Authr.
Invite only. Ask and we will send you a link.
Publishing a book should be as easy as publishing a post. Now it is.
Hey there,
Writing tools are everywhere. Publishing tools stopped at the blog post.
Put a book on the web today and you end up choosing a static site generator, a build step and a server you now have to keep alive. Or you hand it to Amazon, which keeps a share of every sale for the privilege. None of that has anything to do with writing.
So we built Authr. You write page by page. When a word won’t come, you leave a stand-in and keep going. When the draft is ready, you publish an edition. Make the book public and send readers the link: they don’t need an account to read it, or to come back to the page where they stopped.
There’s no AI in it, no comments section, no follower count and no feed. It doesn’t sell your book and it doesn’t take a cut. It writes books and it publishes them. That’s the whole product.
Your first three books are free. If Authr earns a place on your desk, write to us.
Happy writing,
Svair
The problem
Writing a book is hard enough. A word won’t come, or a fact needs checking, and stopping to find it is usually how a page never gets finished. Then the book gets shared while it is still changing, and readers see every half-finished page.
A better way
Authr keeps the draft and the book apart. Write page by page. Leave a stand-in where a word is missing and come back to it later. When the draft is ready, publish it as an edition. Readers only ever see the latest edition. Never the draft. Never a stand-in.
FAQ
Words you’ve marked as not final yet: the fact you still need to check, the name you haven’t settled on. Select them and tap ✱ in the toolbar, press ⌘⇧S (Ctrl+Shift+S on Windows and Linux), or type {~ like this ~}, then keep writing. When you’re ready, “show next” on the book screen takes you to each one in turn. Readers never see them. Your words survive into the edition; the fact that they were provisional does not.
A numbered, dated copy of the whole book, made when you publish, that can’t be changed afterwards. Its cover and colour go with it. Readers always get the latest edition, never the draft, and you and your editors can open every earlier one from Edition history. An edition can’t be taken back once it’s out. To stop people reading, set the book to Only me.
You choose: Only me, People I choose, or Public. Every book starts as Only me. People you choose are added by the phone number they use for Authr, as readers or editors, and each needs an Authr account; if someone doesn’t have one, ask us and we’ll invite them. A Public book needs no account to read, and it’s listed in Authr’s public books, where search engines can find it, so choose it when you mean it. The first time you let anyone read a book, Authr publishes edition 1, and asks you before it does.
For a public book, just the link. No account, no app, no signup. Authr remembers the page they stopped on, even without an account, and a Resume button takes them back to it. Pages they’ve read recently open again without a connection: the words, not the pictures. A book shared only with people you choose is different: each reader needs an Authr account.
Yes. Add them as an editor and they write, reorder pages and publish with you. An editor needs a writer account of their own. Only you, the owner, decide who can read the book or delete it. It isn’t live co-editing, though: if two of you save the same page at once, the second save is told so and keeps its text for you to copy across. Nobody’s words are overwritten.
Yes. Import a Markdown file, an EPUB or a ZIP downloaded from Authr, and it becomes a new, private book. Markdown splits into pages at your chapter headings. An EPUB keeps its chapters in order, with their pictures.
Any time. In Book settings, Download a copy gives you EPUB, Markdown or a ZIP with its pictures, of the draft (stand-ins kept) or of the edition readers have now. Download everything on your account page takes every book you own in one go: drafts, archived pages, covers and every edition, with their pictures. It leaves out books you only edit, and the earlier versions of your pages.
An optional way of seeing the page. A capsule rides under the line you’re writing and taps once for every key, and the paper feeds up as you go. Add real mechanical-keyboard sounds with a bell on Return, and a lamp for writing at night. All the joy of a typewriter, none of the correction fluid. It’s off until you turn it on, and your words are saved exactly the same way.
Your first three books are free, and the Authr Manual every writer starts with doesn’t count. If you want more, write to us. We haven’t set the price yet, and we’d rather agree one with you than guess. Downloading your books and deleting your account are always free, and no edition is ever thrown away to make room.
No comments and no reader feedback of any kind. No feeds, follower counts, analytics or AI. No live co-editing. No PDF export and nothing for print. It sends no email or SMS, so it won’t tell your readers a new edition is out; that part is up to you. It doesn’t sell your book and it doesn’t take a cut. Writing needs an internet connection, though anything you type when the signal drops is kept on your device and sent when it’s back.
By invitation. Request access and we’ll send you a link. Open it on the phone or computer you’ll write on and create a passkey: from then on you sign in with your fingerprint, face or screen lock. Prefer not to? Use an authenticator app and your phone number instead. There are no passwords. On a new computer, let it in from a device where you’re already signed in. If you lose every device, write to us: we check it’s really you, usually by calling the number on your account, then send a new link. Your books are untouched.
Only when you ask for help or something needs fixing. We can then see your account as you see it, drafts and stand-ins included, for up to an hour at a time. We have to give a reason, it’s recorded, and we can’t change anything or download your books.
What's new
- Sign in with your fingerprint, face or screen lock. The authenticator code still works.
- On a new computer, choose Use another device and let it in from a phone where you’re already signed in.
- Your account page names each device you’re signed in on, like “Safari on iPhone”, so you can sign out the ones you don’t recognise.
- A book’s cover and colour are part of its edition: readers see a new cover when you publish, not before.
- Give a book its own language. E-readers get it in the EPUB.
- Move up and Move down beside each page, for when dragging is fiddly.
- Picture pages keep their earlier captions, the way text pages keep their earlier versions.
- Your account page shows how much picture space you’ve used.
- A capsule rides under the line you’re writing, and the paper feeds up as you go.
- Optional mechanical-keyboard sounds, and a lamp for writing at night.
- Publish lights up only when something has changed, shows you what changed, and warns you about stand-ins you’ve left behind.
- Open any earlier edition from Edition history.
- Two editors can no longer publish over each other by accident.
- Pages you’ve opened can be read offline.
- Public books: a library of every book its writer has made public.
- Share a book with people as an editor or a reader.
- Search inside a book, or across all of yours.
- Drag pages to put them in a new order.
- Notes, shelves and topics are gone. Books are the only thing to think about.
Values
Writing is hard enough.
Publishing should not be.
Readers get the book, not the draft.
Your words leave whenever you want them to.