Publish on Apple Books: A Step-by-Step Guide for Authors

Apple Books for Authors, Apple's web-based publishing portal, lets you publish on Apple Books for free. The process is straightforward: sign in with an Apple Account, add your tax and banking details, upload an EPUB file and a cover image, write your metadata, set a price, and submit the book for review. An aggregator such as Draft2Digital offers another route to Apple Books, handling the upload for a share of each sale.

This guide covers both routes in order, starting with what you need to have ready.

What you need before you start

Have these ready before you open the portal. It will save you from stopping halfway through.

• A finished, edited manuscript. Apple reviews every book before it goes live. Typos won't block it, but formatting problems can.
• An EPUB file. This is the main file Apple Books accepts for ebooks. If you're not sure what that is, read our EPUB glossary entry.
• A cover image. According to Apple's published specs, it should be JPEG or PNG and at least 1400 px on the shortest side. Apple recommends 1600 × 2400 px or larger.
• Your metadata. This means title, subtitle, author name, description, categories, language and publication details. See what metadata means if the term is new.
• An Apple Account. If you use an iPhone or a Mac, you already have one.
• Tax and banking information. Apple needs these before it can pay you.
• A decision on ISBN. Apple Books does not require an ISBN for ebooks. You can add your own if you have one. Our guide Do I need an ISBN? explains when owning one is worth it.

You can only publish ebooks and audiobooks on Apple Books. There is no print-on-demand paperback option, so if you want print copies, you need a separate service.

Step 1: Set up an Apple Books for Authors account

1.1 Sign in with your Apple Account

Go to Apple Books for Authors and sign in with the Apple Account you want tied to your publishing business. If you share an Apple Account with family, or use a work account, think about creating a separate one. The account you choose will hold your books and your payments.

1.2 Accept the agreement

Apple will show you its terms for distributing books. Read them. They set out the royalty terms, the payment rules and the content rules that apply to your books. These terms can change, so it's worth checking them again when Apple notifies you of updates.

1.3 Add your tax and banking details

Enter your legal name, address, tax information and the bank account where you want to be paid. The exact tax forms depend on where you live. Apple's portal walks you through the questions.

Use your legal name here even if you publish under a pen name. The author name on the book can be different from the name on your payment account.

1.4 Set your publisher or author name

You'll be asked for the name that appears as the seller or provider. You can use your own name or an imprint name. Keep it consistent with the name you use on other stores, because it makes your catalog easier to manage later.

Step 2: Prepare your files for Apple Books

2.1 Create and check your EPUB

Your EPUB should open cleanly and show the following:

• A working table of contents, so readers can jump between chapters.
• Chapter headings styled as headings, not just as bold text.
• No blank pages, stray page numbers or running headers left over from a print PDF.
• Images, if any, that display at a sensible size.

Most novels and non-fiction books use a reflowable layout, where text adjusts to the reader's screen and font size. Picture books and some cookbooks use a fixed layout instead. Our guide to reflowable vs fixed layout explains which to choose.

If you write in Inkora, you can export an EPUB 3 file directly from your book. That gives you a clean starting file, but open it in Apple Books on a phone or Mac and page through it before you upload.

2.2 Test the EPUB on a real device

Open the file in the Books app on an iPhone, iPad or Mac. Check that:

• The table of contents links work.
• Italics, scene breaks and block quotes look right.
• The front matter is short enough that a reader reaches chapter one quickly.

Apple's preview sample comes from the start of your book. If the opening is several pages of copyright notices and acknowledgments, readers browsing the sample see very little of your writing.

2.3 Prepare your cover

Apple's published specs ask for:

• JPEG or PNG format
• At least 1400 px on the shortest side
• 1600 × 2400 px or larger recommended

Your cover title and author name should match what you enter in the metadata. Mismatches are a common reason for review delays.

If you already have a 1600 × 2560 Kindle cover, that size is also above Apple's minimum. Our cover size calculator helps if you're working out dimensions for several stores at once.

Step 3: Upload your book in Apple Books for Authors

3.1 Start a new book

In the portal, choose the option to add a new book. Choose ebook, then fill in the basic details:

• Title and subtitle. These should match the cover exactly.
• Author name. This can be a pen name.
• Series name and number, if the book belongs to a series.
• Language.
• ISBN. Leave it blank if you don't have one. Apple does not require it.

3.2 Write your description

This is the text readers see on your book's page. Lead with the hook: what the book is about and who it's for. Keep paragraphs short, because many readers will be looking at a phone.

Don't mention or link to other stores in your description. Apple's content guidelines can reject listings that point readers elsewhere. Our guide on how to write a book blurb covers structure and length.

3.3 Choose categories

Pick the categories that describe your book honestly. A narrow category that fits well usually serves you better than a broad one that only partly fits.

