Create professional book covers with AI — genre conventions, KDP sizing specs, typography workflow, licensing answers, and prompts for fiction and nonfiction.
Readers absolutely judge books by their covers. On Amazon, your cover is a thumbnail smaller than a postage stamp competing against millions of alternatives. Traditional publishers spend $2,000 to $5,000 on cover design because they know the cover is marketing, not decoration. Self-published authors rarely have that budget — which is exactly why AI book cover generators have become standard equipment for indie publishing in 2026.
This guide walks through designing a professional, genre-appropriate book cover with AI: the specs, the genre conventions that actually sell, the prompt formulas, and the licensing questions every author asks.
A book cover has one job: signal the genre and promise of the book instantly, at thumbnail size. Before designing anything, internalize these rules: