KDP Royalties Explained: What Indian Authors Actually Earn

“Amazon pays 70% royalties” is the line most new authors remember — and the line most likely to mislead them. KDP does offer a 70% ebook option, but only inside a specific price band, only after a delivery cost is deducted, and, for sales to readers in India, only if the book is enrolled in KDP Select. Outside those conditions you earn 35%. Paperbacks follow a completely different formula again. This article sets out the current rules as KDP itself states them, in rupees where India is concerned, with one worked example you can check line by line.

Start here: a royalty is not the book's price

A royalty is your share of each sale, calculated by Amazon's formula — not the full price the reader pays. For ebooks, the percentage is applied to the list price excluding VAT or other applicable taxes. For paperbacks, a percentage of the list price is calculated first and the printing cost is then subtracted. That is why two books at the same price can pay very different amounts: file size affects ebook earnings at the 70% rate, and page count affects paperback earnings because a longer book costs more to print.

KDP is free to publish on, and you set your own list price within KDP's limits. What you cannot do is choose a percentage in isolation. Price, format, file size, and marketplace together decide which royalty you actually receive on each sale.

Ebook royalties: the 35% option vs the 70% option

Every Kindle ebook on KDP is published under one of two royalty options, which you select in the pricing step. The comparison below reflects KDP's current help pages.

Three details in that table catch Indian authors out. First, the India price band for the 70% option is ₹99 to ₹599 on Amazon.in. Price your ebook at ₹699 and it cannot earn 70% on Amazon.in, however you set it up — it falls back to 35%. Second, the delivery cost: at the 70% rate, Amazon deducts a delivery cost based on your file size before paying you — ₹7 per megabyte on Amazon.in, with a minimum of ₹1. A tidy text-only book of about 1 MB loses very little; an image-heavy book loses noticeably more on every sale. Third, the KDP Select condition for India: KDP states that for sales to customers in Brazil, Japan, Mexico, and India, a book must be enrolled in KDP Select to earn the 70% rate. If it is not enrolled, or the price is outside the band, that sale earns 35%.

The other 70% conditions worth knowing

• Your ebook list price must be at least 20% below the list price of any print edition of the same book on Amazon.
• If a reader outside the listed 70% territories buys your book, that particular sale pays 35%, even if you selected the 70% option.
• Royalties are calculated on the price excluding VAT or applicable taxes, so the headline percentage is never applied to a tax-inclusive figure.
• You can change your price and royalty option later in KDP, but books already priced do not switch automatically when Amazon changes a band — you need to update them yourself.

A brief note on KDP Select

KDP Select is an optional 90-day programme for Kindle ebooks. Enrolling makes your ebook available through Kindle Unlimited, where you are paid from a shared fund based on pages read rather than per sale, and gives access to certain promotional tools. In return, the digital edition must be exclusive to Amazon during the enrolment term — you cannot sell the same ebook elsewhere in that period. For Indian authors there is one extra, practical reason the decision matters: as noted above, enrolment is required for the 70% royalty on sales to customers in India. Whether that trade-off is worth it depends on whether you also want to sell the ebook on other platforms. Print editions are not part of that exclusivity. Keep the decision deliberate, and review KDP's current Select terms before enrolling, because the programme's details are Amazon's to change.

Paperback royalties: a percentage, minus printing

Paperbacks do not use the 35% / 70% choice at all. For paperbacks sold on Amazon marketplaces where KDP supports paperback distribution, KDP's formula is: (royalty rate × list price) − printing cost = royalty. Since June 2025 the rate itself depends on your list price. On Amazon.com, for example, a list price of $9.99 or above earns 60%, while $9.98 or below earns 50%. Each print marketplace has its own threshold in its own currency — for instance £7.99 on Amazon.co.uk and €9.99 in the euro stores. Printing cost depends on page count, trim size, ink type, and the marketplace the copy is ordered from, and KDP sets a minimum list price so the royalty can cover the cost of printing the book.

Two practical consequences follow. A longer book is not automatically a more profitable book: every extra page raises the printing cost that comes off your royalty. And pricing a paperback just below the 60% threshold can cost you far more than the one cent you saved the reader, because the lower rate applies to the whole list price.

Expanded Distribution pays less — on purpose

If you enable Expanded Distribution for a paperback, KDP can make it available through other distribution channels beyond Amazon's own stores. The royalty there is 40% of the list price minus printing costs — lower than the 50% or 60% you earn on Amazon itself. That is not a penalty; it reflects an extra intermediary in the chain. Some authors accept the lower per-copy amount for the wider reach; others keep distribution to Amazon only. Either way, run the numbers at your actual page count before deciding, because on a long book 40% minus printing can leave very little.

Worked example — for illustration only

The figures below are for illustration only. They are not a prediction of your earnings, and your actual royalty will depend on your final file size, page count, prices, marketplace, and taxes. Use KDP's own pricing preview for your real book before you publish.

Ebook example (Amazon.in)

Suppose your Kindle ebook is priced at ₹299 on Amazon.in, the converted file is 1 MB, and the book is enrolled in KDP Select so the sale to a customer in India qualifies for the 70% option. Ignoring VAT for this simplified illustration: delivery cost is 1 MB × ₹7 = ₹7. Royalty = 70% × (₹299 − ₹7) = 70% × ₹292 = ₹204.40 per sale. The same sale under the 35% option would be 35% × ₹299 = ₹104.65, with no delivery cost deducted. Notice what drives the gap — it is the price band and Select enrolment, not a special deal.

Paperback example (Amazon.com)

Suppose the paperback edition is priced at $14.99 on Amazon.com and, for illustration only, its printing cost is $4.00. Because $14.99 is at or above the $9.99 threshold, the 60% rate applies: royalty = (60% × $14.99) − $4.00 = $8.99 − $4.00 = $4.99 per sale, rounded. Through Expanded Distribution at 40%, the same book would earn (40% × $14.99) − $4.00 = $1.99 per sale. Change the page count and the printing cost changes, so this paperback figure moves in a way the ebook figure does not.

Price decides the royalty band first. Only then does the percentage mean anything.

What Indian authors should check before setting a price

• Check the Amazon.in band, not just the US one: ₹99–₹599 for the 70% ebook option, and remember the KDP Select condition for India sales.
• Check your converted file size before choosing between 35% and 70% — delivery costs only apply at 70%, and they grow with file size.
• For a paperback, get the printing cost for your actual page count and trim size first, then price above the relevant 60% threshold if the maths allows.
• Remember royalties are worked out per sale, per marketplace, and per buyer location — your dashboard will not show one single rate for every copy.
• Re-check KDP's help pages when you publish. Amazon changed the US 70% ebook band in July 2026 and the paperback rates in June 2025; bands and thresholds can change again.

None of this makes royalties complicated once you see the structure: ebooks are a choice between 35% with no conditions and 70% inside a band with a delivery deduction; paperbacks are 50% or 60% of list price minus the cost of printing that copy, or 40% through Expanded Distribution. Set your price with those formulas open in front of you, and there should be no surprises in your first royalty report.

If you would rather focus on the book itself and have the KDP setup, formatting, and pricing steps handled and explained for you, Authorly works with founders and professionals in India on exactly that journey — you can see how it works and start at https://book.authorly.shop/start