Microsoft Word does not have a button that says, “export to paperback” or “export to ebook.” There is no simple way to turn a Word document into a properly formatted ebook or print-ready PDF. Authors often find themselves staring at margins, headings, and page numbers, wondering where to start.
Because formatting feels mysterious, some authors pay hybrid publishers thousands of dollars for a task they could complete themselves in a day, sometimes in hours, sometimes in minutes, if they had the right software.
That software exists. It is called Vellum, one of the most beloved tools in the author ecosystem.
I recently asked Bryan Canter about how authors can use Vellum. He’s a friend of the Novel Marketing show, an author, an independent publishing consultant, and a retired Army officer. He has formatted hundreds of books for authors using Vellum.
What exactly does Vellum do?
Bryan: Vellum does one thing, and it does it very well. Its sole purpose is to take a Microsoft Word manuscript and turn it into two formats.
The first is a print-ready PDF formatted exactly the way print-on-demand services require. The second is an EPUB file, which is the standard ebook format.
I once attended a writers conference where someone gave a presentation on how to set up Word to create a print-ready document for KDP, IngramSpark, or other print-on-demand services. Word is clearly not designed for that. It is also not well suited for writing long-form material like novels. Scrivener is a much better tool for drafting.
Why is Vellum so popular with authors?
Thomas: Part of the reason Vellum is so beloved is that it does not try to do everything. It has very little competition.
Even Dave Chesson, creator of Atticus, will tell you that Vellum is great. Atticus does many things Vellum does not, and that is how it competes. It is a broader tool. But Vellum focuses on one job, and it does that job extremely well. It is also priced well. You pay once, install it on your computer, and use it forever. There is no subscription.
The big asterisk is that Vellum only runs on a Mac. There is no PC version. I know authors who bought a Mac just so they could use Vellum. That is how much authors love this software.
Bryan: I just recommended that to a publishing client. He was working on his second book and wanted me to format it again. I told him he did not need me and that he could do it himself with Vellum.
He said he did not have a Mac. This was around Black Friday, when you shared that great MacBook Air deal. I told him it would be worth buying a MacBook Air just to use Vellum.
He decided not to and tried Atticus on his PC instead. Atticus does many things, but this author got stuck trying to figure it all out. In the end, he decided it was easier to pay me again.
How can I turn my Word doc into an ebook with Vellum?
Thomas: Many authors assume formatting is incredibly difficult. Hybrid publishers often encourage that belief, acting as if formatting is some kind of black magic you have to perform under a full moon.
We are going to demystify that.
Let’s say I have finished my Word document. It has been edited by all my editors and is ready to go. What do I do next to turn it into an ebook using Vellum?
Bryan: Vellum can import almost anything, and you can fix problems inside Vellum, but your life will be much easier if you do a few simple things in Word before importing to Vellum.
First, use Word’s built-in styles. Tag chapter titles with a heading style instead of manually formatting them with a certain font size. If your book has subheads, which are common in nonfiction, memoir, and business books, tag those as subheadings.
It also helps to insert a hard page break between chapters. Finish a chapter, insert a page break, and then tag the next chapter title with the appropriate heading.
Thomas: I use Heading 1 for major sections, Heading 2 for chapter titles, and Heading 3 for subsections inside chapters. My book was nonfiction, so I needed that structure. If you do not like how headings look in Word, you can change the style settings. When you adjust a style, it updates consistently across the entire document.
You can even set a page break to automatically occur before a specific heading, so every chapter always starts on a new page.
This is not just a Vellum skill. It is a Word skill, and it applies to Google Docs as well. Using styles saves an enormous amount of time and keeps everything consistent.
As someone with a web design background, it always surprises me how many Word users still manually bold text instead of using styles.
What formatting should authors avoid in Word?
Bryan: When Vellum imports your manuscript, it reads the heading tags and understands which part is a chapter, a subhead, and so on. That makes the import much smoother.
You should also apply italics, bold, or underline wherever needed, especially if someone else is doing the formatting for you. If you have poetry, lyrics, or special formatting, you can center it or format it in Word so the intent is clear.
What you should not do is try to make the Word document look like the final book. Do not mess with margins, trim sizes, or section breaks.
I recently received a manuscript where the author had worked very hard to make it look right on an 8.5-by-11 page. That was not even the trim size of the book. They added section breaks, custom margins, and all kinds of formatting. It was a nightmare to clean up.
Those choices caused extra line breaks, misplaced scene breaks, and formatting errors when imported. I had to undo much of it before I could even begin.
Use styles, but do not try to design the book in Word.
