Calculate Paperback Print Cost and Royalty

Before you set a list price, you need to know two numbers: what one copy costs to print, and what you keep when it sells. Those depend on your page count and on the platform's rules, and it is easy to set a price that looks fine and loses money on every sale. The Print Royalty Calculator does the sums for one paperback: printing cost, royalty, break-even price, the price for a royalty you want, and how many copies it takes to earn back what you spent on editing and the cover.

It does not look up anything live. Platforms publish their own rates and change them, so apart from one starting preset the figures are yours to type from your platform's own calculator. That makes the tool honest, and it means you should read its notes carefully.

What goes in

The first section sets the printing cost and the royalty rule. You can start from one of three examples: Amazon KDP black ink on Amazon.com in US dollars, another platform where the royalty is a rate on the list price, or another platform where the royalty comes from a wholesale discount. You then fill in:

• A currency symbol, the pages, a fixed charge per copy and a charge per page. Printing cost is the fixed charge plus the per-page charge times the pages.
• The royalty rule. With "royalty rate on list price", you earn the rate times the list price, minus the printing cost. With "wholesale discount", retailers buy at the list price less your discount, and you earn what is left, minus the printing cost.

The second section asks for the list price, the royalty you want per copy and, optionally, upfront costs to earn back.

The KDP preset

The KDP example fills in the printing charges from published tables, dated 25 October 2026 on the page, and the page tells you to confirm them on KDP because rules change. For a black-ink paperback it works like this. For 24 to 110 pages there is a flat charge per copy of $2.30 for a regular trim, or $2.84 for a large trim (wider than 6.12 inches or taller than 9). Above 110 pages the charge is $1.00 plus $0.012 per page for a regular trim, or $1.00 plus $0.017 per page for a large one. The royalty rate is 50 percent for a list price up to $9.98 and 60 percent from $9.99. The tool warns if the pages are outside 24 to 828 or the list price is above $250.

Those thresholds produce small cliffs. A 110-page regular-trim book costs $2.30 to print; at 111 pages the formula changes and it costs $2.33. A list price of $9.98 earns 50 percent and $9.99 earns 60 percent, so a one-cent rise can pay you noticeably more.

Worked example 1: a 300-page paperback

Choose the KDP preset, regular trim, 300 pages, list price $14.99. The printing cost is $1.00 plus 300 times $0.012, which is $4.60. The rate at $14.99 is 60 percent, so the royalty is 0.60 times 14.99, which is $8.994, minus $4.60, and the tool shows $4.39 per copy.

Now the other boxes. For a target of $3.00 per copy, the price needed is (3.00 plus 4.60) divided by 0.60, which is $12.67. If your editing and cover cost $450, you need 450 divided by 4.39, which is 102.5, rounded up to 103 copies to earn it back. The table at the bottom shows the royalty at nine prices around yours, from $10.99 to $18.99 in one-dollar steps, with your own price highlighted and the royalty as a share of the price.

Worked example 2: how trim size changes it

Keep everything the same and change the trim to large. Printing now costs $1.00 plus 300 times $0.017, which is $6.10. At $14.99 the royalty drops to $8.994 minus $6.10, which is $2.89. A bigger page costs you $1.50 a copy more, a third of the royalty you were earning. If you are choosing a trim size, run both.

Worked example 3: wholesale

Switch to the wholesale rule with a 55 percent discount and a printing cost of $4.60 (typed in). Retailers pay 45 percent of the list price, so at $14.99 you earn 0.45 times 14.99, which is $6.7455, minus $4.60, and the tool shows $2.15. To earn $3.00 on that rule, the price has to rise to $16.89. Wholesale terms are chosen by you when you publish, which is why the tool asks for the discount rather than assuming one.

From word count to cost

If you only know your word count, work backwards in the right order: estimate the pages first, then the cost. The Book Page Estimator turns a word count, trim size, type and margins into a printed page count, with a low and a high case. With its default settings (80,000 words, 6 by 9 inches, 11 point type, 25 chapters starting on right-hand pages) it gives 228 printed pages in the low case, 256 as the typical case and 282 in the high case. Put those through the KDP preset at $14.99 and you get a printing cost of $3.74, $4.07 and $4.38, and a royalty of $5.25, $4.92 and $4.61. The spread between the cases is about 64 cents of royalty, which is the range to plan around until the real file exists. Once it does, use the exact page count, and the spine and wrap-cover calculator for the cover.

Two traps in the tool

The first is the minus sign. If the price does not cover the printing cost the royalty goes negative, the figure turns red and the tool says that each sale loses money. At $6.00 for the 300-page book, the KDP preset applies 50 percent, which is $3.00, less the $4.60 printing cost, so the royalty is minus $1.60. Take that as a hard stop.

The second is the royalty rate band. In the KDP preset the rate follows the list price you typed. The break-even price, the price for your target and the table of prices beside it all use that one rate. The table covers four dollars either side of your price, so if you type $12.00 it also lists $8.00 and $9.00, and those rows are worked out at 60 percent, although at those prices the real rate is 50 percent. For the 300-page book, the $9.00 row shows a royalty of $0.80, while at the real 50 percent it is minus $0.10, and the $8.00 row shows $0.20 where the real figure is minus $0.60. If the prices you are testing are near $9.98, type each one as the list price and read the result box, rather than the table.

Steps

1. Choose a starting example, or type your platform's printing cost and royalty rule.
2. Enter the page count, and the trim size if you use the KDP preset.
3. Enter the list price and read the printing cost and royalty.
4. Type the royalty you want to see the price it needs, and any upfront costs to see the copies to break even.
5. Test prices on both sides of the royalty-rate threshold one at a time, typing each as the list price.
6. Confirm every figure on your platform's own calculator before you publish.

Print Royalty Calculator is a Professional Tool with 10 trial uses a day. Reading the result is free; copying, printing or saving it uses one trial use per visit.

Common mistakes

Using the page count of your Word file instead of the printed page count. Forgetting that trim size changes the printing cost. Reading the table across a royalty-rate threshold. Setting the price from the royalty you hope for without checking that readers will pay it. Treating the tool's preset as current without checking the platform.

Summary

Know the cost of one copy, the royalty on one sale and the price that gives you the royalty you want, before you publish. Open the Print Royalty Calculator with your page count and price, and add a word count first if you do not have pages yet. The wider publishing toolkit is under Book Writing Toolbox, and the choice of platform is covered in picking a publishing platform.

Open the Print Royalty Calculator→

Which platform's rules should we add as a preset next? Tell us on the contact page.