How to format an ebook: 7 steps to a clean PDF

Should an ebook be a PDF or an EPUB?

It depends on where it will be read and where it will be sold.

If you sell a guide or a workbook from your own link, PDF is the default. It looks the way you designed it, and people can print it.

If the book is mostly text and meant for e-readers or a store such as Amazon KDP, you want an EPUB. For a long guide, offering both is reasonable.

What tool should you format an ebook in?

The last row is mine. I build bukpress, so read that row knowing it, and see the section on where it is the wrong tool.

If your product is visual, creating a digital product in Canva is the better guide. This one is for ebooks that are mostly words.

How do you format an ebook, step by step?

1. Finish the text first

Formatting a draft is how a two-day job becomes two weeks. Every edit moves a page break. Write in plain text or Markdown, where there is nothing to fiddle with. If AI helped with the draft, the editing pass happens here too, not in the layout.

2. Choose the format

PDF, EPUB or both, from the table above. Decide now, because a PDF lets you control the page and an EPUB does not.

3. Set the heading structure

One level for chapters, one for sections, one more at most. Be consistent: the headings become the table of contents and the navigation in an EPUB.

4. Pick two fonts

One for headings, one for body text. A third font is where most homemade ebooks start to look homemade. Set the body large enough to read on a phone without zooming.

5. Set margins and line height

Generous margins and open line spacing do more for a page than any decoration. Dense pages look like work, and a lead magnet that looks like work does not get read.

6. Put every chapter on a new page

Use a real page break, not a stack of empty lines. Empty lines shift the moment you edit a paragraph above them.

7. Add the cover and the front matter, then export

A front cover, a title page, a contents page, and a back cover if it will be printed. Export with the fonts embedded, so the file looks the same on a device that does not have them. Then open it on a phone and read every page once.

What makes an ebook look amateur?

None of this makes the book sell. What digital products sell best and the sales page decide that. Formatting only stops a good book from looking like a bad one.

Where does bukpress fit?

It sits between a writing tool and a page-layout application. You paste Markdown, choose a design, and download a finished file.

What it gives you:

• A preview that tells the truth. The pages you see are paginated by the same rules as the export. What breaks on page 7 in the preview breaks on page 7 in the PDF.
• Design once, reuse it. Fonts, sizes, colours, margins and covers are saved as a Brand Kit and applied to the next book in one click. Your lead magnet, your workbook and your paid guide look like one brand.
• Your own fonts. Import from Google Fonts or upload a typeface. They are embedded in the PDF and packaged in the EPUB.
• Covers and backgrounds. Full-bleed front and back covers, page backgrounds and paper textures.
• Page breaks in plain text. Three dashes on a line start a new page.
• No watermark, on any plan. That includes the free one. What you export is yours to sell.

That last point matters if the file is a lead magnet for an email list or a handout for an online course: somebody else's logo on your first page is not the first impression you want.

What is still on paper for bukpress?

I build in public, so here is the list as it stands. These are ideas on paper. No dates, no promises:

• More page sizes. A5, US Letter and paperback trim sizes for print on demand.
• Import from Google Docs and Word, for people whose draft does not live in Markdown.
• Cover templates, so a first cover does not require a design tool.
• A share link for the preview, so a client or an editor can read and comment before export.
• A direct hand-off to a store, so an exported file goes straight to a product page.

If one of these is the thing stopping you, tell me. That is how the order gets decided.

When is bukpress the wrong tool?

• You need a page size other than A4. The PDF export is A4 today. A paperback with a specific trim size needs another tool for now.
• The book is mostly images. Planners, checklists with heavy design and picture books belong in a layout tool like Canva.
• You do not want to touch Markdown at all. You only need the basics (a # for a heading, two asterisks for bold), but it is still Markdown.
• The text is not finished. No tool fixes that. Go back to step one.

And if the question is not how the file looks but whether anyone wants it, start with how to create a digital product, then how to price it and where to sell it.

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bukpress, if the layout is what is slowing you down

A note on fit first. If your ebook is ten pages and already looks fine in Google Docs, export it and move on: you do not need another tool. bukpress does not write the book, and it will not make an unwanted book sell.

bukpress turns a Markdown draft into a typeset PDF and a reflowable EPUB: a live paginated preview, your own fonts and covers, a design you save once and reuse, and no watermark. There is a free plan, so you can run a real manuscript through it before deciding anything.

Try bukpress