Free ISBN
barcode generator
for book covers

Yes. Barcode Rocket is free for individual users and small-scale projects. Without an account you can make up to 20 downloads a day from your network, one at a time.

A free account, once you confirm your email, adds lists of up to 50 at once, with an allowance of 50 new barcodes a week in lists, plus History, where you download your barcodes again for free. No credit card is required.

For publishers, agencies and companies, please contact us to arrange business access, higher volumes, custom templates or API integration.

Yes. The free plan is for authors, designers and freelancers, including barcodes for your clients' books, within the free limits. Publishers, printers and agencies that need volume, batch files, a template with their logo or an API can contact us and we will set it up.

Often not: KDP can place a barcode for you, and IngramSpark's cover template already contains one. You need your own when you print with an offset or short-run printer, sell through bookstores with a price in the barcode, work with a printer that asks you to supply the barcode, or want full control of the cover. When you supply your own, KDP asks for a barcode in pure black on white, about 2.0 x 1.2 in. The KDP layout makes exactly that.

Every barcode is a vector PDF whose black is 100% K only (C0 M0 Y0 K100): no pixels, no RGB, no rich black. Black built from several inks prints on several plates, and a tiny shift between them blurs the edges of the bars. Pure K prints on one plate and stays sharp. You place the PDF straight into InDesign, Illustrator or any prepress workflow without conversions.

Before you can download, the number is checked for length, prefix and check digit, and the print check shows the number the barcode scans as. The bars follow the GS1 specification at a printable size. Printing conditions are outside our control, so check a printed proof with a phone scanner or a barcode verifier before a print run.

The small barcode to the right is the EAN-5 price add-on. 90000 means no suggested price. A code starting with 5 is a US dollar price: 51999 means $19.99. Leave the price empty for 90000, which suits books sold in several countries. Prices can be in US dollars, British pounds or Canadian dollars. For euros there is no agreed code, so the add-on is 90000.

The Amazon KDP barcode is 2.0 x 1.2 inches with the EAN-5 price add-on and a 0.5 pt overprint frame. The IngramSpark barcode is 1.255 x 1.0 inches and fits IngramSpark's 1.75 x 1 in barcode area, like the barcode in IngramSpark's cover template (EAN-13 without a price add-on). For other printers, the ISBN option comes at the standard size. All are vector PDFs in 100% K.

The barcodes are built to ISO/IEC 15420 (EAN/UPC), ISO/IEC 15417 (Code 128), ISO/IEC 18004 (QR), ISO/IEC 24723 (GS1 Composite) and the GS1 General Specifications. Check digits are verified, and the standard X-dimension is 0.33 mm (100% magnification). How a barcode scans also depends on printing, paper and size, so always check a printed proof before a print run.

Without an account: ISBN (with correct hyphenation), ISBN with the price add-on, the KDP and IngramSpark layouts and QR codes. With a free account and a confirmed email, also EAN-13, UPC-A, UPC-E, EAN-8, GS1-128, the Connect QR templates (ISBN barcode, QR code and genre band in one file), the QR box (a QR code with a text under it) and GS1 Composite symbols, and lists of up to 50 at once. Publishers and studios can ask for larger batches from a spreadsheet.

No. Barcode Rocket turns a number you already own into a barcode. Get ISBNs from your national ISBN agency (for example Bowker in the US or Nielsen in the UK) and product numbers from GS1.