How to Price Your Self-Published Book
Price feels like it should be a math problem, and it's really a signal. Readers of every genre carry a built-in sense of what a book "should" cost, and when your price lands outside that range, it reads as either cheap-and-suspect or overpriced-and-skippable before anyone reads a word. So you price to your genre's norm, and you price to convert, not to squeeze the most out of each single sale.
The rough bands (2026)
These shift, and you should check what the current bestsellers in your exact subgenre are charging, but the ballpark for ebooks runs like this:
- Romance and urban fantasy: $2.99 to $4.99, with frequent promo dips. High volume is the whole game here.
- Thriller and mystery: $3.99 to $5.99. A big share of the top sellers still sit at or below $3.99.
- Science fiction and fantasy: $3.99 and up. These readers tolerate a higher price, and most top-100 fantasy ebooks sell above $3.99.
- Literary fiction: $4.99 to $9.99. Slower promo cadence, a little prestige built into the number.
- Nonfiction: $4.99 to $9.99 for general, and $6.99 to $14.99 for how-to and expertise, where the buyer is paying for the answer.
- Children's and middle grade ebooks: $2.99 to $4.99. Price it to be an easy yes for a gift, not to maximize each copy.
Why "price to convert" matters at launch
At launch you want volume and velocity, because a cluster of early sales is what trips Amazon's momentum signals and gets you shown around for free. A price that's an easy impulse yes gets you more of those early buys than a price that wrings an extra dollar out of each one. You can always test a higher price later, once the book has reviews and a rank to protect. Early on, make it easy.
The 70 percent thing worth knowing
Amazon pays a 35 percent royalty on ebooks priced below $2.99 or above $9.99, and 70 percent in between. That band is why so much genre pricing lives between $2.99 and $9.99. Drop below or climb above and you're handing Amazon a much bigger cut, so have a real reason before you do.
The short version
Price to your genre's norm, because readers expect it. Lean toward the easy-yes end of the band at launch to build velocity. Stay inside the 70 percent royalty window unless you've got a reason not to. And check your subgenre's current bestsellers, because these numbers drift.
Pricing is one call inside a bigger launch. The free playbook covers the rest, including whether Kindle Unlimited is worth it for your genre.