The 30-second quote form — or the instant calculator for 1–20 copies. Your price lands the same day.
Rough or ready. A real person checks your file and offers clear advice on making it ready to print. Free and fast.
Your preview to sign off before we print the run. Until approval you can still make changes to the artwork.
Stapled booklets with you in 3 days, perfect bound books in 5 and hardbacks in 7 days. Free UK tracked delivery.
Children's book printing at Ex Why Zed covers picture books and early readers in square (210×210mm), A4, A5 or custom sizes, hardback (case bound) or paperback, printed on thick silk or uncoated paper so colours stay bright. 100 square 36-page picture books cost around £412; digital short runs are delivered in 4–9 working days depending on the quantity ordered.
We are here to guide you through the children's book printing process and dedicated to transforming your creative vision into a tangible reality. Here's why we're the ideal partner for your self-publishing journey:
At the heart of our process at is the Print Journey. Each of the 5 steps has its own hub where you can enjoy comprehensive guides, illustrated articles, captivating videos and insightful blog posts. These resources empower you to make well-informed decisions about design and styling, propelling your project from an initial idea to a bound children's book.
➡️ The Ex Why Zed Print Journey
It won't be long before you experience that super exciting moment when a glorious stack of boxes arrives and you unpack the first book. Yes, your self-published book. Enjoy the feel and the smell of them…you worked hard for this moment.
Printed for authors right across the UK. Recent children's books include Yasmin Kinsey's hardback A Melting Planet for Cambridge Children's Books, Laura Arnold's What Happens Underground? in London, Musical Tales' Kaiholo the Whale in Essex and phonics readers for an Oxford-based education publisher.
For more ideas on children's book printing and to see examples of other similar books we have printed, do spend five minutes looking through our portfolio of case studies.
Why Children's Book Covers Matter (and What Makes Them Magic)
What makes a child reach for a book they’ve never seen before? More often than not—it’s the cover. Enjoy this eye-opening article, we dive into what actually works when designing children’s book covers, using ten exceptional examples as our guide. From the whimsical charm of Where the Wild Things Are to the bold, minimal appeal of The Smart Cookie, each design is broken down to reveal the secrets behind its success.
We explore how colour psychology, age-appropriate illustration styles, fun yet readable typography, and smart layout choices all combine to create covers that do more than sell—they spark joy, build anticipation, and establish an emotional connection before a page is even turned.
265x210mm Books
4pp Cover onto 300gsm Silk
Matt Lamination to outer
32pp Text onto 170gsm Uncoated
Four colour print throughout
Perfect bound
Stapled, perfect bound (glued, like a paperback) or hardback? Your page count has already decided — the whole rule in one picture.
Read the full Binding Styles guide →Silk, gloss or uncoated — what each looks and feels like, and the insider hack that saves you money.
Read the full Paper Choices guide →Bleed, page sizes, cover files and the 3 common mistakes — plus we check (or rebuild) your file for FREE.
Read the full Artwork Hub guide →Browse hundreds of real projects we've actually printed — proper inspiration, not a single AI mockup.
Real people who've been printing books since 2006 — friendly, genuinely knowledgeable, and usually replying within minutes.
Design in whatever program you love, save it as a PDF, send it over. Never done it before? A real person checks it for free.
No minimum means you can print a single copy, check the paper and layout in your own hands, then run the full batch with total confidence.
Silk, gloss, uncoated, kraft — we'll post you the real thing so you're never guessing colour and feel off a screen.
Degree hand-in, launch day, a fair this weekend? Tell us your date up front — we'll say straight away if it's doable, then build the whole job around it.
We will aim to deliver short run digital jobs in 4/5 working days and longer, litho print runs in 6-10 depending on the complexity and quantity.
Additionally there can be a day or two of amends required to the artwork before it's print ready which we're more than happy to help with but you'll need to factor that in to timings.
Remember, we’ll need a hi res pdf file with 3mm bleed and crop marks on each edge to go ahead please. Sending it over correctly first time means we can go straight to print. Do have a last check through our file set up guides to make sure all the boxes are ticked.
For authors exploring children’s book printing from AI-created artwork, the biggest opportunity lies in using the technology to unlock ideas rather than shortcut the craft. Our guide to illustrating a children’s book with AI showed how creators can generate early visual concepts, compare different aesthetics and establish a more consistent cast of characters and environments. It is particularly useful for writers who know the atmosphere they want but need support translating that vision into imagery. The hot take is simple: AI can accelerate ideation dramatically, but the most compelling books still come from thoughtful curation, strong art direction and a sharp eye for what belongs on the printed page.
In our ChatGPT children’s book printing guide, we looked at how those digital ingredients could be organised into a book that is genuinely ready for production. From shaping a manuscript into page turns to preparing images at the right resolution, the article unpacked the details that separate a promising draft from a polished printed object. We also covered the factors that influence pricing and finish, including format, extent, paper stock, binding style and print quantity. With our file-checking support, paper advice, flexible order options and experience printing illustrated books, we helped authors make confident choices and avoid the common stumbles that can appear between screen artwork and a finished book in hand.
