TSP-015 · 02 Price & plan
Self-Publishing Cost Calculator
An itemised, honest budget for publishing your book — built from market-rate bands, not one made-up number.
TSP-015 · Self-Publishing Cost Calculator · Free / no account
Note ⊕Market-rate guidance, not quotes — editing uses published per-word bands, covers and formatting use typical freelance fees. Printing is costed separately because it depends on your format and run: use the book printing cost calculator for physical copies. GBP figures are converted at a fixed planning rate.
Ask what it costs to self-publish a book and you get answers from "nothing" to "$10,000" — both technically true and neither useful. This free self-publishing cost calculator builds the number that is actually yours: enter your word count, choose your editing level, cover route, formatting, ISBN and marketing budget, and it returns an itemised low-to-high budget from published market-rate bands.
Editing is priced per word — which is why your manuscript length matters more than any other choice — and every line shows its share of the total. Printing is deliberately left to the book printing cost calculator, because physical copies depend on format and run length. For the full breakdown of what each line buys, read how much it costs to self-publish a book.
- Trim the manuscript before pricing the edit — every cut word is money.
- A premade cover at $50–150 outperforms most $500 DIY hours.
- Budget marketing from day one, even if the number is small.
- Get the free ISBN first; upgrade to your own when a series justifies it.
- 01
Describe the book
Word count first — editing is the biggest line and it is priced per word, so a 120,000-word epic costs roughly twice as much to edit as a 60,000-word memoir.
- 02
Choose your routes
Editing level, cover (DIY, premade or custom), formatting, and whether you buy your own ISBN. Each choice swaps in a realistic market-rate band, not a single guess.
- 03
Read the budget as a range
You get a low and a high for every line and for the total, plus a midpoint planning figure. Rates vary by editor and designer — the range is the honest answer.
Common questions
- How much does it cost to self-publish a book?
- Typically anywhere from under $100 to around $5,000, depending almost entirely on how much professional help you buy. A copyedited 75,000-word book with a premade cover and a modest marketing budget lands in the $2,000–$3,500 band; a DIY-everything ebook can genuinely cost nothing but time.
- What is the biggest cost in self-publishing?
- Editing, in almost every budget that includes it. It is priced per word — a copyedit runs a few cents per word and a developmental edit more — so on a full-length book it is usually a four-figure line. That is also why cutting a bloated manuscript before hiring an editor saves real money.
- Does this calculator include printing costs?
- No, deliberately. Print cost depends on trim size, page count, paper and run length, so it needs its own tool — the book printing cost calculator prices physical copies from real print-trade rates. Print-on-demand routes like KDP charge nothing upfront and deduct print cost per sale instead.
- Do I need to buy an ISBN?
- Not necessarily. KDP and most platforms assign one free; buying your own (from Bowker in the US or Nielsen in the UK) makes you the publisher of record and travels with the book across retailers. It is a legitimacy-and-control purchase, not a requirement.
- Are these real quotes?
- They are market-rate bands, not quotes — editing uses published editorial-association per-word ranges, covers and formatting use typical freelance fees. Any individual editor or designer can sit outside the band; use the range to plan and gather two or three real quotes before you commit.
Ready to print your book properly?
Run the numbers with our free tools, then print with real UK book printers.