If you are a self publishing author, it is probably the best idea to hire a professional cover designer from Fiverr to get you cover design done for only $5. However there are also some free cover creators available for creative minded authors to create their own cover free. In this article we will walk you through step-by-step how to create a professional looking book cover.

Get cover ideas from Amazons top sellers

The first step is to find inspiration. You need to understand each genre has its own style. I suggest you to go to Amazon and look at the top seller books in your genre to get some book cover ideas for your book before you jump into your book cover design.

Choose your design tool

You need to choose between paid and free cover creators. If you are looking for free tool I suggest you to use Canva. If you are not afraid of learning and you want unlimited possibilities you may try Photoshop. Canva’s online book cover maker is ridiculously easy to use even for non-designers. They offer hundreds of editable layouts for every genres.

Find free legal stock photos

There are a few websites offering free stock photos you can use for your book cover without violating copyrights. Our favorite is Unsplash offering their images for commercial and noncommercial purposes without asking for credit. If you didn’t find the perfect image for your cover you may also try Pixaby and Pexels.

Download a free font for the titles

You can choose between hundreds of fonts on Google Fonts, but keep in mind usually less is more. You definitely shouldn’t fill the most of your cover with text. An awesome feature of Google Fonts is you can type your title and view how it would look with all the fonts.

Test you cover in a book mockup

After you created you new book cover it is always a good idea to see how it looks in a book cover mockup before you print it. An other advantage of using a book mockup that you can use these images to promote your book on social media.

Use your book cover in a book trailer

Videos have billions of views every day and much higher conversion rate compared to photos or text. Don’t miss this opportunity and order a book trailer to promote your book!