3.4 Upload the EPUB and cover

Upload both files. Apple checks the EPUB for technical errors during or after upload. If it finds problems, fix them in your source file, export a new EPUB and upload again.

3.5 Disclose AI use if it applies

If you used AI tools in writing the book, read Apple's current guidelines on disclosure and follow them. Our AI disclosure glossary entry explains the general idea, but the store's own rules are what count.

Step 4: Price your book on Apple Books

4.1 Understand the royalty

According to Apple's published terms, authors earn 70% of the list price on ebook sales. Treat that figure as an estimate and confirm the current rate in Apple Books for Authors before you plan around it.

Unlike Amazon KDP's ebook royalty, Apple doesn't publish a narrow price band you have to stay inside to get the higher rate. That gives you more freedom with low and high prices.

4.2 Set prices by country

You set a price in your home currency, and Apple can suggest prices for other countries. Review those suggestions. A converted price can land on an awkward number, or it may not match how books in your genre are usually priced in that market.

4.3 Decide on preorders and free books

Apple Books lets you set a future release date so readers can preorder. Check the portal for the current preorder rules and deadlines before you commit to a launch date.

You can also price a book at free. Many series authors make the first book free on Apple Books to draw readers into the rest of the series.

4.4 Compare against your other stores

If you also sell on Amazon, keep your prices consistent across stores. Some store terms include price-matching rules, so read each store's terms on this point.

Step 5: Submit and go live

Review every field one last time, then submit. Apple reviews the book before it appears in the store. Review time varies, so don't schedule a launch announcement for the same day you submit.

Once the book is live:

• Search for it in the Books app to confirm it appears correctly.
• Open the sample and check what readers see first.
• Check that the cover looks clear at thumbnail size.

To update the book later, upload a new EPUB in the portal. Updated files usually go through review again.

Publishing direct vs through an aggregator

You have two ways to get onto Apple Books.

Direct means using Apple Books for Authors yourself, as described above.

Through an aggregator means uploading once to a service like Draft2Digital. The aggregator then distributes your book to Apple Books and other stores for you.

	Direct (Apple Books for Authors)	Via aggregator (e.g. Draft2Digital)
Cost to publish	Free	Free to upload
What you earn	Apple's royalty, stated as 70% of list price (verify in the portal)	Store royalty minus the aggregator's fee, stated by D2D as about 10% of list price (verify)
ISBN	Not required	Optional; D2D can assign a free one
Control	Full access to Apple's settings and reports	You work through the aggregator's dashboard
Effort	One account per store	One upload reaches several stores
Payments	Paid by Apple	Paid by the aggregator, combined across stores
Best for	Authors focused on Apple who want the highest share	Authors selling on many stores who want less admin

Going direct gives you the highest share per sale and a direct relationship with the store. An aggregator saves time if you're publishing to many stores at once. Many authors go direct to the biggest stores and use an aggregator for the rest.

Read more in what is going wide and our Draft2Digital publishing guide.

Don't publish the same book to Apple Books both directly and through an aggregator. You'll end up with duplicate listings, and fixing that takes time.

Inkora's Publishing Hub includes a step-by-step Apple Books checklist you can follow alongside this guide. Inkora doesn't upload books for you, so you still submit from your own Apple account.

Common problems and fixes

The EPUB fails validation. The portal will usually point to the file or line with the problem. Common causes are broken internal links, missing table of contents entries, or leftover code from a word processor. Fix the source file, export again and re-upload. Don't try to patch the EPUB by hand unless you're comfortable editing its files.

The cover is rejected. Check that the shortest side is at least 1400 px and that the file is JPEG or PNG. Check that the title and author name on the cover match your metadata. A subtitle that appears in the metadata but not on the cover is usually fine, but a different title is not.

The book is stuck in review. Wait a few days before taking action. If nothing changes, check the portal for messages from Apple, then contact Apple's support through the portal.

The book was rejected for content or links. Remove any mentions of, or links to, other bookstores from the book and the description. Remove placeholder text and "coming soon" pages, and make sure the book is complete. Then resubmit.

Prices look wrong in some countries. Open the pricing section and set those territories manually instead of relying on the automatic suggestion.

You want to switch from an aggregator to direct. First, unpublish the book from Apple through the aggregator. Wait until it's fully removed from the store, then upload it directly. Ratings and reviews may not carry over to the new listing, so plan the switch for a quiet period rather than a launch.

You can't find your sales. Sales reports and payments can lag behind the actual sale. Check the reporting section of the portal and compare against Apple's stated payment schedule before assuming something is missing.

Publishing on Apple Books comes down to a clean EPUB, a cover that meets Apple's size specs, honest metadata and a price you've checked by country. Choose direct if you want full control and the full royalty, or an aggregator if you'd rather manage many stores from one place. Test everything on a real device before you submit, and most of the problems above won't happen to you.