kindle ebook, which works on Amazon only.
• Print: a PDF set to your trim size, the finished size of the book. Many novels and nonfiction books use 5.5 x 8.5 or 6 x 9 inches.
• Interior details: a title page, copyright page, table of contents for ebooks, consistent chapter openings, and page numbers and headers in print.
• Page count matters. Your print cost, spine width and minimum price all come from it.

If you only want an ebook, you can skip the print file. That’s the simplest way to self-publish an ebook, and you can add print later. Our book formatting starts at $89 for an ebook, and all three editions (ebook, paperback and hardcover) start at $429.

An ISBN is your book’s ID number in stores and libraries. Get it before your files are final, because it goes on the copyright page and in the barcode on the back cover. Each print format needs its own number, so the paperback and the hardcover get different ones. Amazon doesn’t require one for the ebook.

• Free ISBNs work in one place. KDP gives you a free ISBN for print books, but it can only be used on KDP, and your publisher is listed as “Independently published.”
• Your own ISBN works everywhere. In the US, ISBNs come from Bowker: $125 for one, or $295 for 10. It also lets you publish under your own imprint name.
• Copyright is automatic. Your book is protected as soon as you write it. Registering it with the U.S. Copyright Office is optional but gives you stronger legal protection. The online fee is $45 for one work by one author, or $65 for most other filings, as of October 2026. A fee schedule sent to Congress in July 2026 would raise these to $55 and $85 in late 2026, so check before you file.

This information, called metadata, is how readers and stores find your book. It matters as much as the cover.

• Title and subtitle. Fiction titles set the mood. Nonfiction subtitles should say what the reader gets.
• Book description. The 150 to 300 words on your sales page. Open with a hook, then tell readers what they’ll get. Skip the chapter-by-chapter summary.
• Categories. On KDP you choose up to three of Amazon’s own categories. IngramSpark, Apple Books and many other stores use BISAC codes, the standard subject codes for books, and IngramSpark also takes Thema codes for stores outside North America. Specific categories are easier to rank in than broad ones.
• Keywords. KDP gives you seven keyword boxes. Use phrases readers type, such as “cozy mystery with a cat,” and don’t repeat words already in your title.
• Author bio. Two or three sentences on why you’re the right person to write this book.

For many authors, the best way to self-publish a book is KDP for Amazon and IngramSpark for bookstores and libraries, then a choice about how to sell the ebook. Compare every option in our guide to self-publishing platforms.

Rates as of October 2026. Check each platform before you publish.

Audiobooks are a separate format you can add later. They need a narrator, either you or someone you hire, and a square version of your cover.

Amazon only, or every store?

One ebook choice matters early. KDP Select puts your ebook in Kindle Unlimited, Amazon’s reading subscription, where you’re paid for pages read, but the ebook can be sold only on Amazon, in 90-day terms. Going wide puts it in every store and in library apps. Print books are never affected, and you can switch when a term ends. Compare both in our guide to publishing exclusive to Amazon or wide.

Amazon’s setup has its own rules for prices, categories and keywords. Our step-by-step guide on how to self-publish on Amazon covers every setting, with the 2026 royalty rules.

Price like the books you compete with, then check the math.

• Ebooks: novels often sell for $2.99 to $5.99, and nonfiction often for $4.99 to $9.99. Since July 7, 2026, Amazon’s 70% royalty reaches up to $12.99 (older titles must opt in). A $4.99 ebook earns $3.28 (2 MB file), as of October 2026.
• Paperbacks: printing is taken out of your royalty. A 300-page black-and-white paperback costs about $4.60 to print on KDP. At $14.99 you earn about $4.39 per copy on Amazon. At $9.98 you’d earn about 39 cents.
• Series: a lower price on book one can pull readers into the rest of the series.

