Apple Books vs. BooksOasis: Apple's Ebook Store or a Store That Pays You in Full?

Among the large ebook retailers, Apple Books treats authors unusually well. It pays the same 70% whatever you charge, deducts nothing for file delivery and never asks for exclusivity. BooksOasis works on a different deal altogether: Apple keeps a share of each sale, whereas BooksOasis takes a set annual fee and passes the full ebook price to you. It also sells your paperback and hardcover.

The audiences differ too. Apple's readers are people with an iPhone, iPad or Mac. BooksOasis readers can be on any device that runs a web browser. Below we look at money, costs, pre-orders, print and reading apps, then at how the two stores sit together in a wide plan. Apple's terms come from Apple Books for Authors and its partner support pages.

Whichever you choose, the file matters. Apple takes EPUB and also Word documents. LiberScript produces tidy EPUBs that look right in Apple Books, in the Oasis Reader app and in the other major stores, and it also produces the print-ready PDFs a BooksOasis paperback or hardcover needs.

At a glance: Apple Books vs. BooksOasis

The money

Apple's royalty

Apple's rule is easy to remember: seven tenths of the list price, on any ebook, with no deduction for file size. Amazon is less generous at the edges. On Amazon.com you only get 70% between $2.99 and $12.99, a delivery charge comes off, and anything outside that band earns 35%. So a 99-cent sale and a $14.99 sale both earn 70% at Apple, while each would drop to 35% at Amazon.

Payment arrives monthly, provided your balance has cleared the minimum set for your bank's country or region. If a payment is late, Apple's support pages say to check your paperwork and balance once 45 days have passed since the month ended. Accounts are opened through iTunes Connect under your legal name, and books can be uploaded from the web or with Apple's own tools.

BooksOasis's model

BooksOasis is a bookshop for indie authors and small presses. Instead of a commission it charges an annual plan, so the ebook price you set is the amount you receive. For print, you get the cover price less the cost of printing and a handling fee equal to 30% of that printing cost. Shipping is added at checkout and paid by the reader.

Side by side, per copy

Amounts per copy, ignoring tax and exchange rates. Remember the BooksOasis plan has an annual cost and Apple does not.

Who will see your book

The Apple Books app comes preinstalled on Apple hardware, so a large audience already carries a bookshop in their pocket. In genres that do well there, Apple can become one of your main earners, and Apple's own merchandising teams run promotional placements.

A BooksOasis visitor arrives at a shop that stocks only independent authors. They can wander through shelves by genre, series pages, the latest releases, a Coming Soon shelf of pre-orders, and discounted titles. Since the reading app needs nothing more than a modern browser, the shop works for someone on an Android phone, a Windows laptop or a Chromebook, as well as Apple users who never open Apple Books.

What reading feels like

Apple's app is smooth and keeps a reader's place in step across their Apple devices via their Apple account.

Oasis Reader lives in the browser but can be added to a home screen and then behaves much like an installed app:

• downloaded books open without a connection;
• position, highlights and notes follow the reader to any device they sign in on;
• four themes are offered: light, sepia, dark and automatic;
• text size can be changed, including with a pinch on touch screens;
• readers pick between turning pages and scrolling continuously.

Pre-orders and print

At Apple, giving a book a future release date puts it on pre-order automatically, and you can do this as much as 365 days early; free books are the exception. At BooksOasis, the listing's release date does the job. Buyers pay at checkout, the ebook appears in their library when the day comes, and any printed copies are produced and posted after release. Once a copy has sold, that date can be moved earlier but never later, which protects readers' plans.

Printed books are not part of Apple's offer at all; it sells ebooks and audiobooks. BooksOasis puts a paperback and a hardcover on the very listing that carries the ebook and prints each copy when someone orders it. There are five trim sizes to pick from: 5 x 8, 5.5 x 8.5, 6 x 9, 7 x 10 and 8.5 x 11 inches. Paperbacks can run from 32 to 800 pages, hardcovers from 24 to 800.

Discounts and free books

Apple's flat rate makes it a strong place for bargain pricing. Drop a book to 99 cents and you still earn 70%, compared with 35% at that price on Amazon.com. Apple will also list a book for free, which suits a permanently free first book in a series.

On BooksOasis you can discount any edition and, if you like, give the sale a start and end date. The original price is shown struck through, and discounted books are eligible for the shop's On Sale banners. Because you keep the whole price, even a cheap first-in-series price lands entirely in your account.

