How to Format a Book in Vellum for Kindle and Print (2026)

If you want a book that looks professionally typeset without learning a complex layout program, Vellum is one of the easiest tools to start with. It is built specifically for authors, so instead of wrestling with page layout, you focus on your manuscript, choose a style, preview the result, and generate finished files for Kindle and print. That simplicity is exactly why so many self-published authors choose it for novels, memoirs, and other text-led books.

Before you dive in, though, it helps to know what Vellum is and what it is not. When you format a book in Vellum, you are working inside a Mac-only program that turns a clean Word document into a polished ebook and, with the Press edition, a print-ready paperback. It handles chapter headings, front matter, back matter, and consistent styling beautifully, but it is not a cover designer and it is not the right tool for every kind of book.

This guide walks through the full process step by step, from preparing your manuscript to uploading your finished files to KDP. You will learn how to format a book in Vellum for both Kindle and print, what to check before you export, and where Vellum reaches its limits so you can plan around them before you spend money on a licence.

What Vellum Can and Cannot Do for Your Book

Vellum is a Mac-only program, and it requires macOS 13 or later, so the first question is simply whether you have a compatible Mac available. If you do, you can download Vellum and build and preview your book for free, which means you can try the whole workflow before you pay anything. You only pay when you are ready to generate finished files, and that free preview stage is a genuine advantage because you can see exactly how your book will look before committing.

The pricing is a one-time payment, not a subscription, and each licence covers unlimited books. Vellum Ebooks costs $199.99 and generates ebook files, while Vellum Press costs $249.99 and adds paperbacks, so you only need Press if you plan to publish a print edition. When you format a book in Vellum with either edition, you can reuse the licence for your next book and the one after that, which makes the cost easier to justify if you plan to publish more than once.

What you get for that payment is a polished, consistent result with very little manual layout work. Vellum exports EPUB files for ebooks and, with Press, a print-ready PDF for paperbacks. It offers chapter styles and book themes that apply professional typography throughout, and its previews let you check how the book will look on devices and in print. What it does not do is create covers, so you will still need a separate cover file for KDP, and it is weak for complex tables, footnotes, and images-heavy layouts, so heavily illustrated or reference-heavy books may need a different tool.

Prepare a Clean Manuscript Before You Import

Vellum imports DOCX files only, so your manuscript needs to be a Word document before you start, and the cleaner that document is, the smoother the whole process will be. This is the step most authors rush, and it is also the step that causes most formatting headaches later, because Vellum builds its structure from the styles and breaks already present in your DOCX file. A tidy manuscript gives Vellum clear instructions, while a messy one forces you to fix the same problems again inside Vellum.

Start by applying consistent heading styles throughout your manuscript, with Heading 1 for chapter titles and normal body text for everything else, and remove manual formatting tricks such as repeated blank lines, extra spaces, and tabs used to indent paragraphs. Check that scene breaks are marked consistently, that your chapter titles read exactly as you want them to appear, and that you have removed tracked changes, comments, and placeholder text. If you format a book in Vellum from a manuscript full of stray formatting, those strays tend to survive the import and show up in your previews.

Finish this stage by reading through the manuscript once as a reader, not as a writer, looking for double spaces, inconsistent quotation marks, and headings that were typed in bold rather than styled as headings. Save a backup copy of the cleaned DOCX file before you import it, so you always have a safe version to return to if you need to start again. A little patience here saves a great deal of fiddling later, and it is the difference between a book that looks polished on the first preview and one that needs round after round of small corrections.

Import Your DOCX and Build Your Chapter Structure

Importing is straightforward: open Vellum, create a new book, and import your cleaned DOCX file, after which Vellum will split your manuscript into chapters based on your heading styles. Take a moment to check that split carefully, because a chapter that starts in the wrong place usually means a heading style was missing or misapplied in the Word document. Fixing the DOCX file and re-importing is often faster than patching the structure by hand, especially if several chapters are affected.

Once the chapters are in place, organise your front matter and back matter in the order readers expect. Front matter typically includes the title page, copyright page, and dedication, while back matter can include an about the author page, a note asking readers to leave a review, and any acknowledgements. Vellum provides dedicated elements for these sections, so use them rather than typing front matter as ordinary chapters, because that keeps page numbering, headings, and styling consistent across the whole book.

Pay attention to chapter breaks and section breaks at this stage, since they control where each new chapter begins and how the book flows from one part to the next. If your book has parts as well as chapters, set those up now rather than halfway through styling, because restructuring later can disturb the work you have already done. When you format a book in Vellum, a clear structure is the foundation everything else rests on, and it is much easier to adjust a style across a well-organised book than to rescue a book whose chapters are out of order.

Style Your Book and Preview Every Format

With your structure in place, choose a book style and chapter style that suit your genre, and let Vellum apply consistent typography, spacing, and ornamentation throughout. A literary novel might suit a quiet, classic style, while a contemporary romance or thriller might suit something a little bolder, but in every case the goal is the same: a look that feels intentional and does not distract from the text. Resist the urge to mix too many decorative elements, because a book that changes its look from chapter to chapter reads as unfinished rather than creative.

