A KDP cover is a 1600×2560 layout, not a book trailer
Kindle Direct Publishing wants a 1600×2560 front with title and author type that survive the thumbnail. Seedream or Ideogram. /for/authors is the person. A generated 'open the book' clip is not the cover file.
Kindle Direct Publishing wants a 1600×2560 front with title and author type that survive the thumbnail. Seedream or Ideogram. /for/authors is the person. A generated 'open the book' clip is not the cover file.
A KDP upload that ships is a still: 1600 wide, 2560 tall, title and author readable when Amazon shrinks it to a grid tile. It is not a 9:16 trailer of a hand opening a hardcover. Letter the strings. Export the jpeg. Leave the trailer on a different day.
1600×2560 is the cover file
Kindle Direct Publishing’s recommended eBook front is 1600×2560. That ratio is the product. A 16:9 film still that dies when KDP letterboxes it is a cover you cannot ship. A 1:1 crop that eats the author line is a regenerate.
Title, subtitle if you print one, author name — those strings are the listing. Proof at 100%, then at grid size. One misspelled surname is a new still, not a “fix in video.”
Do not generate a photoreal hand “opening the book” as the cover. The hand is a lifestyle scene. The cover is type. Do not generate a fake review wall. Quote every string you will proof. "Marina Chen" is a string. “A moody literary name” is a byline you cannot ship. Generate in the portrait the store wants. Do not paint a landscape and hope a crop saves the title.
Seedream for dense type; Ideogram for the lockup
Seedream 5.0 Pro is the stills row when the cover is a layout: text-to-image, 7 credits, native text in 14 languages, dense layouts listed. Title plus author plus a series line is a page. Quote every line. If Seedream “improves” a subtitle, you still proof the string. A cover that ships The Salt Line and a tile that shows Salt Lines is two books.
Ideogram V4 is the short lockup: text-to-image, 6 credits, posters and logos with accurate text listed. Eight to twelve words that must read at thumbnail size. Quote the string. Do not ask a photoreal row to spell the book.
Use Seedream for a dense front. Use Ideogram for a title card. Mixing them in one generate is a pretty mark on unreadable body copy, or a dense layout whose title is mush. Neither row is a video model. Motion will not correct a misspelled author. Motion is not the KDP file.
Generate an image from text is the named stills job: you describe the layout, the agent asks about style, aspect, and count, then picks a model — or uses the one you name. Cost is priced per model, shown before you confirm. Name Seedream or Ideogram. A bare “make a book cover” paints a mood, not a 1600×2560 front. Text-to-image is the same door without the chat loop. Proof at 100%.
Generate the still, not an open-the-book clip
A generated “open the book” clip is a trailer. Trailers have duration, a mix, a hand, pages the model invented. KDP does not ingest that clip as the cover. The cover is one still. A trailer is a different file, on a different day — and it still does not replace the 1600×2560 jpeg.
Do not text-to-video a hardcover opening, use an unproofed trailer frame as the upload, or generate a reader’s hands and a fake bookstore shelf. Hands are people. Other spines are other people’s marks. If the art is a scene from the book, generate it as a still at the cover ratio, then letter title and author on a typesetting row — or composite type after from strings you typed. Do not ask a video model to “hold the cover for eight seconds.” You will pay for seconds of a typo. A 4K invented jacket is still the wrong file if the box is not 1600×2560.
/for/authors is the person, not the jpeg
/for/authors is the person: a real line as a hook, a passage reading, a desk, a signing. 9:16. Three posts a week. That page sells voice. It may be a world trailer as a separate generate. It is not the KDP cover spec.
Do not rewrite /for as a cover factory. The cover does not need a mouth. The author might, on a different file, reading a line they wrote. Do not generate a photoreal author who is not you. If the jacket uses a portrait, it is a photograph you own, or it is not on the cover. Quote the strings; Seedream the dense front or Ideogram the lockup; export 1600×2560; proof the thumbnail. If you cannot read the author name, you made a trailer.
FAQ
Should every KDP cover be Seedream 5.0 Pro?
No. Dense fronts — title, author, series, a stacked lockup — are Seedream 5.0 Pro: 7 credits, text in 14 languages, structured layouts. Title cards with a handful of words are Ideogram V4 at 6 credits. Scout cheap. Proof the string at thumbnail size.
Can I skip the still and prompt a video model for a “cinematic cover”?
You can. You will not get a signed KDP file. You will get a clip whose first frame is a guess, and every extra second is unreadable type. Lock the 1600×2560 still first. An “open the book” generate is a trailer, not the upload.
Is this the same job as /for/authors?
No. That page is the person: a real passage, a desk, a 9:16 hook. This page is the Kindle front — 1600×2560, title and author that survive the grid. Do not rewrite the author audience as a cover jpeg.
Why not use the first frame of my book trailer as the cover?
Because a trailer is composed for motion and a feed, not for a 1600×2560 store tile. Type that reads in 9:16 often dies in the KDP grid. Generate the cover as a still on Seedream or Ideogram. Keep the trailer as a second file.