Have you ever noticed on a library or book store shelf how not all the books are the same height and width? There are a lot of different sizes of books. But their are several goto standard book sizes that publishers and authors heavily rely on. Readers don’t often think about the size of a book unless the change is dramatic enough to bother them. But authors have many reasons to care about the size of their book.
Why You Should Care About Standard Book Sizes
If you’re writing a book, it’s important to know standard book sizes for your genre. This ensures that your target reader feels familiar with the size of your book. Another reason to make sure that you have thought about the size of your book before you send it to your printer is that once your book is laid out it will take substantial reformatting to convert it to another size.
If you have neglected to do this you can have major issues when it comes time to send your book to your printer, cover designer or interior layout artist. The author, book designers, and printers will need to be on the same page when it comes to the books size to achieve the best results with minimum miscommunications or delays.
Book Genre Can Effect Standard Book Sizes
Book sizes can vary so these are more guidelines than rules, but it is important whatever size you pick to verify from your POD or traditional printer what their standard book sizes are. You will traditionally pay more if you ask for a size that a printer is not equipped to easily print.
Books come in a variety of standard book sizes and dimensions that vary depending on the type of book you’re writing. The majority of book sizes printed are a standard digest size of 5.5” x 8.5”. The infographic below outlines the common sizes of different book types.
