What is KDP Select? KDP Select for Authors

With Kindles still dominating the e-reader market, Amazon is often the first place that comes to mind when readers think about ebooks. Despite many other retailers selling digital editions, Amazon still has a strong hold on the ebook market. But should you restrict your ebook’s distribution to Amazon alone, or make it available to a wider customer base on other retailers? As a Senior Digital Marketing Controller at Troubador Publishing, Amazon KDP Select is a service I talk to our authors about everyday, and for many of our authors, it’s a brilliant fit. In this article, we’re going to take a deep dive into Amazon’s KDP Select programme - what it is, the pros and cons, and whether it’s a suitable choice for your ebook. 

What is KDP Select?

KDP Select is Amazon’s exclusivity programme for ebooks. This means that if you choose to enroll, for 90 days your ebook will be sold exclusively on Amazon. As part of this it will be on the Kindle Unlimited Programme (recently renamed as Kindle+!) and you will have the opportunity to run either the Five Free Days promotion or The Countdown Deal. 

Readers pay a monthly subscription to access the Kindle Unlimited library, and would be able to read your ebook as part of that subscription during the ninety day exclusivity period.

What is the Five Free Days Promotion on KDP Select? 

With the Five Free Days promotion, you can choose five days during your exclusivity period to make your ebook available completely free of charge to any customer. Timed well, this can be a fantastic opportunity to boost visibility of your ebook on Amazon and to generate interest in your ebook. If there are any newsworthy events that tie in well with your ebook, you may want to run this promotion around that time - or alternatively you might choose to make the ebook free over a long weekend or public holiday. For example, if you’re publishing a children’s ebook, you might want to run this promotion in the run up to the half term break. One of our recent authors, Chris Tryhorn, ran a promotion for his ebook Homer’s Odyssey to tie in with the release of the recent film adaptation!

You won’t receive any royalties from these downloads, but increased traffic to your Amazon page could really help boost your ebook’s discoverability on Amazon, and you may also get some good reviews from those who’ve downloaded a copy!

What is The Countdown Deal Promotion on KDP Select?

The Countdown Deal involves dropping the price of your ebook to 99p and then gradually increasing it in two or three increments over the course of a week until it is back at the original price. During this time, there will be a timer on your Amazon listing letting people know how long they’ve got to buy a copy before the price goes up again. The aim here is to generate a buzz and a sense of urgency, to make readers feel like they need to buy a copy now or they’ll be missing out on a good deal.

The Countdown Deal and The Five Free Days promotion are great ways to promote your ebook and really help to establish it on Amazon.

What Are The Benefits of KDP Select?

There are benefits of Amazon KDP Select include the fact that people are more likely to try your book, the promotions which can help establish your book on Amazon, and the ability to focus your efforts on one retailer rather than thinking about marketing across multiple platforms. 

For Troubador author Chris May, KDP Select worked very well. He was delighted that in the weekend following his enrollment in KDP Select, his book reached number one in the free Amazon UK Kindle Charts for LIterary Fiction, number three for Mystery & Suspense and number 9 for Thrillers. In the US, he also made the Top 10 in all these categories. Learn more about Chris’s marketing efforts here. 

Let’s look at the advantages of KDP Select in more detail: 

People are more likely to try your book: 

If your ebook is included in a monthly fee that readers are already paying, they may be more willing to take a punt on it. Ebooks can be expensive these days, and so if readers haven’t heard of you or your book they may be unwilling to spend a lot of money on it, whereas if they can read it for no extra cost, they may be more inclined to take a chance. This exposure to new readers could then lead to an increase in traffic to your Amazon listing and hopefully some good reviews.

The Promotions: 

As mentioned, during your KDP Select period, you’ll also have the option of running one of either the Five Free Days promotion and the Countdown Deal. Both of these promotions are a great way to encourage a boost in downloads for your ebook, and really help establish it on Amazon. 

Focusing Your Marketing Efforts:  

Another perk of KDP Select is that, for ninety days, you can focus your marketing efforts solely on one retailer without having to think about all of the other platforms your ebook’s available from. You can encourage as many friends and family members as possible to buy or download the ebook, share the link, or leave a positive review, meaning that by the time the ninety days come to an end, you’ve hopefully already established a strong presence on Amazon, allowing you to start focusing on those other ebook retailers your title is now available from.

