Free tool — no signup
Kindle Unlimited earnings calculator
What do KU pages read actually pay? Convert your word count to KENP pages, see what a full read is worth, and project monthly earnings — with an honest comparison against plain sales.
Estimated KENPC
321
normalized KU pages (~187 words/page)
Per complete read
$1.44
321 pages × $0.0045
Monthly estimate
$101.12
22,470 pages read
Compare that to selling: this book at $4.99 on the 70% plan earns about $3.19 per sale — roughly the same as one full KU read pays on a 60k-word book only if your book is long. KU rewards page count; sales reward price. Longer books and binge-read series do disproportionately well in KU.
KU or wide, you still need the book files.
publish.ai turns your manuscript into a validated EPUB, designed covers, print-ready PDFs, Amazon listing copy, and launch graphics — everything KDP asks for. One upload, minutes, from $29.99.
How Kindle Unlimited actually pays
KU doesn’t pay per borrow — it pays per page read, the first time each reader reads it. Every month Amazon takes the KDP Select Global Fund and divides it by the total KENP pages read across every enrolled book; the result is that month’s per-page rate, announced after the fact with royalty reporting. Recent US rates have floated around $0.004–$0.005 per page.
Your book’s page count for this math is its KENPC— Amazon’s normalized count, roughly 187 words per page for text-heavy books, so a 60,000-word novel is about 320 KENP pages no matter what font or trim you chose. Three things drive your KU income: length (more pages per full read), borrows (how many readers open it), and read-through (how far they actually get). The calculator above multiplies exactly those three.
What a full read pays, by book length
Estimated payout for one complete read (KENPC ≈ words ÷ 187), at recent per-page rates:
| Word count | ≈ KENP pages | @ $0.0040 | @ $0.0045 | @ $0.0050 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 30,000 | 160 | $0.64 | $0.72 | $0.80 |
| 50,000 | 267 | $1.07 | $1.20 | $1.34 |
| 70,000 | 374 | $1.50 | $1.68 | $1.87 |
| 90,000 | 481 | $1.92 | $2.16 | $2.41 |
| 120,000 | 642 | $2.57 | $2.89 | $3.21 |
| 150,000 | 802 | $3.21 | $3.61 | $4.01 |
Read the table with read-through in mind: if readers finish 70% of a 90,000-word book, you earn about 70% of that row.
KU or selling wide? The break-even math
A $4.99 ebook on the 70% royalty plan pays about $3.20 per sale after delivery fees. At $0.0045 per page, a full read pays that much only past roughly 710 KENP pages — about a 130,000-word book. Shorter than that, one sale beats one full read; the bet you’re making with KU is volume— that the KU badge, page-one visibility from borrow-driven sales rank, and binge readers working through a series generate far more reads than you’d get sales selling wide.
That bet tends to pay off for long genre fiction and series (each full read of book one advertises books two and three). It tends not to for short standalone books at high list prices — a 25,000-word nonfiction guide at $9.99 earns ~$7 per sale but barely $0.60 per full read. Run your own numbers in the calculator above, and remember KDP Select is a 90-day commitment, not a marriage.
Common questions
How much does Kindle Unlimited pay per page read?＋
Amazon announces the rate monthly after dividing the KDP Select Global Fund by total pages read. Recent US rates have hovered around $0.004–$0.005 per KENP page — so a full read of a 300-KENP book pays roughly $1.20–$1.50.
What is KENPC and how is it different from my print page count?＋
KENPC (Kindle Edition Normalized Page Count) is Amazon's standardized page measure, so a page pays the same regardless of font or formatting tricks. For text books it works out to roughly 187 words per KENP page — usually noticeably higher than your print page count. KDP shows your exact KENPC on the book's Promote page once enrolled.
Do I get paid if someone borrows my book but doesn't read it?＋
No. KU pays only for pages actually read, the first time each customer reads them. A borrow that sits unopened earns nothing — which is why read-through (how far readers actually get) matters more than raw borrow numbers.
Is Kindle Unlimited worth it for my book?＋
KU requires ebook exclusivity to Amazon (KDP Select, 90-day terms). It tends to pay off for fiction series and binge-friendly genres (romance, thrillers, LitRPG) where a full read of a long book can out-earn a discounted sale. Standalone nonfiction with high cover prices often earns more selling wide at 70%.
Can my book be in KU and still sell normally on Amazon?＋
Yes — enrollment adds the KU badge but your ebook stays purchasable at your list price, and you earn normal royalties on those sales. Exclusivity only means you can't sell the ebook on other stores (print is unaffected).
How often does the KU per-page rate change?＋
Monthly. Amazon sets the rate after the fact by dividing that month's KDP Select Global Fund by the total KENP pages read across all enrolled books, and announces it with the month's royalty reporting. It drifts a fraction of a cent month to month, which is why this calculator lets you set the rate instead of hard-coding one.
Do KU borrows affect my Amazon sales rank?＋
Yes — a borrow counts toward sales rank like a sale at the moment it happens, regardless of how much gets read later. That's a real hidden benefit of KU for visibility: borrows prop up your rank, and rank drives the also-boughts and category placement that sell more copies.
What's a realistic read-through percentage?＋
For binge-friendly genre fiction (romance, thrillers, LitRPG), 60–80% is common; for standalone nonfiction that readers dip into, it can be under 40%. Once enrolled, you can back into your own number: divide your KENP read by (borrows × KENPC). Until then, 70% is a reasonable fiction default — that's what this calculator starts with.
Related tools: royalty calculator, page count calculator.