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How to Format a Large Print Book (and Meet the Real Standards)
What actually counts as large print, the standards KDP and accessibility bodies expect, and how to format a large print edition of your book without redoing the whole layout.
Large print is one of the easiest editions to get wrong, because the name sounds like a preference when it is actually a standard. Readers who need large print, and the libraries and retailers that serve them, expect specific things: a minimum text size, generous spacing, and typography chosen for legibility rather than style. This guide covers what the standards actually say, and how to produce a large print edition without rebuilding your book from scratch.
What actually counts as large print
The accepted threshold for large print is 16 point body text. UK accessibility guidance from the RNIB describes large print as 16 point and upwards, US library standards for large print collections work to 16 to 18 point, and Amazon KDP expects at least 16 point before an edition is labelled large print in the store. Many dedicated large print publishers go to 18 point.
For comparison, a typical trade paperback is set at 10 to 11 point. That gap matters, because a common mistake is to nudge a standard layout up to 12 or 13 point and call it large print. It is bigger print, but it does not meet the standard, and readers who depend on the label notice immediately.
Size is not the whole standard
Genuine large print changes more than the font size. The established guidance also asks for:
- Generous line spacing. Bigger text needs more air between lines to stay trackable; large print settings typically run noticeably looser than trade layouts.
- Ragged right text. Justified text at large sizes produces rivers of uneven spacing that are harder to follow. Left-aligned text with hyphenation off reads more reliably.
- A legibility-first typeface. Decorative serifs and tight, high-contrast faces work against low-vision readers. Fonts designed for legibility keep letterforms open and make similar characters, like capital I, lowercase l, and the number 1, clearly distinct. Atkinson Hyperlegible, developed by the Braille Institute for exactly this purpose, is a strong choice.
- A larger trim. At 16 point, a small trim fits so few words per line that reading becomes choppy. A 6 by 9 inch trim is a common, comfortable choice for large print fiction.
- Restraint with decoration. Faint ornaments, pale greys, and text over images all cost legibility that large print readers cannot spare.
Publishing a large print edition on KDP
Amazon treats large print as its own edition. You publish it as a separate paperback, tick the large print option so the store labels it, and give it its own ISBN if you supply your own. Because everything in the interior is bigger, the page count rises substantially, which raises the print cost and the minimum list price; pricing the large print edition a little higher than the standard paperback is normal and readers expect it.
It is worth doing anyway. Large print is an underserved corner of most genres, the readers who need it are loyal to authors who provide it, and libraries buy it. For a book you have already written and formatted, it is one of the cheapest additional editions you can produce.
Formatting a large print edition in Koberger
Koberger ships an accessibility-focused preset built around these standards: Atkinson Hyperlegible for body text, a genuine 16 point large print size for the paperback interior, generous line spacing and margins, ragged right text, a 6 by 9 trim, and hyphenation off. Applying it to an existing book produces a large print edition from the same manuscript, so the standard paperback and the large print edition stay identical in content and differ only in presentation.
The print setup is explicit about what you are getting: the large print density sets 16 point body text with 1.65 line spacing, on a 6 by 9 trim with generous margins. Nothing is nudged or approximated, so the edition you upload to KDP genuinely meets the label.
The practical workflow: format your standard editions first, then apply the accessible preset (or your own preset built from it), review the print preview since the page count will have grown, and export a fresh print PDF for the large print edition. The ebook, incidentally, is where readers already control text size themselves; large print is fundamentally a print concern, which is why the standard lives in the paperback settings. See our guides to margins and gutters and previewing before you publish for the surrounding steps, or try Koberger free and apply the accessible preset to your own manuscript.
Frequently asked questions
What font size is large print?
Large print means body text of at least 16 point. That is the threshold accessibility organisations such as the RNIB work to, and the minimum Amazon KDP expects before a book is listed as a large print edition. Many large print publishers set 18 point. Ordinary paperbacks are typically set at 10 to 11 point, so simply calling a 12 point book large print does not qualify.
What is the best font for a large print book?
Choose a font designed for legibility rather than decoration: clear letterforms, open spacing, and strong distinction between similar characters such as capital I, lowercase l, and the number 1. Atkinson Hyperlegible, developed by the Braille Institute specifically for low-vision readers, is a strong choice and is bundled with Koberger.
Does KDP support large print books?
Yes. Amazon KDP lets you publish a separate large print paperback edition and mark it as large print, which adds the label to its store page. Amazon expects a genuine large print interior, which in practice means body text of 16 point or larger. You give the edition its own ISBN if you use your own, and it sits alongside your standard paperback.
Do large print books need a bigger trim size?
Usually, yes. Text at 16 point on a small trim leaves very few words per line, which makes reading choppy. A 6 by 9 inch trim is a common choice for large print fiction: it keeps a comfortable line length at the bigger size without making the book unwieldy, though page count and therefore print cost will still rise noticeably.
Should large print text be justified?
Ragged right (left-aligned) text is generally recommended for large print and accessible editions. Justified text at large sizes produces uneven word spacing that is harder to track across the line, especially for readers with low vision. Keep hyphenation off for the same reason.