Thomas: This applies beyond Vellum. When you copy text from Word into a blog post or another system, styles transfer cleanly. Inline formatting, on the other hand, causes problems.
Hitting “enter” repeatedly to force spacing is a bad habit. Those extra returns often break later, and your document will be a mess.
I am dealing with this right now while building the Novel Marketing Conference workbook. This year, I am doing the entire thing in Google Docs, using proper styles from the start. Because it is an 8-by-10 coil-bound workbook, I do not need Vellum. I want it to feel like a Word document. But the same principles apply.
How does editing work inside Vellum?
Bryan: Vellum is template-based, which means it is very hard to do something that violates industry standards.
For example, the first line of a chapter should be flush left. Vellum enforces that. The less you fight it, the better your results will be.
Vellum has two main panels. On the left is the workspace, where you edit text. On the right is a real-time preview showing exactly how the book will look. Any change you make on the left instantly appears on the right.
You can also download Vellum for free and experiment with it. You only pay when you want to export the final PDF or EPUB files.
Thomas: Jonathan Shuerger recently did a tutorial video on how to use Vellum. It can help you as you play with the software.
Instant Preview
One of Vellum’s most powerful features is its instant preview. You can see what your book will look like on a Kindle Paperwhite, a standard Kindle, or in print. You can flip between devices in real time and catch problems immediately.
Intentionally Limited
Another key strength of Vellum is that it is intentionally limited. If you want maximum power, you use InDesign. But that power also makes it easy to create a disaster. I often joke that you should study design in college before using InDesign. Vellum puts you on guardrails. It does not let you make bad decisions.
You cannot do extremely complex layouts or textbooks in Vellum, but for most books, especially novels and straightforward nonfiction, it is perfect.
For normal books by normal authors, Vellum gives you excellent results with minimal frustration.
Should authors hire professionals for covers and editing?
Bryan: I am a strong proponent of hiring professionals for the parts of publishing that require professional skill. A few authors have graphic design ability, but most are not designers and have no business making their own covers in Canva. The same goes for editing and the other specialized pieces of publishing.
But Vellum changes one major thing. It allows any author can do their own interior layout, and that is powerful.
We live in a print-on-demand and ebook world where the latest file you upload is the version readers get. That gives you flexibility.
If you release book two in a series, you can go back to book one and update the back matter. You can insert the first pages of the new book, add a chapter sample, swap out your reader magnet, or update calls to action, then re-upload the files. The next reader who buys the book on KDP gets the updated version.
Thomas: That is huge. Typos always slip through, but if your book is print-on-demand and your files are in Vellum, you can fix the typo, export again, re-upload, and tomorrow’s buyers will never see the mistake.
With InDesign, it is a different story. I used InDesign for my book because the interior layout was complex. Readers found two minor typos, and they are still there because opening the InDesign file, finding someone with the right skill set, and re-exporting is too much hassle for two small fixes.
The ease of editing back matter is another advantage. It is incredibly powerful marketing real estate. You can build loyalty, grow your email list, and sell the next book. You’ll want to update it over time as you release more books in a series.
When editing interior layout is easy, the cost of adding marketing assets drops low enough that it becomes worth doing. Traditionally published books rarely do this because they often use InDesign, and every update costs time and money.
How does Vellum handle the different files for print and ebook?
Bryan: Vellum exports both a print-ready PDF and an EPUB, and it provides previews for both.
When I do layout, I focus on the paperback version because that is what gets printed. The print PDF will look the same every time.
EPUB is different. You do not have the same control. The formatting changes depending on whether someone is reading on a phone, tablet, or computer, and readers can adjust font size. If you are worried about margins and spacing in EPUB, a lot of that goes out the window.
Vellum produces both files from the same project. InDesign does not do that cleanly. You can generate EPUB from InDesign, but it usually requires extra tweaking to make it come out correctly.
Vellum feels like magic, but you still have to do some setup after you import. You tag things, like block quotes or centered text. The interface is simple, and I think most authors can learn it quickly. The guardrails make it hard to do something truly wrong.
How “fancy” can you get with Vellum?
Thomas: What if I want a decorative flourish after “Chapter Seven,” or I want a big drop cap at the start of each chapter. Can Vellum do that?
Bryan: You can do some of that, within limits. Vellum is template-based. It has 26 templates in a variety of styles, and you can usually tell which ones lean toward sci-fi, nonfiction, romance, and so on.
Within a template, you get design options. For chapter headers, you may have three or four standard layouts. They recently added more control. For example, you can now choose whether “Chapter” is spelled out and whether the number is written as “ONE” or as “1.” But it is constrained. You choose a template and then choose from the options it allows.
