Director's Report
KDP Pricing Strategy: How to Price Your Self-Published Book for Maximum Royalties
As of July 7, 2026 the 70 percent ebook band on Amazon.com is $2.99 to $12.99. Paperback royalties flip from 50 percent to 60 percent at $9.99, then printing comes off.
By C. V. Wooster, Founder, BookIntelReport
Royalty math is not a promise that a price will sell. It is the formula Amazon publishes for what you are paid if a copy does sell. Tax withholding, VAT, file size, price matching, and returns can all change the deposit. This is not tax or legal advice. If you publish as a business, ask a tax professional about your own return. The figures below are copied from KDP Help so you can check them before you type a price.
The ebook band moved on July 7, 2026
KDP's list-price page says that, effective July 7, 2026, the 70 percent royalty option on Amazon.com runs from $2.99 to $12.99. The old ceiling was $9.99, and it had been $9.99 since 2007. The $2.99 minimum did not change, and the 35 percent option did not change. You are not required to reprice. A book already on 70 percent stays where it is until you edit it. If a book is on 35 percent and the list price sits between $2.99 and $12.99 and it meets the other tests, you can switch it to 70 percent.
On Amazon.com the 35 percent option allows a wider range, and the minimum rises with file size: $0.99 under 3 megabytes, $1.99 from 3 megabytes up to but not including 10, and $2.99 at 10 megabytes or more, with a $200 maximum. The 70 percent option ignores that file-size ladder and simply requires $2.99 to $12.99.
Other stores have their own floors and ceilings on the same help page. The 70 percent band is £1.77 to £12.99 in the UK, €2.69 to €12.99 in the euro marketplaces, C$2.99 to C$12.99 in Canada, and A$3.99 to A$15.99 in Australia. Do not copy a US price into those fields and assume the royalty option survived.
The 70 percent rate applies only when the buyer is in a 70 percent territory. You do not have to live in one of those countries to choose the option. Sales to buyers outside the territories pay 35 percent of list price without VAT. KDP says both rates can show on your Bookshelf for the same book, because Amazon.com sells to customers in more than one place. The rate is chosen at purchase, from the buyer's location. For Brazil, Japan, Mexico, and India, the list-price page says the ebook also has to be in KDP Select to qualify for 70 percent.
Public-domain works, or books that are mostly public domain, are limited to 35 percent unless you add substantial original content or an original translation.
How the two ebook formulas differ
At 35 percent, royalty is 35 percent of list price without VAT. There is no delivery deduction. KDP's example is a $0.99 list price. A buyer with no VAT produces $0.35. A buyer at 20 percent VAT produces $0.29, because the VAT is removed before the rate is applied.
At 70 percent, royalty is 70 percent of list price without VAT, minus delivery costs, for buyers in the 70 percent territories. KDP says average delivery is about $0.06 per unit and that the real fee varies with file size. The worked example on the royalties page is a €1.99 list price in Spain, a 1 MB file, delivery of €0.10 per MB, and 4 percent VAT, which comes out to €1.27. A book full of images can move that delivery line enough to matter. Look at the estimate on your pricing tab rather than assuming the average.
If Amazon cuts the price to match another seller's digital or print edition, or to match Amazon's own print price, you are paid 70 percent of the sale price, less delivery and VAT, for eligible sales in the 70 percent territories. Your list price is not a floor Amazon promises to honor.
KDP pays monthly, about 60 days after the end of the month in which the sale was reported, once you clear the payment minimum. Expanded Distribution royalties are on a longer clock, about 90 days, and they are a print topic.
Paperbacks: 50 percent or 60 percent, then print cost
Paperback royalty on Amazon is not 70 percent. KDP's paperback page says the rate is 50 percent or 60 percent of list price, depending on the price and the marketplace, minus printing cost. On Amazon.com, $9.98 and below is the 50 percent band and $9.99 and above is the 60 percent band. The formula is (royalty rate times list price) minus printing cost.
Printing cost is a fixed amount plus page count times a per-page amount, and it depends on marketplace, ink, and paper. Trim size, bleed, and cover finish do not change the print cost. For a black-ink paperback on Amazon.com with cream or white paper, books from 24 to 110 pages pay only the fixed cost ($2.30 at a regular trim). From 110 to 828 pages the US regular-trim cost is $1.00 plus $0.012 per page.
KDP's own example is a $15 list price, a 333-page regular-trim black-ink paperback, and a $5.00 print cost: (0.60 times $15) minus $5.00 equals $4.00. You can reproduce that print cost from the formula. One dollar plus 333 times $0.012 is $4.996, which rounds to the $5.00 in the example.
A customer may buy below list because of a promotion. KDP says that discount does not change your paperback royalty. The list price is what the formula uses.
Expanded Distribution, if you turn it on, pays 40 percent of the list price in effect in that channel, minus printing cost. The same $15 book in KDP's example returns $1.00. Hardcover is not eligible for Expanded Distribution. Enrollment is free and does not promise that a store or library will order the book. Those royalties show up in reports about 30 days after the end of the month of the sale, and payment runs on the 90-day Expanded Distribution schedule.
The minimum list price exists so the royalty covers printing. KDP will not accept a price below that minimum. The maximum on Amazon.com for a paperback is $250.
A price you can defend
Use the pricing tab's estimate, not a genre chart from a forum. Amazon does not publish a required price for romance or thrillers. What it publishes are the bands above. A useful check is to write down the list prices on the detail pages of books a reader of yours would also consider, then see whether your number sits inside the royalty band you actually want. That is observation, not a rule that their price is the right one for you.
Here is an illustrative example. An author we'll call Nia prices a 300-page US black-ink paperback at $16.99 so the book is in the 60 percent band. Print cost is $1.00 plus 300 times $0.012, which is $4.60. Royalty is (0.60 times $16.99) minus $4.60, about $5.59, before any tax withholding. The same book at $9.98 would fall into the 50 percent band and might not clear the print-cost minimum. The estimate on the pricing tab is the number to trust if your page count or ink type differs.
Kindle Countdown Deals, which require KDP Select, add another constraint: the digital list price has to sit still for 30 days before the deal and 14 days after it. If you think you will run one, do not plan a casual price change in that window. Countdown Deals are only on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk.
BookIntelReport's pricing notes can sit beside a manuscript's page count. They do not file the price, and they are not a substitute for the calculator at kdp.amazon.com.
Open the pricing tab, read the estimated royalty for the option you selected, and change the list price until that estimate is a number you would accept on a single copy. Then leave it alone long enough to learn whether shoppers agree.