Comparison
Bookshaper vs Vellum
Vellum-quality formatting, plus everything that comes before it
Feature comparison
| Feature | Bookshaper | Vellum |
|---|---|---|
| Scene-based editor | ||
| Autosave | ||
| Manuscript preview pane | ||
| Parts / chapters / scenes hierarchy | ||
| Outline + Beat Cards | ||
| Thread Health | ||
| Drag-and-drop reordering | ||
| Character profiles | ||
| Location tracking | ||
| Character presence matrix | ||
| Character relationship map | ||
| Story Bible (AI-extracted characters, locations & relationships) | ||
| Series management (multi-book) | ||
| Narrative coaching | ||
| AI manuscript chat | ||
| Scene refinement & line edit | ||
| Scene audio narration | ||
| Bring your own AI key (Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, OpenRouter, Together.ai, more) | ||
| Style profiles & drift detection | ||
| Voice-calibrated suggestions | ||
| Consistency dashboard | ||
| Dialogue harmonization | ||
| Proofread mode | ||
| Revision tracking (analysis diffs) | ||
| Marketing blurb generation | ||
| Submission Kit (query letter, synopsis, author bio) | ||
| Cover Studio (front, back, spine) | ||
| Print-ready KDP & IngramSpark/custom-template wrap PDF export | ||
| ACX audiobook cover export (2560×2560, ACX-ready) | ||
| 3D marketing mockups (paperback, e-reader, flat) | ||
| Genre-art-directed cover presets (per-genre fonts, palette, effect stack) | ||
| AI art-direction brief with mix-and-match creative directions | ||
| Pro title effects (foil, texture fills, blend modes, arc/curved text) | ||
| Thumbnail test (Amazon search size) + print safe-area guides | ||
| Cover versions — named design snapshots with restore (A/B-test directions) | ||
| Series style kits — save a cover style, apply it across a series | ||
| KDP storefront metadata (description, keywords, categories, bio, A+ Content) | ||
| Comp Title Finder (manuscript-aware, web-verified comparable titles) | ||
| Pitch One-Sheet (one-page visual sales-sheet PDF) | ||
| Reader-magnet exporter (deleted scene, character interview, prequel, world guide) | ||
| Trope tags (content-derived discoverability tags that feed blurbs, keywords, comps) | ||
| Pull-quote image cards (share-ready, in your book's typography) | ||
| Reading group guide (auto-generated book-club discussion questions) | ||
| Interactive evidence charts | ||
| Style editor (typographic control) | ||
| Interior design recommendations (genre-aware template, ornament, font & trim) | ||
| Custom font upload (your TTF/OTF, embedded in EPUB, PDF & DOCX) | ||
| Genre / era template library (60 templates, 9 categories) | ||
| Ornament library (scene breaks & chapter headings) | ||
| Page backgrounds & decorative borders (print-only, per-page or chapter openers) | ||
| Footnotes (print bottom-of-page + ebook popup notes) | ||
| Special content blocks (text-message threads, callout boxes, written notes) | ||
| Multi-format import (DOCX, EPUB, Markdown) | ||
| Multi-format export (EPUB, PDF, DOCX) | ||
| Retailer-specific ebook store links + linked Also-By catalog (per-store EPUB editions, cover thumbnails, author profile) | ||
| Pre-export preflight report (KDP / IngramSpark spec checks) | ||
| Print / save-as-PDF of analysis & insight views (synopses, continuity, structure, tension…) | ||
| Publish-ready print formatting | ||
| Pro typesetting (character-level justification, hung punctuation) | ||
| Guided page-level fix-its (widows, orphans, hyphen ladders, overflow — print-only) | ||
| Research notebook | ||
| Project-wide find & replace with undo | ||
| Quick Open navigation | ||
| Inline comments & annotations | ||
| Snapshots / version history | ||
| Writing goals & session targets | ||
| Auto-backup with retention management | ||
| macOS | ||
| Windows | ||
| Linux |
Yes Partial No
The bottom line
Vellum is a best-in-class formatting tool and a great choice if your workflow already includes a separate writing app. Bookshaper is the better fit if you want to write, organize, analyze, and format your manuscript in a single application — especially if you're on Windows or Linux.