Your cover will be judged at eighty pixels wide.
Most readers will first encounter the book as a tiny image while scrolling beside other books.
We design for that moment.
A standard AngryPages cover is included when we publish your book.
Make My Cover →A phone. Four books across. A moving grid.
The paperback is the width of a fingernail. The reader has never heard of the author and may spend less than a second deciding whether to stop.
That is the venue. Not a full-size mock-up on your laptop, with the file open, seen by the person who wrote the book. The cover has to earn a moment from a stranger, beside other books, while the page is moving.
A cover is not an image.
It's a decision made in under a second.
Legibility beats illustration.
If the title cannot be read when the cover gets small, the design has failed. It may be beautiful at full size, but the reader still needs to know what the book is.
Contrast beats detail.
Fine detail disappears first. A photograph with a wide tonal range can collapse into grey at thumbnail size while a simple contrast remains clear. We design for the size the reader will see, not only the size the designer works at.
Three elements beat seven.
At thumbnail size, complexity turns into noise. One clear shape, a readable title and a strong colour relationship can do more than a cover full of things competing for attention.
You know too much.
When the author sees a figure walking down a road, they may see chapter eleven. The stranger sees a figure walking down a road.
You see the cover big and alone, after years inside the manuscript. Your eye supplies meaning that the customer does not yet have. They can keep scrolling without losing anything.
The cover needs to work before someone knows the story.
It's a genre signal before it's an aesthetic object.
Readers first decide whether the book looks like something meant for them. They compare it with books they already know and like. A cover that ignores its category can signal that it does not belong on the shelf, rather than that it is original.
Recognition comes first. The work is originality inside the convention: give the reader enough familiarity to understand the promise, and enough distinction to remember this book.
Unmistakably the same shelf.
Unmistakably not the same book.
Not somebody else's cover.
Not a template everybody else has.
Authors reasonably fear both designer ego and generic templates. A cover somebody else authors still carries your name. A familiar template can look polished and still feel like a book the reader has already passed twice this month.
You see the cover before it goes live. Nothing ships as a placeholder. If it isn't right, it isn't finished.
What we check.
- Title readable at thumbnail size
- Useful subtitle hierarchy
- Strong contrast
- Social crops do not cut off important content
- Author name remains visible
- Light and dark surroundings
- Print trim
- Spine width
- Front / spine / back alignment
A subtitle that only works in the design file, a social crop that cuts off your name, or a spine that does not match the trim can all look fine on a desktop. We check the conditions the reader and printer will actually meet.
Checked at thumbnail, because that's where most readers will first judge it.
What you get.
Digital
Front cover and title treatment prepared for AngryPages, phones, storefront-style listings and social previews.
When the book goes to print, we prepare the front, spine and back to the printer's specifications.
Thumbnail check
Shrink it and judge it where the reader will actually meet it, alongside other books.
A good book shouldn't look unfinished.
If AngryPages publishes the book, the standard cover is included.
No separate cover-design charge just to give the book a proper face. A real cover is part of publishing the book properly, not a cheap giveaway.
The author may also bring their own cover. AngryPages can review it and use it if it works.
If you request extra custom design work beyond the included standard cover, paid creative work uses the same AngryPages standard rate:
$60 per hour
We tell you how much time we expect the extra work to take before we begin.
Give the book a cover worth stopping for.
Most people will see the cover before they read a single word.
Your standard AngryPages cover is included.