I have wanted to write this article for a long time because I have several friends and relatives who write, and self-publishing e-books seems to be the way to go. Since the birth of the Kindle and e-books in 2007, the way millions of readers buy and read books has permanently changed. Anyone can upload and launch their book without needing to find a publisher. That saves the readers money and reduces the amount of royalties the author must share. An independently published e-book that is digitally distributed will reach many more readers around the globe. Should you want to offer print on demand of your book as well as a digital version, there are cost-effective ways to do that as well.
Traditional publishing means writing a book proposal, finding an agent, and signing with an established publishing company. That company will cover the editing, book and cover design, printing, and distribution. Going this route means a higher royalty split and compromising with an editor on content and design. On the other hand, the editing may be educational for you and good for your book. Traditional publishers can get your book into bookstores. It used to be that publishing companies also set up a book tour for authors, but these days, authors must do it themselves.
Self-publishing gives the author full control and creative independence, but the author pays for editing, formatting, and marketing. It also gives the author a faster time-to-market than traditional publishing would. To be clear, if you self-publish, your book will not be sold in bookstores. If you are publishing a complex text, or a book with artwork or photography, self-publishing in an e-book format will probably not work for you.
There is a third publishing option, but it is expensive. Hybrid publishing is a combination of traditional and self-publishing. You pay the publishing company to publish your book. The company usually has no editorial or quality criteria for which books they will publish – you pay them, and they’ll publish it.
The benefits of the hybrid are that it’s faster than traditional publishing, and you get 100% of the royalties since you paid upfront. Like self-publishing, you have complete control of editing and design. You get the caché of saying you had a publisher, and you will have extra services offered like editing, cover design and more should you want them. Most hybrid publications are higher quality than the self-publishing versions.
The con is that it can be very expensive. Any improvement in quality over self-publishing is still not as good as traditional publishing.
There are two ways to self-publish a book. The first is to sell directly through book retailers like Amazon or Barnes and Noble. These are online bookstores where your book will be sold. The second way is to use an aggregator who would distribute your book to many book retailers all at once. This will save you time but there will be an extra fee for this service. When publishing your own book, you will keep more of the profits from sales. Most retailers and aggregators only take a cut when a copy of the book is sold.
Here are the top five self-publishing platforms that received the highest praise and were in the top five of most surveys.
Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) is at the top of the heap for book retailers. It accounted for 91.5% of all self-published books in 2018. KDP is Amazon’s self-publishing platform. It offers a global audience, is user-friendly and offers the author assistance with covers and print options. It is free to upload your book on KDP.
Authors keep 70% of the royalties on e-books priced between $2.99 and $9.99.
For e-books priced below $2.99 or above $9.99 the author keeps 35%.
For paperback or hardcover books printed on demand, the author keeps 60% of the royalties minus the cost of printing.
Authors can easily launch a print edition (POD) if they are already selling e-books on Amazon. They must upload a formatted PDF and cover design with a spine and back. Through KDP’s expanded distribution option, authors can distribute books to shops and libraries around the world.
Apple Books founded its self-publishing arm in 2010. In 2012 it announced that 400 million books were downloaded (does not mean sold) on Apple Books. There is no fee to upload a manuscript. Authors keep 70% of the royalties regardless of the price of their e-book.
It is free to upload your book to Barnes & Noble Press.
Authors keep 70% of royalties on e-books priced above $0.99.
Authors can even offer their book for free on this platform.
IngramSpark is an aggregator which means it will distribute your e-book or print-on-demand book to many book sellers. Their global distribution network sells books and e-books to over 40,000 outlets worldwide.
It is free to upload your e-book or print book. Their quality of printing POD books is very high.
Authors receive global book distribution, affordable book advertising opportunities, free publishing tools and resources, and access to IngramSpark’s Book Building Tool.
Royalty pricing is more complicated with aggregators. Click here for IngramSpark’s guide on self-publishing.
Draft2Digital is also an aggregator and very popular. They offer good customer support, a user-friendly dashboard, and they will do the formatting for you.
Draft2Digital takes 10% of the book’s retail price per copy sold, and the retailers take about 30%, leaving the author with 60% of royalties. Your e-book or POD book will potentially reach a wider audience with an aggregator.
I have a writer friend who was very helpful with this article. She shared her experiences with the three different platforms she used for her three books. For the first one she used Amazon, which back then was not KDP, and it has since evolved into a larger, more efficient platform. Nevertheless, she was happy with that experience. For her second book she tried a different e-book publisher who was mediocre. Because she felt she wanted more advice and interaction with an editor, for the third book she went to a small boutique printer called Mayfly Design and she was very happy with them.
It seems that there is a self-publisher for everyone, but it’s important to really understand what you need and what each platform is offering.
Resources:
The Do’s and Don’ts of Self-Publishing Your First Book
Best Self-Publishing Companies 2025: Which One is Right for You?
Take this free short online course – To Self-Publish or Not to Self-Publish.
The Best Self-Publishing Companies: Key Factors to Consider
Want to publish your book as an audiobook? Sadly, that will have to be another article, because most digital self-publishing platforms do not allow you to publish your audiobook alongside your e-book and print versions.
