Pricing gets treated as a question of nerve, as though the only thing to settle is how much you dare charge. Most of the decision is arithmetic. Royalty bands, printing costs and the number of books a reader can buy next will narrow the range to two or three sensible numbers, and then you test within that range.
Amazon's royalty bands set your practical ceiling
KDP pays 70% on ebooks listed between $2.99 and $9.99 in eligible territories, and 35% on anything priced outside that band. The 70% option also carries a delivery fee based on your converted file size, $0.15 per megabyte in the US, taken out of every sale. A text-only novel is usually well under a megabyte, so the fee is pennies, but an illustrated or heavily formatted book can lose real money per copy. Check the current thresholds on KDP's pricing help page before you commit, because Amazon has moved them before.
That structure creates a hard edge. A $9.99 ebook earns roughly $6.99 at 70%. To beat that at 35%, you would have to charge close to $20. Anything priced between $10 and $20 earns you less per copy than a book at the top of the 70% band, on top of selling to fewer people. There are specialist non-fiction titles that hold $14.99 and there are readers who pay it, but you are choosing to take a third of the money when you do.
One more constraint worth knowing before you set your print price: to qualify for 70%, your ebook list price has to sit at least 20% below the list price of your own print edition.
The other retailers do the maths differently
Kobo pays 70% between roughly $2.99 and $12.99 and 45% outside that, with no delivery fee deducted. Apple Books and Google Play pay 70% at every price point, which means a $0.99 loss leader earns you about 69 cents there and about 34 cents on Amazon. If you distribute through Draft2Digital, it takes around 10% of the retail price, so a 70% retailer royalty lands closer to 60% by the time it reaches you.
None of that argues for different prices on different shops, since readers do compare and Amazon price-matches. It does mean your discount and free promotions earn very differently depending on where the sale happens.
Print pricing starts with the printer, not the reader
On KDP, print royalties are 60% of list price minus printing cost for Amazon marketplaces, and 40% minus printing cost through expanded distribution. Printing cost rises with page count and jumps for colour interiors, so a 500-page paperback has a floor that a 250-page one does not. Run your exact page count and trim size through the KDP printing cost calculator before you pick a number, because the floor is not negotiable and the platform will refuse a list price below it.
Watch the expanded distribution figure separately. A price that pays you a decent royalty on Amazon at 60% can pay almost nothing at 40%, which is worth knowing if bookshop and library ordering matters to you.
Series position changes the answer
A standalone has to earn everything it will ever earn on one sale, so it can usually carry a higher price. A series opener is buying you the next four purchases, and many indie authors price book one at $0.99, at $2.99, or permanently free, then hold the rest of the series higher. Box sets run into the top of the 70% band quickly, which is why three-book and four-book bundles cluster at $9.99.
If you write non-fiction with no sequel, none of that applies. Price against the value of the outcome and against the other books solving the same problem, then hold it.
Selling direct changes what a price is worth
On your own store you keep most of the price rather than a share of it, minus payment processing of roughly 3% plus a fixed fee per transaction. The same $6.99 ebook can earn you around $6.50 direct against about $4.75 on Amazon. Digital sales tax is the part to check: UK ebooks have been zero-rated for VAT since May 2020, but selling into the EU brings VAT obligations from the first sale unless your store acts as merchant of record and handles it for you.
Since undercutting Amazon invites price-matching, the usual approach is to match the retail price and add something on your own store instead: a bundle, the whole series, an audiobook, a signed copy.
How to test a price without fooling yourself
Change one price at a time and leave it alone for at least a month, because a fortnight of data tells you about your last promotion rather than your price. Judge it on royalty per month and on read-through into the next book, not on units sold. A lower price that moves twice the copies and pays half as much has told you nothing until you compare the totals.
Where the Toolchest comes in
Pricing is easier to act on when you own a sales channel you control. The •BulletPoint Toolchest gives you an author website, a mailing list, direct ebook sales, ARC distribution and a press kit for one flat monthly fee, so you can test a price on your own store, keep most of it, and stop paying for five separate subscriptions to do the same job.