Should You Turn Your Book Into an Audiobook?

Audiobooks are one of the fastest-growing formats in publishing, and every author eventually asks the same question: should I make one? Audio can open a whole new revenue stream and reach readers who never sit down with a print book. But production costs real money and time, and audio isn’t equally valuable for every book. Here’s an honest framework for deciding whether an audiobook makes sense for yours.

The case for audio: a growing, underserved market

Listeners consume books during time they’d never spend reading — commuting, exercising, cooking, walking the dog. That’s genuinely additive: an audiobook doesn’t just move a sale from print to audio, it often reaches someone who’d never have bought the book at all. Audio buyers also tend to be loyal subscribers who work through a lot of titles. For the right book, it’s a real and expanding opportunity.

Does your genre suit audio?

This is the deciding question. Some genres thrive in audio; others struggle:

• Strong fit: fiction, memoir, self-help, business, biography — anything consumed start to finish, driven by story or voice.
• Weak fit: highly visual books, reference works, cookbooks, heavily illustrated titles, and anything readers dip in and out of or need to see.
• It depends: technical nonfiction can work if it’s narrative rather than diagram-heavy.

If your book is a linear, immersive read, audio is likely worth exploring. If it relies on visuals or random-access reference, the format fights the content.

Weigh the production investment

A professional audiobook means a skilled narrator, studio-quality recording, and careful editing — it’s a genuine investment, typically priced per finished hour of audio. You can reduce upfront cost through royalty-share arrangements with narrators, but that trades cash now for a share of earnings later. Either way, budget audio as a real production line item, the way you would cover design or editing, and factor it into your overall self-publishing budget.

Who should narrate?

You have two paths: hire a professional narrator, or narrate it yourself. Professionals bring performance skill and consistency, and for fiction that usually wins. But for memoir, self-help, and business books, author narration creates real intimacy — readers often want to hear the author’s own voice. If you narrate, be honest about your ability; a flat or error-filled reading undercuts the book. Our audiobook production team can help either way.

Run the simple math

Estimate your production cost, then your likely audio sales — look at how comparable titles in your genre perform in audio. If your book suits the format, has an audience, and you can absorb the upfront cost (or a royalty-share), audio usually pays off over time because it keeps selling for years. If your genre is a weak fit or the numbers are shaky, it’s fine to wait until the book has proven demand in print and eBook first.

A reasonable default

For most narrative fiction, memoir, and business books with an existing audience, an audiobook is worth making — often after the book has shown it can sell in other formats. For visual or reference-heavy books, it usually isn’t. Once you decide to produce one, treat it as its own product with its own marketing, and it can become a durable new income stream.