KDP meaning: Kindle Direct Publishing, and how authors get paid

KDP stands for Kindle Direct Publishing. It is Amazon's self-publishing platform: a free set of tools that lets authors publish ebooks, paperbacks and hardcovers and sell them in Amazon stores worldwide, without a traditional publisher. Amazon says KDP lets you publish in more than 10 countries and over 45 languages.

"Kindle" is Amazon's ebook reader and store, "direct" means authors publish themselves rather than through a publishing house, and "publishing" covers both digital and print. Despite the name, KDP is not only for Kindle ebooks: KDP prints paperbacks and hardcovers on demand and ships them to customers.

Amazon's KDP home page lists the promise in three parts: control over content, design, price, audience and advertising; ownership of your content; and a book appearing in Amazon stores around the world in 72 hours.

KDP's eBook royalty page says you choose between two options for each eBook. At 35%, your royalty is 35% of the list price without VAT. At 70%, it is 70% of the list price without VAT, minus delivery costs, which average $0.06 per unit and vary with file size, for sales to customers in the 70% territories; sales elsewhere earn 35%.

Two conditions decide whether 70% is available. The book must be in copyright: works that are mainly public domain only qualify for 35%. And the list price must sit in the 70% band, which KDP's pricing page says is $2.99 to $12.99 on Amazon.com from July 7, 2026, up from $2.99 to $9.99.

For print, KDP says you earn a royalty each time a new copy is manufactured to fill an order. The rate is 50% or 60% of the list price, depending on the price and marketplace, and KDP then subtracts the printing cost, which depends on page count, ink type and the marketplace. The formula KDP gives is: royalty rate times list price, minus printing costs.

Expanded Distribution, which offers print books to other retailers and libraries, pays 40% of the list price minus printing costs. KDP sets a minimum list price so the royalty always covers the printing cost, and a promotion that discounts the price to the customer does not reduce your royalty.

KDP Select is a free 90 day program for Kindle eBooks. Enrolling an eBook automatically includes it in Kindle Unlimited, Amazon's reading subscription, and makes it eligible for Free Book Promotions and Kindle Countdown Deals. Read the program's terms before enrolling, since they set where else the eBook can be offered during the enrollment.

Kindle Unlimited pays differently from sales. KDP's help page says authors share a monthly KDP Select Global Fund based on pages read for the first time, measured in Kindle Edition Normalized Pages, with credit capped at 3,000 pages per title per customer. KDP's home page reported total KU author earnings of $69.4 million for August.

Publishing puts the book in the store; readers still have to find it. KDP's own tools cover the basics: keywords and categories in the book's details, a clear cover, and a description that reads well. KDP Select adds Countdown Deals and Free Book Promotions, and Amazon Ads lets authors advertise books in search results.

In an Amazon context, KDP almost always means Kindle Direct Publishing. The same letters stand for other things elsewhere, so if you met the term outside books and Amazon, it may mean something else. On Amazon seller forums, in publishing and in Amazon's own help pages, it is Kindle Direct Publishing.

Related Amazon terms often appear next to it. KDP Select is the optional eBook program; KU is Kindle Unlimited; KENP is Kindle Edition Normalized Pages, the unit KU pays on; and ACX is Amazon's audiobook production marketplace for Audible.

For product sellers, KDP is a separate business from Seller Central: a different account, different fees, royalties instead of referral fees, and printing handled by Amazon. It suits sellers who already have expertise to share, such as a guide to the products they sell, and authors who want an inventory-free route onto Amazon.

Books you did not write are a different matter: reselling physical books happens through a normal seller account, under Amazon's book condition guidelines. Our guide on whether you can sell used items on Amazon covers those rules.