Are There Any Drawbacks to KDP Select?

As of June 2026, the Telegraph estimates that there are around 650,000 ebooks included in the UK’s Kindle + (formerly known as Kindle Unlimited), presenting a similar problem to that faced by users of streaming platforms like Netflix - too much choice. With so many titles available it could prove overwhelming for readers, scrolling through pages and pages of results until making a decision about what to read feels almost impossible. There’s also the issue of readers not actually owning a copy of your ebook - as soon as a Kindle Unlimited subscription is cancelled, all books accessed from it are lost, so there’s an element of impermanence that you don’t get when you’re making a considered purchase of an individual book.

Rather than someone visiting the Kindle Store and intentionally purchasing your book at full price, you do run the risk of readers downloading it purely because they don’t need to pay any extra, but then never getting around to reading it or only reading a few pages. You’re also limiting your ebook’s reach by tying it to Amazon, as - despite undoubtedly being the biggest ebook retailer - they are by no means the only option, and many readers use alternative retailers to source their ebooks. 

At Troubador, we have a wide distribution network for the ebooks we publish. As well as Amazon, our ebooks are available via Apple Books, Google Play, and Kobo, as well as Gardners (an ebook wholesaler supplying smaller, independent retailers), Overdrive and Borrowbox (supplying ebooks to libraries) and Everand (an ebook subscription service). If you don’t opt for KDP Select, your ebook will be available from all retailers from the beginning. If you do choose exclusivity, your ebook will be made available from all other platforms once your ninety day KDP Select period comes to an end.

Is KDP Select Suitable For My Book?

Fiction tends to work best for KDP Select, as fiction readers often won’t have a specific title in mind when browsing for their next read, so are usually happy to browse and see what catches their eye. With non-fiction titles, particularly more niche non-fiction on specific topics, readers are more likely to be intentional with their purchases, seeking out books on that topic and buying them outright.

If your ebook is a new release, KDP Select may be a good option for establishing an identity on Amazon and getting the ball rolling with your book. Being able to make the ebook available for free for a limited time is a great way to entice potential readers, as is the inclusion in Kindle Unlimited, where your ebook may be introduced to readers who otherwise may not have come across it. 

How Do the Royalties Work with KDP Select?

The short answer is that at the end of each month royalties will be paid for the exact number of pages your book has been read. For example, if your ebook is 400 pages long and someone reads 150 pages before stopping and not reading any more, you will receive royalties for the number of pages they read, and nothing for the pages that they didn’t. 

The long answer is that, unlike a single sale (where you would receive a royalty based on the full price of the ebook) royalties made through Kindle Unlimited work slightly differently, because readers are not purchasing a copy of your ebook outright - they are reading it as part of a monthly subscription.

Amazon uses their KENP (Kindle Edition Normalised Pages) system to calculate royalties for titles read via a Kindle Unlimited subscription. Because ebooks are reflowable, meaning the number of pages will vary depending on the e-reading device being used and the font size settings of the individual device, Amazon applies fixed settings to your e-book file, including a standard font, font size, line height, and line spacing to calculate the average number of pages.

Amazon will put a certain amount of the Kindle Unlimited fees paid by readers into their KDP Select Global Fund. At the end of each month, the royalties paid will be for the exact number of pages of your book that have been read. 

Should You Use Amazon KDP Select For Your Book? 

Before deciding whether or not to opt for KDP Select, there are many factors to take into consideration. Is the genre of your book suitable? Who is your readership and where do they buy their ebooks from? Is your goal wide distribution of the ebook or a more focused initial approach? 

If you do wish to take part in KDP Select, it’s important to note that this needs to be decided on at the point that the ebook process begins. This is because if you are opting for KDP Select, we will need to ensure that the metadata for your ebook is not disseminated out to the wider book trade until the exclusivity period is over. For this reason, KDP Select cannot be opted into retrospectively once the ebook is already available from other platforms. 

To learn more about different marketing strategies for eBooks, check out our article on the subject here.