Uploading to each store

Apple, directly. Open an iTunes Connect account in your legal name, add tax and bank information, then upload an EPUB (or Word file) with the cover, blurb, categories and price. Choose a release date if you want pre-orders, and pick the territories where the book will be on sale.

Apple, through a distributor. Draft2Digital will deliver to Apple for about 10% of the retail price; PublishDrive charges a subscription and no commission. If Apple turns out to be a big store for you, the extra effort of a direct account usually pays off.

BooksOasis. No distributor delivers here, so you set it up yourself. Pick a plan and write a listing: the description needs at least 100 characters, and you choose three to five genres plus a minimum of three keywords. Then add editions, an EPUB for the ebook and, for each print format, an interior PDF and a full-wrap cover.

Once the interior is uploaded, BooksOasis tells you the printing cost and the lowest price you can charge, gives the precise cover dimensions and spine width, and supplies a template to design against. Before anything goes to review, an automated check confirms the files are ready to print.

Running both stores together

Match your metadata

Someone who spots your book in two places should know at a glance it is the same book. Keep a master file with the title, subtitle, blurb and series information, copy from it into both dashboards, and use the identical cover. When something changes, change it in both stores the same day.

Series

Readers who finish book two want book three straight away. At Apple, attach every title to its series and end each book with a link to the next. BooksOasis builds a series page listing the books in order, numbered and each with a brief summary. Readers can hide what they already own and put several ebooks in a single basket, and books not yet out are added as pre-orders. A low price on the first book helps in either store, and at BooksOasis the reader's whole payment still reaches you.

Prices

• Charge the same list price in both places, and use time-limited sales for discounts.
• If you want a free or 99-cent starter, Apple is the natural home, since it lists free books and its rate does not drop at low prices.
• Point your newsletter and website readers to BooksOasis when you would like the whole price, or when they ask for a printed copy.
• Show both store links on your site and in the back of each book so readers choose their own app.

A four-step routine

1. Prepare the book once in LiberScript and export the EPUB and the print PDF.
2. Put the ebook on Apple Books, with a direct account if Apple readers are important to you.
3. Add the ebook plus paperback and hardcover editions to BooksOasis.
4. Open pre-orders in both for the next title and share both links in the same announcement.

Tracking the money

Apple's dashboard shows sales and pays each month above your country's threshold. Every BooksOasis sale, digital or print, lands in an earnings ledger that you can check whenever you like, and withdrawals go to a bank account or PayPal. Payouts to banks abroad are sent by wire after your balance reaches a minimum. A monthly spreadsheet with a column per store quickly shows which one earns more for each title.

Examples

A romance writer with mostly iPhone readers goes direct with Apple, uses 99-cent sales there because the rate stays at 70%, and also puts the series on BooksOasis so fans who want paperbacks can buy them.

A science-fiction writer whose readers use a mix of Android and Apple makes BooksOasis the main shop, since any device can read there and each ebook pays in full, and sends books to Apple through a distributor because Apple brings in less of their income.

Choosing

Lean towards Apple Books if your audience is on Apple devices, you want free starters or deep discounts that still pay 70%, or you want to start with no cost and sell audiobooks too.

Lean towards BooksOasis if you want every cent of the ebook price, print editions beside the ebook, a shop that works on Android and Windows as well as Apple, and built-in series pages, dated sales and pre-orders.

Frequently asked questions

How much does Apple Books pay? A flat 70% on any ebook at any price, and no delivery charge.

Do I have to be exclusive to Apple? No. The same ebook can be on sale at Apple, BooksOasis and anywhere else simultaneously.

How much is a BooksOasis plan? $29.99 a year covers up to 10 books, $179 covers 100 and $599 covers 500. You receive the full price of every ebook you sell.

Do BooksOasis readers need an Apple device? No. Oasis Reader runs in an ordinary web browser on a phone, tablet or computer.

Is print available through Apple Books? No, Apple sells ebooks and audiobooks only. On BooksOasis, paperbacks and hardcovers are printed whenever a reader orders one.

Does one LiberScript EPUB suit both stores? Yes. It is a standard EPUB that both Apple Books and BooksOasis accept.

More reading: Apple Books for Authors alternatives on the BooksOasis publisher site, and our Apple Books for authors guide.

The bottom line

Apple Books offers a fair, uncomplicated deal: 70% on everything, no charges, no lock-in and an audience that already owns the app. BooksOasis hands you the entire ebook price, sells print on the same page and reaches readers on whatever device they own, all for a single annual plan. Use Apple for the people who read there, use BooksOasis for the readers you send yourself, and export both files from one LiberScript project.