KDP cover review guide
Pass KDP’s automated cover review on the first upload.
KDP’s reviewer checks geometry, bleed, safe zones, barcode placement, and file format. Every rejection we’ve seen falls into one of seven buckets. Here they are, with the exact spec each one trips on.
The pre-flight checklist
- Computed spine width with kdpcover.pro using the actual paper choice (white / cream / standard color / premium color).
- Full-cover dimensions match my interior trim (width × 2 + spine + bleed/wrap).
- Bleed: 0.125" on paperback, 0.51" wrap on hardcover.
- Safe zone: 0.125" inside on paperback, 0.635" inside on hardcover.
- Hardcover only: nothing in the 0.4" hinge dead-zone on either side of the spine.
- Barcode: 2" × 1.2" reserved area at the bottom-right of back cover, light/white background.
- Spine text: only if the book is ≥79 pages.
- Single flattened PDF, fonts embedded, no crop marks, 300 DPI, CMYK preferred.
- Filename includes ASCII characters only.
Run every line before exporting. Most KDP rejections are first-time-author misses, not edge cases.
The seven rejection patterns
01. Spine width is wrong for the page count
KDP rejects covers when the spine in your PDF doesn't match the page count × paper multiplier. Use the calculator to compute the exact spine before laying out artwork — not after.
02. Spine text on a sub-79-page book
Books under 79 pages have spines too narrow for KDP's reviewer to accept printed text or graphics. Either keep the spine plain or add pages.
03. Bleed missing or wrong
Paperback covers need 0.125" bleed on every outside edge. Hardcover (case-laminate) covers do not use traditional bleed; instead they have a 0.51" wrap that folds inside the case. Mixing the two is the most common rejection.
04. Safe-zone violations
Keep critical text and graphics 0.125" inside the trim line on paperback, or 0.635" from outside edges on hardcover. Hardcover has an additional 0.4" hinge dead-zone on each side of the spine — nothing prints there.
05. Barcode area covered or off-spec
Reserve a 2" × 1.2" white area at the bottom-right of the back cover, with 0.25" clearance from spine and trim edges and 0.76" from the bottom. Anything overlapping this fails review.
06. File too large or wrong format
Submit a single flattened PDF — back, spine, and front in one file — with fonts embedded, no crop marks, 300 DPI minimum, CMYK preferred. Recommended ≤40 MB; hard limit 650 MB.
07. Trim size mismatch with interior
The cover trim must exactly match the interior trim you uploaded. Custom trims work, but both files must agree to the 0.01" precision.
Don’t want to eyeball all seven?
Cover Pass-Check runs this whole checklist against your finished file in seconds — full-cover size, bleed, safe zones, DPI, color space, and embedded fonts — and tells you exactly what to fix before KDP sees it.
FAQ
- How do I calculate my KDP book cover size?
- Multiply your interior page count by KDP's paper multiplier to get the spine width, then add trim size and bleed for the full cover. In the calculator, choose paperback or hardcover, pick your trim size and paper type, and enter the page count — it adds trim, bleed, and (for hardcover) hinge and wrap to produce the exact full-cover width and height.
- What size should a KDP paperback cover be?
- It depends on page count, trim, and paper. For a 300-page 6 × 9 in white-paper paperback the full cover is 12.9256 × 9.25 in with a 0.6756 in spine. Enter your own numbers above for an exact, KDP-verified size.
- Is this the same as Amazon's official KDP cover calculator?
- Yes — it uses the same published KDP formulas, and every value is golden-tested against Amazon's official cover-template generator. The difference: it runs entirely in your browser with no Amazon login, and adds a live safe-zone diagram and a downloadable print-ready template.
- What is the Kindle eBook cover size?
- A Kindle eBook cover is a single image, ideally 1,600 × 2,560 px (a 1.6:1 ratio). That is separate from a print cover — this tool calculates print paperback and hardcover dimensions, which change with page count and trim size.
- What spine width do I get for a 200-page book?
- A 200-page white-paper paperback has a 0.4504 in spine (200 × 0.002252). Cream is 0.5000 in; standard color matches white; case-laminate hardcover is 0.4694 in. Adjust paper or page count above to recompute instantly.
- Why did KDP reject my cover for wrong dimensions?
- The most common causes are computing the spine from the wrong paper multiplier and omitting the 0.125 in bleed on every paperback edge. Match the full-cover size from this calculator exactly, keep text inside the safe zone, and upload a single flattened PDF with fonts embedded.
Ready to compute your spine? Open the calculator →