You can also add chapter header images. Vellum includes standard scene break characters, and you can use a custom one. I worked with an author whose story was set on the coast of Maine. He wanted a lobster buoy as the scene separator, so we found a suitable image and used that.
You can do those kinds of touches, but you do not get the granular control you have in InDesign.
Thomas: If I am writing epic fantasy and my cover designer creates a sword-and-shield graphic, I can use that as a scene separator in Vellum. That kind of light customization is still possible without going full InDesign.
Bryan: Exactly. Vellum handles images, but in a limited way. You get a few preset image sizes. With the two smallest sizes, you can wrap text around the image.
What you cannot do is place an image at an exact size and position on the page the way you can in InDesign. If you are creating a business book with charts and diagrams that must land in a specific spot with text flowing around them, do not even try. That is not what Vellum is for. Take that kind of project to a professional using more advanced software.
What kinds of books should not be formatted in Vellum?
Thomas: Children’s books are a great example. Vellum is not the tool if you need text to fit precisely into illustrated pages.
I like that Vellum does not pretend to do everything. It is not for children’s books. It is for novels and straightforward nonfiction. Since it is not trying to serve everyone, it is easy for most people most of the time.
If you are making a children’s book, I recommend having your illustrator add the text, or working with someone who uses InDesign. InDesign is perfect for children’s books because it can do anything. And children’s books often play with typography, placement, and size in a way Vellum cannot.
Bryan: Vellum does work well for certain kinds of images. If you write fantasy or sci-fi and want to include a map, you can do that. You can even do a double-page spread, as long as you remember that part of the image will disappear into the gutter near the binding.
Memoirs can include photographs as well. You can scatter images throughout or create a dedicated photo section.
Where Vellum stays limited is fonts and styling. You can tag headings at levels 1 through 4, but you cannot change typefaces, bolding, alignment, or font choices beyond what the template allows. That is intentional.
If users had full control, many would create inconsistent designs, mismatched fonts, and layouts that do not work. Most people do not have design training. Honestly, I do not either. I can use Vellum professionally, but I do not have the background to design from scratch the way a trained book designer can.
Thomas: Since Vellum is so popular, readers see Vellum-style formatting constantly. It has become a kind of standard for indie books. Other tools exist, but they have smaller market share.
Those defaults train reader expectations. I suspect it even pressures traditional publishers to format books in ways that feel more like a Vellum book, so their books do not look odd or inconsistent compared to what readers are used to.
How does Vellum handle the table of contents?
Thomas: Authors often struggle with the table of contents. Page numbers must line up, and if you do it manually, it breaks every time you edit. How does Vellum handle that?
Bryan: It auto-generates the table of contents, which is good because that means your page numbers are always correct. Vellum calculates and updates them automatically.
Word can also do this if you tag headings correctly, but Vellum makes it straightforward.
The downside is that you cannot heavily customize the formatting of the table of contents. It follows the template’s settings. What you can control is what gets included. For example:
- Only chapter titles, or chapter titles plus subheads
- Parts and volumes, if you have them
- Different heading levels, depending on how you tag your manuscript
Once your headers are tagged, Vellum builds the table of contents and keeps it accurate. It is a phenomenal feature because you do not have to babysit it. But avoid typing headings in all caps. If you type a chapter title in all caps, it forces all caps everywhere. Many templates display chapter headings in all caps, but the table of contents often looks better in normal title case. If you type the title in title case, the template can still render it in all caps for the chapter page while keeping the table of contents looking normal.
Thomas: And for ebooks, Vellum also adds the hyperlinks automatically.
EPUB files are essentially simplified web pages, which means they support internal links. That is how “tap Chapter Seven” works on a phone or ereader. Vellum generates those links for you.
You can theoretically do this in Word but figuring it out and making it work reliably takes real effort. Vellum makes it automatic.
Can authors use internal links, QR codes, or pull quotes in Vellum?
Bryan: Beyond the internal links in the table of contents, you can highlight any text and link it to another part of the book. You can also link out to external websites. That is especially useful in the back matter for reader magnets, like, “Sign up for my email list to get a free resource related to this book.” In the ebook, the link is clickable.
For print, many authors include a QR code as well. We often include both, a QR code for print readers to scan and a clickable link for ebook readers. You can place those links anywhere in the book.
Thomas: Can Vellum create a pull quote that highlights a key line from the page?
Bryan: Vellum gives you limited options through block quotations. A standard block quote is inset on both sides. You can also add an attribution that appears in a slightly different style.
There are two pull-quote-like options:
- A block quote with large, stylized quotation marks at the top
- A block quote with horizontal bars above and below
That is basically it. You tag it as a block quotation and choose one of those two styles.
