Print on demand

Print on demand (POD) is a printing model in which a copy of a book is printed only after someone orders it. You upload a print-ready interior PDF and a cover file once, and the service prints and ships each copy as orders arrive. Services such as Amazon KDP and IngramSpark offer POD for paperbacks and hardcovers.

With POD there’s no print run to pay for in advance and no stock to store. Instead, the printing cost of each copy is deducted from the list price before your royalty is calculated. That cost depends mainly on page count and ink (black and white or color), and on some services on the trim size.

Why it matters for indie authors

POD makes a print edition possible without upfront printing costs, apart from proof copies. The trade-off is a higher cost per copy than a large offset print run, so pricing matters: set the list price too low and the royalty per copy is small. KDP won’t accept a list price below what covers printing.

POD also makes corrections simple. Upload a fixed file, and new orders print from it.

Through KDP’s Expanded Distribution or a service such as IngramSpark, a POD book can be made available for bookstores and libraries to order. Being available to order isn’t the same as being stocked on a shelf.

Example

An author formats her 6" × 9" nonfiction guide as a print-ready PDF and has a full-wrap cover made for her page count. She uploads both to KDP and orders a printed proof, which shows the text running too close to the spine. She widens the inside margin, re-exports, orders a second proof and publishes. From then on, each order is printed and shipped, the printing cost comes out of the list price, and she receives the royalty.

AIBookWriter’s Format & export step produces a print-ready PDF at the trim size you choose, runs preflight checks and calculates the spine width for your paperback cover. The free KDP Royalty Calculator shows ebook and paperback royalties before you set a price.

Common mistakes

• Skipping the proof copy. Screens hide problems that print reveals: margins, image quality, cover color.
• Low-resolution images. Use images at 300 DPI at their printed size.
• Reusing a cover after the page count changes. Spine width depends on page count, so the cover has to be resized.
• Spine text on a thin book. KDP allows spine text only on books with more than 79 pages.
• Pricing without checking printing costs in each marketplace you sell in.