How to convert your Word manuscript to EPUB for Amazon KDP

Amazon KDP's recommended upload format for ebooks is EPUB. Word's own “save as” can't produce one, and most converters either mangle your formatting or make you upload your unpublished manuscript to someone's server. Here's the clean way to do it, free, in about two minutes.

Step 1 — Prepare the manuscript in Word

Give every chapter title the Heading 1 style (Home ribbon → Styles). Titles like “Chapter One”, “Prologue”, or “Epilogue” written as plain lines are also detected.
Mark scene breaks with *** on its own line.
Use italics and bold normally — they're preserved.
Delete manual page numbers, headers, and footers; ebooks don't use them (the reader's device paginates).

Step 2 — Convert

Open manuscripttoepub.com in any browser.
Drop your .docx on the page. Your file is processed on your own computer — it is never uploaded.
Check the detected chapter list, set your title and author name, and click Download EPUB.

Convert my .docx now — free

Step 3 — Upload to KDP

Go to kdp.amazon.com → Create → Kindle eBook.
Fill in your book details, then under Manuscript, upload the .epub file you just downloaded.
Use KDP's online previewer to page through — check the table of contents jumps to each chapter.

Common KDP upload errors (and what they mean)

“We found formatting issues” — usually stray manual page breaks or text boxes in the source .docx. Remove them and re-convert.
Missing chapters in the TOC — the chapter titles weren't styled Heading 1 and didn't start with “Chapter”. Fix the styles in Word and re-convert.
Weird symbols — smart quotes and em-dashes are fine; unusual dingbat fonts are not. Stick to standard text.

Publishing a paperback too?

KDP paperbacks need a print-ready PDF with proper trim size, margins, and page numbers. The Pro version ($19 one-time) exports a justified 6×9 in PDF with running heads and page numbers, ready for KDP Print.