Previewing is where Vellum earns its reputation, so use the previews properly instead of glancing at the first chapter and moving on. Check the ebook preview for different devices and the print preview if you are using Press, and read through chapter openings, scene breaks, front matter, and back matter in each view. Look for awkward page breaks, headings sitting alone at the bottom of a page, and any text that looks cramped or uneven, and fix those issues now while changes are still cheap and easy to make.

This is also the point to be honest about whether Vellum is the right fit for your particular book. If your manuscript relies on complex tables, extensive footnotes, or a large number of images placed in precise positions, you may find Vellum frustrating, and it is better to discover that during the free preview stage than after you have paid to generate files. For most novels, memoirs, and straightforward nonfiction, though, the combination of ready-made styles and reliable previews is exactly what makes it so popular with independent authors.

Export, Check, and Upload to KDP for Kindle and Print

When your previews look right, you are ready to generate your finished files, and this is the point at which you pay for your chosen edition. With Vellum Ebooks you generate an EPUB file for Kindle, and with Vellum Press you can also generate a print-ready PDF for a paperback edition. Before you export, confirm your KDP trim size, bleed, and margins, because those print settings need to be right before you generate the PDF, not discovered afterwards when a proof copy arrives looking wrong.

For Kindle, upload the EPUB file to KDP and check it once more in the online previewer, including chapter navigation and the table of contents. For a paperback, upload the print-ready PDF with a separately prepared cover matching the same trim size and spine width. If you are unsure about any of these print settings, our guide to what a print-ready PDF is explains what makes a PDF genuinely ready for print, and our guide to formatting a book for KDP print covers the wider KDP print setup in more detail.

If you are on Windows, the honest answer is to choose a different tool rather than forcing Vellum to fit. You can our guide to formatting a book in Atticus as a cross-platform alternative, or use Reedsy, and both let you produce Kindle and print files without a Mac. For a direct comparison with another popular ebook tool, our Kindle Create versus Vellum comparison sets out where each program shines, and it can help you decide whether Vellum on a Mac, or an alternative on Windows, is the better match for your book.

Vellum Pre-Publish Checklist

A final check before you generate files and upload them will catch most of the mistakes that lead to rejected files or embarrassing proofs. Work through this list slowly, in order, and do not skip the print checks just because the ebook preview looked good, since Kindle and paperback have different requirements and a problem in one format will not always show up in the other. When you format a book in Vellum, this last pass is what turns a good-looking preview into a file you can publish with confidence.

Treat the checklist as a gate, not a formality: if an item fails, fix it and re-preview before moving on, because uploading a flawed file and hoping KDP will catch the problem wastes far more time than checking it yourself. Keep your cleaned DOCX backup, your exported files, and your cover file together in one folder for each book, so that future updates, such as a corrected edition or a new back-matter page, start from the right files rather than a scramble through old downloads.

Finally, run the whole check twice if you are publishing both formats, once for the ebook and once for print, because a clean EPUB does not guarantee a clean PDF. The few extra minutes this takes are well spent, and they are the reason careful authors rarely have to pull a published book back for corrections.

• Manuscript is a clean DOCX file with consistent heading styles and no tracked changes
• Chapters, front matter, and back matter are in the correct order
• Book style and chapter style suit the genre and are applied consistently
• Ebook preview checked on device views, including chapter openings and scene breaks
• Print preview checked if using Press, with trim size, bleed, and margins confirmed
• Cover file prepared separately, since Vellum does not create covers
• EPUB generated for Kindle and print-ready PDF generated for paperback with Press
• KDP upload preview checked for navigation, table of contents, and opening pages
• Final files and cleaned DOCX backup stored together for future updates

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Vellum only available for Mac?

Yes, Vellum is Mac only and requires macOS 13 or later. Windows users should use Atticus or Reedsy instead, which offer a similar book-formatting workflow without needing a Mac.

How much does Vellum cost?

Vellum is a one-time payment, not a subscription, and each licence covers unlimited books. Vellum Ebooks costs $199.99, while Vellum Press costs $249.99 and adds paperbacks to the ebook output.

Can I try Vellum before I pay?

Yes, you can build and preview your book for free in Vellum. You only pay when you are ready to generate finished files, so you can check the styling and previews before committing to a licence.

What files do I upload to KDP from Vellum?

Upload the EPUB file for your Kindle ebook and, if you have Vellum Press, the print-ready PDF for your paperback. Check your KDP trim size, bleed, and margins before you export the print file.

Does Vellum create book covers?

No, Vellum does not create covers. You will need a separate cover file for KDP, designed to match the trim size and spine width of your print interior.

Conclusion: A Polished Kindle and Print Book Without the Layout Struggle

When you format a book in Vellum, you trade the complexity of a full layout program for a focused workflow that suits most text-led books very well. Clean up your DOCX file, organise your chapters and front and back matter, choose a style, preview carefully, and export the right file for each format, and you will end up with a book that looks like it came from a professional typesetter.

Just remember the boundaries before you start: you need a Mac running macOS 13 or later, your manuscript must be a DOCX file, covers come from elsewhere, and complex tables, footnotes, and images-heavy layouts may need a different tool. Within those limits, Vellum is a fast, reliable route to a polished Kindle ebook and, with Press, a print-ready paperback you can be proud to publish.