Amazon Cracks Down on Kindle Books Under 2,500 Words

By Jason Boog 

Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing is reportedly planning to remove Kindle books that have fewer than 2,500 words.

At the KBoards site for Kindle readers and writers, one author shared a letter from Amazon that explained: “Content that is less than 2,500 words is often disappointing to our customers and does not provide an enjoyable reading experience.”

UPDATE: We reached out to Amazon last week for commentary, but still have not received a response. We have reached out again.

The Digital Reader also reached out to Amazon, but did not receive a response. Reader Angelia Almos said she received this note from Amazon:

I wrote to Amazon KDP to ask about this rumor and got the following response:

Hello,

I can confirm that that information is not from Kindle Direct Publishing, therefore it is not true.

I hope this helps.

Thanks for using Amazon KDP.

We’ve included the complete letter below. A few of writers responded to the post saying they were selling books that were under 2,500 words at Amazon, including a speculative fiction author and a fantasy writer.

Has anybody else received this message? Here’s a complete copy of the original note:

 

Hello,

During a quality assurance review of your KDP catalog we have found that the following book(s) are extremely short and may create a poor reading experience and do not meet our content quality expectations:

Name of Short

In the best interest of Kindle customers, we remove titles from sale that may create a poor customer experience. Content that is less than 2,500 words is often disappointing to our customers and does not provide an enjoyable reading experience.

We ask that you fix the above book(s), as well as all of your catalog’s affected books, with additional content that is both unique and related to your book. Once you have ensured your book(s) would create a good customer experience, re-submit them for publishing within 5 business days. If your books have not been corrected by that time, they will be removed from sale in the Kindle Store. If the updates require more time, please unpublish your books.