How to Make an Ebook in Google Docs and Publish It

Google Docs is free, runs in any browser, and can export an EPUB file, the format ebook stores use. For a novel, a memoir or a short nonfiction book, that is enough to get a book into the Kindle store, Apple Books and dozens of others without paying for software. The process has a few traps, mostly in how you format the document before you export, and this guide walks through each step in order.

It works best for text-led books. If your book depends on complex layout, such as a cookbook, a picture book or a workbook, see our comparison of ebook creation software for tools that handle fixed layouts.

Step 1: Switch the document to Pages format

New Google Docs often open in Pageless format, a continuous scroll. Page breaks, section breaks and image wrapping are not available in Pageless, and you will need page breaks. Go to File, Page setup, choose Pages, and click OK.

Step 2: Use heading styles for every chapter title

This is the step that matters most. Ebook files are navigated by structure, not by how text looks, so a chapter title that is merely large and bold is invisible to a reader’s table of contents. Select each chapter title and apply Format, Paragraph styles, Heading 1. Use Heading 2 for sections within chapters, and Title for the book title. Leave body text in the Normal text style rather than changing fonts and sizes by hand.

Step 3: Start each chapter on a new page

Put the cursor before each chapter heading and choose Insert, Break, Page break. Do not use a run of empty lines to push a chapter onto a new page: ebooks reflow to fit each screen, so blank lines that look right in Docs leave odd gaps on a phone.

Step 4: Add front matter and a table of contents

Add a title page and a copyright page at the start, each followed by a page break. Then add a contents page with Insert, Page elements, Table of contents, which builds links from your headings. Keep it, but do not rely on it: one test found that a table of contents made in Docs did not appear in the exported EPUB, and ebook readers build their own navigation from the headings in Step 2 anyway.

Step 5: Keep images simple

Click an image and set it to In line from the toolbar that appears. Wrapping text around images is a page-layout idea that reflowable ebooks do not support well, and an older test of the Docs export found images overflowing the margins. Inline images, on their own line, are the safest choice.

Step 6: Export the book

You have two good options, and it is worth making both.

• File, Download, EPUB Publication (.epub) gives you an EPUB directly.
• File, Download, Microsoft Word (.docx) gives you a Word file, which Amazon KDP, Kindle Create and Draft2Digital all accept and convert themselves.

Google’s EPUB export is basic, and Google does not document how it builds chapters or handles fonts. Running heads are dropped, which does not matter in an ebook. If the EPUB has problems in Step 8, the Word file is your fallback: upload it to KDP or Draft2Digital and let their converters do the work, or open it in Kindle Create.

Step 7: Make a cover that every store accepts

Each store states its own cover rules:

One file covers all three: a 1,600 by 2,560 pixel RGB JPEG, kept under 5 MB. Amazon’s two cover help pages give different maximum file sizes, 50 MB and 5 MB, so the smaller is the safe limit.

If you designed the cover in a tool that exported a PNG, such as Canva, convert it with our PNG to JPG converter, then set the exact dimensions with the JPG resizer. Both run in your browser. Start from an image at least that large, because Apple rejects covers that have been visibly upscaled. Our guide to design tools covers free options for making the cover itself.

Step 8: Check the book in a real ebook reader

Never publish an EPUB you have only seen in Google Docs. Open it in at least one reader and page through it, checking that every chapter starts on a new page, the reader’s table of contents lists your chapters, images fit the screen, and italics and special characters survived. Free readers that open EPUB files:

• Kindle Previewer, Amazon’s free app for Windows and Mac, which also shows how the book will look on Kindle devices and opens Word files.
• Apple Books on a Mac: File, Import.
• Calibre’s E-book viewer and Thorium Reader, both free.
• Our EPUB reader, which opens the file in your browser without uploading it.

For a formal check, run the file through EPUBCheck, the W3C’s official validator. pagina EPUB-Checker gives it a simple interface on Windows, Mac and Linux. Apple Books requires books to pass it, and it catches structural errors no reader will show you.

Step 9: Publish

Amazon KDP. Upload the EPUB, the Word file or a Kindle Create file, add the cover, and use KDP’s previewer before publishing. You do not need an ISBN for a Kindle ebook.

Everywhere else in one go. Draft2Digital accepts Word files and EPUBs, converts Word files free, and distributes to Apple Books, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, library services and more. It charges a one-time $20 activation fee for new accounts and about 10% of the retail price of each sale. Accounts earning under $100 a year pay a $12 annual fee, unless they have no titles in distribution.

Apple Books directly. Apple requires the EPUB to pass the latest EPUBCheck and validates it again on upload.

When Google Docs is not enough

If the exported EPUB keeps breaking, or you want typography beyond the basics, write in Docs and format elsewhere. Download the Word file and open it in Kindle Create (free, for Kindle), Reedsy Studio (free, in the browser), or Draft2Digital’s converter. For a quick EPUB of a draft to read on your own e-reader, our Word to EPUB converter makes one in your browser; it carries the text only, without images, bold or tables, so it is for reading drafts rather than publishing.