Book Cover Guidelines & Templates

With FeedARead, you have the choice of using your own cover images or one of our stylish cover templates. The FeedARead system makes cover creation simple and quick, and will size your images correctly for you in minutes. Please follow the instructions below.

Template covers:
You can choose one of FeedARead’s stylish template covers -  click here  to view our cover choice.

Your own cover images:
You can upload your own cover images during our simple cover creation publishing step, and our system will size your images correctly for you in simple steps if you have any difficulty sizing your own images to the correct sizes below. Try the cover creation step now as outlined in the next paragraph, and see how your cover will appear in minutes.

Try the simple cover creation system:
Auto-sizing  The simplest and quickest way to check your cover images are correct is to begin publishing and go to the cover creation step and upload your images. This takes minutes to do, and our system automatically sizes your images to the correct book cover size and will display exactly how your cover will appear. Simply click here to start publishing a new book, then just complete up to and including the step where you add your book title. Then click on My Books under your Author Account page on the left menu, and click the Go button next to your book title on that page. This will take you to a page where you can add your Cover Art.

The specific sizes for covers are below, but our system will automatically resize your images if you have difficulty sizing as above, and we recommend visiting the cover creation step as above to see in minutes how your images will appear.

Front Cover and Back Cover Images:

5 x 8 books If you choose to publish at 5 inches wide x 8 inches high then your front cover and back cover image should each be 5.125 inch wide x 8.25 inch high and at a high resolution, ideally 300 dpi.

6 x 9 books If you choose to publish at 6 inches wide x 9 inches high then your front cover and back cover image should each be 6.125 inch wide x 9.25 inch high and at a high resolution, ideally 300 dpi.

Auto-Sizing Our cover creation system will size your images correctly for you if you have difficulty sizing. Try our cover creation system in minutes as above.

Spine Image: You don’t have to add a spine image as this can be quite specialized, but can just add text on your spine by using our simple cover creation programme as above. This is as simple as typing your book title and author name on the spine text part of the cover creation page.

Our cover creation page will automatically size your cover spine width to the correct width once you upload your manuscript and show you your spine's width if you click on 'spine image' on the left column of the cover creation page. If the spine width is greater than 0.35 inches (9 mm), all text and logos on the spine should be at least 0.0625 inches (2 mm) from the spine's sides. If the spine width is less than 0.35 inches (9 mm), all text and logos on the spine should be at least 0.03125 inches (1 mm) from the spine's sides.

If you choose to upload a spine image, click here to view the spine width calculator for the number of pages in your book. If you have difficulty sizing a spine image to the correct size, just try our simple cover creation system as outlined above. Our system will correctly size your spine image in seconds in the cover creation program after you have uploaded your final manuscript in the publishing steps.

Cover text: Please ensure any cover text is a minimum of 13mm or .5 inch from the outer sides of your cover. Our cover creation system shows you on the screen if you have done this correctly. Cover text should be within the yellow dotted guidance lines on the cover creation page.

Bleed Area: .125 inch of the very outer sides of your cover is the ‘bleed area’ - the printers safety margin for trimming and printing a book - and will not appear on the final cover. Our system displays this bleed area automatically to you as the area outside of a red dotted line when you upload a cover image so you can see where it is on your cover. The area within the red dotted line on our cover creation page is the printed area of the cover give or take a mm or two. Any colored borders on your image should ideally extend in for at least .5 inch from the outer side of your original image in order for prints to be uniform. 

Our system automatically sizes your images correctly when you upload them if you have difficulty sizing your images, however any colored border should extend in at least .5 inch from the outer sides of your original image. Try our cover system as outlined above by uploading your cover within minutes to view on our cover creation page.

Cover Size and Resolution:       Size: Our system will adjust your image(s) to the correct size if you are not able to. Resolution: We recommend that your image(s) be 300 dpi in resolution for the best print resolution quality. If you are uploading an image of below this resolution or of low clarity then this is the author responsibility.

CMYK Values:  The overall combined percentage of CMYK values of artwork for our printer's presses should be less than 240%. For example, the 'rich black' they recommend would be 60% Cyan 40% Magenta 40% Yellow 100% Black (60+40+40+100=240%). All other colors in the artwork should remain less than 240% CMYK overall color density as well.

Images within manuscripts For best results, images should be of a good quality and have high resolution for printing. Continuous tone images are recommended for submission as 8-bit, grayscale. Black-and-white images are recommended for submission as 1-bit, black-and-white. For best results, all manuscript images should be converted to grayscale by authors before submitting. Images submittted in a file as RGB or CMYK will be converted to grayscale when printing–this can sometimes cause a color shift. Any dissatisfaction with color shift will be the author responsibility.

Back Cover Bar Code: Our printers will add a barcode and ISBN on the back cover for you after your cover is submitted for publishing. The cover creation display clearly shows the space for the barcode and ISBN to you so be sure not to add text over it. Please don’t add a price to your cover at this stage, as this restricts the flexibility of altering your price in the future in line with changes to average retail prices and commercial demand. For cover designers, the barcode space left on the back cover should be a 2" wide (50.8 mm) by 1.2" high (30.5 mm) white box in the lower right-hand corner of your book's back cover” which is 0.25” (6.35 mm) to the left of the spine and from the bottom of the trim (bleed line).” This means the bottom of the barcode space allowed should be 0.375 inch from the  bottom of  cover INCLUSIVE of 0.125 bleed area.


Cover Designers and Advanced Cover Design

If you have employed your own cover designer then the designer can upload a complete cover for you via the cover creation functions above, and should size exactly to the correct sizes, specifications and ideal resolution of 300 dpi for cover images as above. If you are using a cover designer it is very important that you provide them with the cover submission details on this page so that they can complete your cover correctly for you according to the correct cover size, resolution and other cover instructions as outlined above. You can choose to give them access to the cover creation step for your book to upload your cover to our system for you, but we recommend never enabling access to your login and password details. If a cover designer designs and uploads a cover for you, you should be sure to check the cover on the cover creation step of publishing has been designed correctly by the cover designer, and that it meets the design requirements you gave your cover designer before you approve it for publishing in the publishing steps.

Please don’t add a price to your cover, as this restricts the flexibility of altering your price in the future in line with changes to average retail prices and commercial demand.

Please note that cover design can be a very specialized skill, and if further advice is required authors should seek the advice of a cover design specialist. As our system provides free publishing set-up we do not offer further advice beyond the simple cover upload system and all the cover instructions and information provided above.