Lanternbee vs BookSpace

Lanternbee as a BookSpace alternative

A print-on-demand bookstore for authors, formerly called Books.by. Its prices and features sit next to Lanternbee’s below, including where BookSpace does better.

Not open yet. We’re letting authors in from the waitlist, a few at a time.

What BookSpace is

BookSpace gives you a bookstore page, prints each paperback when it is ordered and ships it to the reader. It charges a yearly fee and takes no cut, so you keep the price minus printing, shipping and card fees.

Who it suits

Authors who mainly sell paperbacks, want printing and shipping fully handled, and don’t need ebooks or audiobooks in the same store yet.

What BookSpace costs

US prices, checked against the sources at the bottom of this page.

Plan	Price	Fee on sales
Core	US$8.25 a month. Billed US$99 a year	None; printing, shipping and card fees come out of each sale
Pro	US$24.92 a month. Billed US$299 a year	None; printing, shipping and card fees come out of each sale

BookSpace and Lanternbee side by side

BookSpace and Lanternbee, feature by feature
What you need	BookSpace	Lanternbee
Bundles and box sets	Not listed	Yes. Readers who own book one pay less for the rest.
Ebook and audiobook delivery	NoPaperbacks only; it says ebooks are on its roadmap.	Yes. Download links by email, and a reader library.
Send to Kindle	NoNo ebooks yet.	Yes, from the reader library.
Print on demand for books	YesPaperbacks printed and shipped through Lulu.	Partly. Printed formats are set up for BookVault or Lulu; sending orders to the printer is being built.
Your reader list	PartlyBuyer names and emails; no emailing found.	Yes. Every buyer lands on your reader list, with tags.
Your own domain	NoIts terms say custom domains are not available yet.	Yes. yourname.lanternbee.shop or shop.yourname.com.
Monthly cost	Core: US$8.25 a month. Billed US$99 a yearPro: US$24.92 a month. Billed US$299 a year	Free: nothing a month. Author: US$39 a month, or US$29 paid yearly.
Fee on sales	Core: None; printing, shipping and card fees come out of each salePro: None; printing, shipping and card fees come out of each sale	None, on every plan.

BookSpace prices in US dollars. “Not listed” means we could not find it on BookSpace’s own pages or in the sources below, so check with them. Rows we could not check at all are left out. Card fees apply everywhere; on Lanternbee they are Stripe’s, with nothing added.

What BookSpace does better

Fair reasons to stay where you are.

Printing and shipping are built in, with no printer account of your own to set up. On Lanternbee, printed formats are set up for BookVault or Lulu, but sending orders to the printer is still being built.
Free ISBNs, a cover builder, and author copies at cost.
BookSpace is the merchant of record and collects sales tax, GST or VAT where the law asks. On Lanternbee you are the seller, and you file the tax Stripe works out.
It is open today. Lanternbee is still on a waitlist.

Moving from BookSpace

There’s no importer for BookSpace. Moving by hand takes these steps.

Add your books on Lanternbee: covers, blurbs and prices. Put the paperback, ebook and audiobook of each book on one page.
Set up your printed formats for BookVault or Lulu. Until sending orders to the printer is ready, keep BookSpace for paperbacks if you like.
Keep your BookSpace buyer list in your email tool. Lanternbee cannot import it yet.
Swap your BookSpace links for your Lanternbee book links in your back matter, website and newsletter.

Questions about BookSpace and Lanternbee

Is Lanternbee a BookSpace alternative?

If you sell ebooks or audiobooks as well as paperbacks, it can be: Lanternbee puts every format of a book on one page and delivers the files. For paperbacks today, BookSpace prints and ships for you, which Lanternbee does not do yet.

Is BookSpace the same as Books.by?

Yes. Books.by now sends visitors to BookSpace.com, and the site says Books.by is becoming BookSpace.

Does BookSpace take a cut of each sale?

No. You pay the yearly plan, and printing, shipping and card fees come out of each sale. Lanternbee takes no fee on any plan either, only Stripe’s card fees.