Amazon has just announced a major change that affects everyone who self-publishes e-books made available through KDP. The change relates to Digital Rights Management (DRM) technology—specifically what happens when it is not applied to an e-book.
ALLi News Editor Dan Holloway
DRM is designed to protect copyright (obviously a hot-button topic right now). It works by preventing people from doing certain things to files on which it’s used, such as downloading them or converting them to a different format.
This prevents people from buying a single copy of a Kindle book and then either handing copies around their friends or reading it on, for example, a Kobo e-reader instead of a Kindle.
The latter feature became the object of frustration among many Kindle users, as it effectively locked them in to their Amazon device for reading, with increasingly stringent controls from Amazon on transfer between devices.
What Changes in January 2026
As indies, we have always had the option of activating DRM or not. Because we know legitimate readers find it frustrating, and those with suspect motives find a way around DRM, many of us have often chosen not to apply DRM to our e-books.
From January 2026, what happens when we don’t apply DRM will change. E-books without DRM will be able to be downloaded in EPUB or PDF format. That means they will be transferable across reading devices and ecosystems.
Amazon has some clarification on its help page:
- This change will only apply to titles published after December 9.
- For titles published prior to that without applying DRM, EPUB and PDF download will not be made available.
- Steps are given for how to update the DRM settings on all your titles.
Why the Change May Backfire
Interestingly, TechCrunch makes the point that early reactions suggest this may backfire a little. Some writers have suggested that the expanded options available for books without DRM applied might make them more inclined to apply DRM than they had been in the past.
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We’ve already lost the right to determine use of DRM on our work:
From KDP’s Terms & Conditions (§5.5): “We may, but are not obligated, to provide you the option to apply DRM technology in connection with the distribution of your Digital Books. If we provide you the option to apply DRM technology, you acknowledge that we make no representations as to the efficacy of the DRM and will not be responsible for any failure of the DRM.”