1. Create free accounts on KDP and, for bookstores and libraries, IngramSpark.
2. Enter your metadata, upload the files and set your prices.
3. Use the online previewer to check every page.
4. Order a printed proof and read it on paper. Check the margins, the spine and the colors.
5. Answer KDP’s AI question honestly. If an AI tool created any text, images or translations in your book, KDP asks you to disclose it, even if you edited them. Using AI only to help you edit or brainstorm doesn’t need disclosing, and the answer isn’t shown on your book’s page, as of October 2026.
6. Fix anything you find, then publish. On KDP, a book usually appears on Amazon within 72 hours.

Order author copies at printing cost, plus shipping, to sell at events. For large orders, a print run from a book printer costs less per copy, but you pay up front and store the books.

Set up a pre-order if you want time to build buzz. It gives readers a date to buy and lets you collect early sales.

Publishing puts the book in stores. Marketing gets it read. Self-publishing book marketing works best when it starts before launch day.

• Build a small launch team. Give free early copies to readers in your genre before launch day. Reviews must stay optional, as Amazon requires.
• Start an email list. It’s the one audience you own. Start with a signup link at the back of your book.
• Use Amazon ads carefully. Start with a small daily budget, target books like yours, and stop ads that don’t sell.
• Keep writing. A second book is often the best marketing for the first.

From a finished manuscript, plan for about two to four months. Much of that time goes to editing and waiting on feedback.

An ebook-only book with a light edit can be ready in a few weeks. A long book with a full edit takes longer.

You can do every step yourself. Many authors do some and hire the rest. The rule of thumb: hire for what readers judge, which is the editing and the cover, and do the uploading yourself.

Red flags before you pay any publishing company

Much of the help for self-published authors is honest, but some companies charge a lot for little. Walk away if a company:

• Keeps your retail accounts in its own name instead of yours.
• Takes a share of your royalties or any of your rights.
• Won’t list prices in writing, or hides them behind a sales call.
• Promises bestseller status, film deals or bookstore placement.
• Charges for marketing extras that promise results, such as paid book fair displays or “guaranteed” review packages.
• Pressures you to decide on the first call.

The nine steps are the same for every book. What changes is where you spend, which formats sell and how you price. Pick your genre to see what matters most.

You can self-publish with a few tools, most of them free.

8 mistakes first-time self-publishers make

1. Publishing without a professional edit.Reviews that mention typos stay on the page for good.
2. A cover that doesn’t fit the genre.Readers skip it in a second.
3. Pricing a paperback just under $9.99.It cuts your Amazon royalty from 60% to 50%.
4. Skipping the printed proof.Margins and colors look different on paper.
5. Weak keywords and broad categories.Readers can’t find the book.
6. Using the free ISBN for everything.It only works on KDP.
7. Launching with no reviews and no email list.Early reviews and sales help readers, and Amazon’s recommendations, find the book.
8. Treating launch day as the finish line.A book can keep selling for years after launch.

We checked every figure on this page against Amazon KDP’s help pages, IngramSpark, Kobo, Draft2Digital and the U.S. Copyright Office in October 2026. Platforms change their terms, so confirm on each one before you publish.

• Higher ebook prices at 70%.Since July 7, 2026, Amazon pays 70% on ebooks from $2.99 to $12.99. The top of the band was $9.99 before, and older titles must opt in.
• Lower royalties on cheap paperbacks.Since June 10, 2025, KDP paperbacks and hardcovers priced under $9.99 earn 50% instead of 60%.
• Free IngramSpark setup.Uploading a title to IngramSpark costs nothing.
• Copyright fees under review.A fee schedule sent to Congress in July 2026 would raise registration fees from $45 and $65 to $55 and $85 in late 2026.
• Libraries moved to Ingram.Baker & Taylor, the largest distributor of print books to US public libraries, stopped shipping to libraries in late 2025, and about 2,000 libraries opened accounts with Ingram (NPR, January 2026). A listing through IngramSpark matters more for library sales.
• Fewer Kindle tools.Amazon withdrew Kindle Comic Creator and Kindle Kids’ Book Creator in early 2025 and now points authors to Kindle Create.

How to self-publish a book: FAQs