Genuinely, we are trying to make your journey into print as easier as possible!
Our house papers come in a silk, gloss or uncoated finish.
For an example of a children's book with a gloss cover, check out Pouch's Magical Worry Cheeks. This also has gloss lamination to really make the cover jump off the shelf.
For a more subtle matt cover and silk finish, take a look at our case study of Nana Duck.
The numerous offspring of Ex Why Zed staff love their board books so we know these well but at present they are not something we are able to produce. If you check the back cover of any of them, they are all currently printed in China.
As a cost and time saving alternative, we can print you a wire stitched, perfect bound (softback) or case bound (hardback) the children's books.
Any portrait size up to A3 (420x297mm).
Any landscape size as wide as A4 (210x297mm).
Any square size up to 297x297mm.
Any portrait or landscape size up to A4 (210x297mm).
Any square size up to 295x295mm.
Any portrait or landscape size up to A4 (210x297mm).
On longer print runs (700 copies+) we can increase to around 320x280mm portrait.
Any square size up to 294x294mm.
Wire stitching is a little bit of print jargon for ‘stapling’. To confuse things even more it can also be known as 'saddle stitching'. Let’s stick with stapling though if that’s easier.
If you have an A5 zine then we print it onto A4 sheets, fold them in and put two staples along the left-hand edge to bind the sheets together.
The total number of pages needs to be a multiple of four to work as a stapled booklet.
To set-up artwork for wire stitching, visit our dedicated page.
The perfect bound method of binding will give your publication a square spine and professional looking finish.
For further advice follow our perfect binding set up guides.
Lamination is a thin film that we apply over the top of your printed cover to give it more longevity and to prevent scuffing and ink cracking. It only adds around £4 to the total cost but really helps your zines arrive looking in pristine condition.
Choose from matt, gloss or soft-touch.
Matt Lamination works best with silk and uncoated covers. This is a our recommended go-to lamination choice. However, we would suggest using gloss lamination if you are aiming for a super shiny, high impact cover.
Soft-touch has a velvet, illustrious feel but does attract finger marks REALLY quickly so best not eat your lunch before reading! In recent tests a soft-touch laminated zine ended up looking like we'd eaten a bacon sandwich off it within minutes - stick to matt or gloss instead.
We don’t, but you can go direct to https://www.nielsenisbnstore.com/ who are the UK supplier of ISBNs.
From there you can download the number and/or a barcode to add to your artwork.
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We like to interact with our customers, find out about their projects and have a bit of dialogue rather than hide behind a massive, confusing spreadsheet on a website.
We provide a bespoke quote for each and every job because your project is bespoke and unique.
Don’t get us wrong, our process is quick and efficient but we like to add extra value by starting a conversation with you first. Remember conversations? Yep, they are what happened before your phone was glued to your head! 🙂
For this reason we don’t list all our prices online but get in touch either in email or through our quote form and we will give you a bespoke quote.
Great question! Check out our recent blog article on the cost of children's book printing for more insight.
Enjoy our recent blog post '10 Ideas to Promote Your Children's Book on Social Media'.
As the proud author of a new children's book you have just printed at Ex Why Zed, you are now looking for ways to get the word out on social media. Well, you've come to the right place! Social media offers a great way to promote your book to the right audience and maximise its impact. Brilliantly, it is also FREE. You have done the hard work of writing the book, getting it illustrated and transforming it into print, now comes the fun bit of showing the world.
Yes, we did and here is our case study of Little Lost Luna.
Creating a children’s book that feels imaginative, age-appropriate and genuinely ready for print starts with getting the foundations right. The strongest projects pair a clear understanding of the reader with memorable characters, a well-paced story and visuals that support the narrative at every turn. Whether you are shaping the manuscript from scratch using the practical advice in how to write a children’s book, exploring the creative possibilities of using AI to illustrate a children’s book, or developing early ideas with ChatGPT as part of the children’s book creation process, the key is to treat writing, illustration and page design as one connected storytelling system. The more carefully these pieces are planned together, the more confident and polished the final printed book becomes.
From there, production choices shape how the book feels in the hand and performs in the real world. Format, paper, binding, cover finish, print quantity and artwork setup all influence both quality and cost, which is why it helps to choose a route that matches the ambition of the project. The sections on this page explore the practical options for bringing illustrated stories to life, from short-run stapled books to more substantial perfect-bound and hardback editions, while our self-published book printing page looks at the wider journey from print-ready files to delivery, fulfilment and professional presentation. With the right creative planning and informed print decisions, a children’s book can travel all the way from first spark to finished copy with far less guesswork and far more magic.
Yes. Order a single test copy so you can check the cover, colours, page order and finish in your hands before committing to the full run.
It depends on the book. Stapled binding suits short activity books, perfect binding works for longer readers, and hardback (case binding) is ideal for picture books that need to survive bedtime after bedtime.
Set the correct trim size and page count, add bleed to any artwork that runs to the edge, and supply the cover and inside pages as print-ready PDFs. A real person checks every file for free before we print.
