This article about Kobo Writing Life is part of my Beginner’s Guide to Self-publishing direct with ebook Retailers series.

Do you want to self-publish your ebook directly on Kobo and make your book available on their global retail store? Here’s the information you need to create a direct relationship with them to publish your ebook. Kobo and OverDrive’s parent company is Rakuten and in Japanese this name means optimism.

About Kobo Writing Life

Japan’s Rakuten bought Canadian company Kobo in 2011 and released its e-reader in Japan before Amazon got into that marketplace. Kobo sells directly through its own online global retail stores, but Rakuten are proactive about establishing affiliate partnerships, which means that when you distribute through Kobo, you also get secondary distribution to other major online retailers, for example:

• Parent company Rakuten in Japan and the U.S.; W.H. Smith in the U.K.; Indigo in Canada; Angus & Robertson and Collins in Australia; Paper Plus in New Zealand; Eason & Son in Ireland; FNAC and PriceMinister in France; FNAC in Portugal; Livraria Cultura in Brazil; Feltrinelli and Mondadori in Italy; Bol in the Netherlands and Belgium; Crossword and W.H. Smith in India; National Book Store in the Philippines; Pick n Pay in South Africa; La Central in Spain; D&R in Turkey (through Idefix); Orbile in Mexico (which is a partnership between Porrúa and Gandhi); and Walmart.

Several digital bookstores closed down and transferred their users to Kobo’s bookstore, including the U.S. Borders Store, the Sony Reader Store, Germany’s Tolino, and the U.K.’s Waterstones.

Historically, Rakuten’s Kobo has had more of a global than a U.S. presence, but in 2018 Rakuten established a partnership with Walmart so now two of the world’s biggest retailers are teaming up to take on Amazon in the US. Walmart became the exclusive mass retailer of Kobo ereaders, and the Kobo library will be available via Walmart.

Kobo don’t ask for exclusivity so you’re free to publish on other platforms. They will also convert your manuscript to the EPUB standard format for free and with no strings attached. What’s not to love?

• Kobo Retail Site: bit.ly/H2-Kobo
• Travel Guides on Kobo: bit.ly/H2-KoboTG

Kobo Author Interface

The interface and steps to upload and list your book on Kobo Writing Life are extremely easy and distraction free. There’s a downloadable user guide to walk you through the process, but the process is intuitive enough so you shouldn’t need it.

• Kobo Writing Life: bit.ly/H2-KoboWL
• Kobo Writing Life Blog: bit.ly/H2-KoboWLblog
• Kobo Writing Life Author Guide: bit.ly/H2-KoboUG

Kobo Author Pages

The Kobo website doesn’t feature author pages.

Kobo Publication Timeline

When you hit the publish button, it takes between 24-72 hours to list your ebook in the Kobo Store, and then it’ll get filtered down to the other global stores.

Kobo File Requirements

• File types accepted: DOC, DOCX, ODT, EPUB, and MOBI
• File type read: EPUB
• File size limit: 100MB
• File Conversion Guidelines: bit.ly/H2-KoboFC

Kobo ISBN Requirements

If you don’t have your own ISBN, Kobo will assign a free one to your book in order to distribute within their network. If you access Kobo through an aggregator, an ISBN is a requirement.

Kobo Subscription Program

Kobo has their own monthly subscription program called Kobo Plus (in partnership with BOL.com), and you have to enroll for a 3 month period, but unlike Amazon, there is no exclusivity requirement. Initially this subscription service was only available to readers in the Netherlands and Belgium, and authors get paid based on page reads.

UPDATE July 2020: Kobo Plus is being rolled out to Canada.

Kobo Plus royalties are paid out of the pool of revenue earned from subscribers at a 60% royalty rate.

• More information about how this percentage is calculated: bit.ly/H2-KoboPay
• More Information about Kobo Plus: bit.ly/H2-KoboPlus

Kobo Additional Distribution Benefits

As well as their own online retail sites, and their affiliate partnerships with other online retailers, Kobo also has a direct relationship with OverDrive who supplies 20,000+ public libraries worldwide, and schools. When you set up your book you can opt in or out of this distribution network. You need to set a unique USD library price independent of your USD retail price. Any changes to your ebook, including opting in or out, may take up to a week to be updated in OverDrive’s catalog.

Kobo Upfront Costs

Kobo doesn’t charge an upfront fee for distributing your ebooks.

Kobo Author Royalties

If you set a list price of $2.99 USD or more you will earn maximum royalties of 70%. If your list price is less, you’ll receive a 45% royalty rate.

Here’s how royalties would be calculated for a $2.99 book, based on Kobo taking 30%:

• Going direct you would receive a 70% royalty rate ($2.09).

Kobo Going Direct Alternative

Using $2.99 as an example list price, if you don’t want to go direct with Kobo, you could (for example) distribute to them via:

• PublishDrive and Smashwords (Royalty Rate: 90% of list price): They keep 10% of your list price ($0.29), and that would be deducted off the 70% royalty rate received from Kobo ($2.09), leaving you with a royalty payment of around ($1.79)
• Draft2Digital (Royalty Rate: 85% of Net): Based on the 70% royalty rate paid by Kobo ($2.09), Draft2Digital would take 15% of this ($0.31), leaving you with a royalty balance of around ($1.77)

Read more articles in my How to Write a Travel Guide Series

I’m putting the finishing touches on my How to Write and Self-Publish a Travel Guide Series, which details a step by step approach for writing and producing your own travel guide. It’s part of a four-part series aimed at helping travel bloggers achieve passive income based on their passions and existing content.

Each month I host a monthly free prize draw and give away a travel writing e-book to the lucky winner. Sign up to join my mailing list to participate.