Short answer. To use a KDP cover wrap template, get your final page count, download the template from KDP's cover calculator, and set a canvas at the full size with 0.125 inch bleed. Place your front on the right panel, build the spine and back around it, keep the barcode corner clear, and export one flattened PDF.
Key points
- A paperback cover is back, spine and front as one PDF. An ebook cover is only the front.
- The template is made for one page count. Make it from the final interior.
- A standard ebook cover file is too small and the wrong shape for a 6 x 9 front at 300 DPI.
- Work from the layered source files, not the JPEG.
- Our cover wrap and spine service does this conversion for $99 in 5 business days.
What is the KDP cover wrap template?
A guide file from KDP's Print Cover Calculator and Templates page, in PDF and PNG. You enter binding, paper, trim size and page count. It gives the full cover size and a template to put under your art as a guide layer.
It marks the bleed, the safe area, the spine, the spine safe area and the barcode margin. Our post on the KDP cover template generator walks through each line on it. This post is about the next step: filling it from a front cover you already have.
Why can't I stretch my ebook cover to fit?
Because the shape and the pixels are both wrong. KDP's ideal ebook cover is 1,600 x 2,560 pixels, a height of 1.6 times the width.
A 6 x 9 front panel with bleed is 6.125 x 9.25 inches, a height of about 1.51 times the width. At 300 DPI, which KDP asks for on print covers, that panel needs 1,838 x 2,775 pixels.
Put the 1,600 pixel wide ebook cover across 6.125 inches and you get about 261 pixels an inch, under the 300 KDP asks for. Its taller shape also runs about 0.55 inch past the panel, so either the top and bottom get cut off or you squash it to fit and every letter distorts. That is why the work starts from the source files.
How do I build the wrap, step by step?
Seven steps, in this order.
- Fix the page count. Use the count from your formatted interior PDF, not Word. Every page widens the spine.
- Download the template. Enter the same trim, paper and page count in KDP's calculator.
- Set the canvas. Full cover width by full cover height, at 300 DPI, with the template as the bottom layer.
- Place the front. It goes on the right panel for a left to right book. Run its background 0.125 inch past the top, bottom and right edges.
- Build the spine. Title and author only if the book has enough pages. Keep 0.0625 inch clear of each fold.
- Build the back. Extend the front's background or pick a color from it, add the blurb, and leave the barcode corner empty.
- Export. Hide the template, flatten, embed fonts, and save one single page PDF.
What are the numbers for a 6 x 9 book?
Take our sample wrap, a 384 page book on cream paper.
- Spine: 384 x 0.0025 = 0.96 inch.
- Full cover by KDP's formula: 0.125 + 6 + 0.96 + 6 + 0.125 = 13.21 inches wide, 9.25 inches tall.
- At 300 DPI that is 3,963 x 2,775 pixels. These are sums, not an exported file.
For the art, we used one public domain painting, John Constable's Salisbury Cathedral, placed once across the whole wrap. We set it 15.39 inches wide and started it 0.25 inch past the left edge of the file, so the canvas edge never shows. Back and front share one continuous scene, and nothing had to be mirrored or stretched.
Other page counts and trims are in our post on KDP paperback cover size and spine width.
The fix we do for this: we take your ebook cover's source files and final page count, rebuild the front at print size, and design the spine and back around it, checked against KDP's cover specs. It costs $99 in 5 business days. A new wrap from scratch is $249 in 7. Send us your trim and page count.
What goes on the back cover?
Usually a blurb, sometimes an author photo and a short bio, plus the empty barcode box. KDP asks that every word sits at least 0.125 inch inside the trim and is at least 7 points.
Any title, author name or ISBN you print must match the book details you entered in KDP exactly.
What goes wrong most often?
From KDP's cover checks and our own build:
- The template was made for a page count that later changed.
- The front was stretched instead of rebuilt, so the type looks wide.
- The background stops at the trim, leaving a white edge.
- Spine text on a book under 79 pages.
- Art or text in the barcode area.
- Template lines left visible in the exported PDF.
KDP also says cover files over 650 MB will not convert and recommends 40 MB or less.
What else do authors ask about the KDP cover wrap template?
From KDP's Print Cover Calculator and Templates page, as a PDF or PNG.
Only with real limits. A 1,600 pixel wide JPEG is below 300 DPI on a 6 x 9 front. Use the source files or a larger original.
The right panel for left to right books. KDP puts the front on the left for right to left books.
You can. A mirrored title reads backwards, so we carry over the background only.
Make a new template and refit the spine and panels.
What should you do next?
Get your final page count, download the template for it, and check whether your source files cover a 6.125 x 9.25 inch front at 300 DPI. If they do not, or you would rather not build it, send them through our cover wrap and spine page.