If you want something more custom, you can create the pull quote as an image, like a boxed callout you design in Word or PowerPoint. Then you export it as an image or capture a high-quality screenshot and insert it.
Vellum will warn you if the image resolution is too low for print, which is helpful. If someone scans an old photograph and it is low quality, Vellum flags it.
Vellum also allows you to add alt text to images, which matters for accessibility, especially in ebooks.
How can authors generate alt text efficiently?
Thomas: If you need help writing alt text for your images, AI is great at it. You can upload an image to an AI tool and ask it to describe the image, then tweak the wording as needed. Describing images can be surprisingly hard, especially when you are trying to make it useful for someone who is visually impaired.
Alt text also matters for websites. Eventually, AI will be cheap enough that most accessibility tools will generate this automatically. Right now, we are in a transition era. AI is good at it, but not always free and automatic everywhere, so it makes sense for the author to generate the alt text once and paste it in.
What are the drawbacks of using images?
Bryan: If you use images or pull quotes, keep in mind that ebook platforms often offer dark mode and light mode.
The user controls that setting, and when they choose dark mode the device does not invert your images. So, if you insert a dark image and a reader is using dark mode, the image may be hard to see. If your image has a white background, it may appear as a bright white box on a dark page.
That might be fine if it matches what you want, but it can also feel unintended. This is something you could handle more precisely in InDesign, but not in Vellum.
Thomas: One thing I like is that Vellum shows previews, including how the Kindle app looks on an iPhone in dark mode. You can also preview different font sizes and font choices because those are user controlled.
Vellum also checks image DPI, which you cannot reliably judge on a screen. Most screens display around 72 DPI, while print-on-demand typically needs 300 or 600 DPI. A low-DPI image can look fine on a monitor and print blurry.
That warning system is part of Vellum’s guardrails. It keeps you from publishing something embarrassing.
Bryan: It warns you, but it does not stop you.
That matters because sometimes the image quality is the best you can get. Memoirs often include photos taken decades ago. Even the best scan will still look grainy because the original photo was grainy. The warning at least helps you make an informed decision about whether the resolution is acceptable.
Thomas: If a reader changes to dark mode and an image looks odd, most readers will blame their dark mode choice, not the author.
Where you should be careful is using photos as scene breaks or separators. A transparent PNG generally plays nicer across modes than a photo with a solid background. But most authors should stick with Vellum’s built-in scene breaks. Readers have seen them so often they become invisible, which is the point.
For fiction, you want the formatting to disappear so the story can take over. Even for nonfiction, you want readers focused on what you are saying, not on the layout.
That is why Vellum is so effective.
It is also valuable for traditionally published authors who want to create reader magnets. Your publisher likely will not format your reader magnet in InDesign unless you are selling at a very high level. If the publisher does it, they may want rights or control that you do not want to give up. Doing it yourself keeps it clean.
Also, AI tools are surprisingly good at answering Vellum questions because Vellum is so widely discussed online. The common problems and solutions are well documented, and AI has absorbed a lot of that information.
Should an author buy Vellum or hire a formatter?
Thomas: What would you say to someone who is debating hiring a professional for $300 to $500 versus buying Vellum for around $250?
Bryan: Buy Vellum. You can download the full version for free. The only limitation is that it will not export the final PDF and EPUB files. You can import your manuscript, experiment, and see the previews.
Look at the paperback preview, then check the ebook previews on an iPhone, a tablet, or a Kindle. Ask yourself, “Would I be satisfied with this as a reader?”
In my experience, the answer has always been “yes.” You will quickly see that Vellum produces professional output. Save your professional budget for what truly requires professionals, like cover design.
Vellum is not hard to learn. There are advanced tricks, like page borders and images behind chapter headers, but you do not need most of that. In many cases, it is better not to use those things.
For a novel or memoir that is mostly text, you can often format it in about 30 minutes. More complex books take longer.
Thomas: One more benefit is the accurate page count.
Word gives you word count, but word count does not always translate cleanly into page count. Dialogue-heavy books often take up more pages than dense paragraphs. That can affect pricing, printing costs, and even structural decisions, like whether a story should be split into two books.
With Vellum, you can import a draft and get a page count in minutes. You can see, “With this trim size and this font, I’m already at 350 pages and I’m only two-thirds done.” That can help you make better decisions earlier.
The fact that you can use the full software without paying until export makes it easy to test.
I know this has sounded a little like a commercial, but the only people I hear complain about Vellum are people who have not used it, usually because they are on Windows and can’t use it.
Try it, and I think you will be pleasantly surprised.
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