BUILT FOR NOVELISTS|The All-in-One Publishing Engine for Authors
The dedicated publishing engine for novelists.
Write your manuscript, keep a story bible beside it, collect feedback from beta readers, publish your author website, send a newsletter and sell your books directly, all from one workspace.
Your own payment link, we never take a cut
Your own domain on paid plans
14-Day Free Trial, No Card
The Complete Author Toolkit
Every tool an author needs. None of the chaos.
Stop stitching together generic business software. PenCanvas is purpose-engineered around the craft, revision cycle, reader community, and direct monetization of books.
Writing Core
Manuscript & Chapter Editor
A clutter-free drafting interface with chapters and folders, a focus mode, a word-count target, autosave and a revision history you can restore from.
Worldbuilding
Story Bible & World Wiki
Keep characters, lore entries (locations, factions, magic, items) and a story timeline for each book in a panel beside your chapters, and search them as you write.
Audience Feedback
Gated Beta Reader Portal
Share a private reading link, with a watermark. Readers highlight text to comment and tag it, and you see how far each reader got in every chapter.
Web Presence
Visual Author Website Builder
Start from one of 36 templates and edit it by drag and drop. Your site includes a blog and book pages, and the Creator and Studio plans add your own domain with SSL.
Monetization
Direct Book Sales
Sell books and extras with your own payment link on any button, page or bio link. Paperbacks link out to the retailers you choose. PenCanvas never takes a cut.
Audience Growth
Newsletters with double opt-in
Sent through Amazon SES. Subscribers confirm by email, you can tag and segment them, schedule campaigns and build automations. You can send from your own domain once its DKIM records are verified.
FEATURE 01 · CORE WRITING ENGINE
A distraction-free manuscript editor that respects your focus.
Built for long-form fiction. PenCanvas keeps your chapters and story bible side by side, imports DOCX, EPUB, PDF, Markdown and text files, and exports a whole book as DOCX, EPUB or HTML.
Distraction-Free Focus Mode
A focus mode that hides the side panels, plus typography and layout settings, so the page is all you see.
Autosave that retries
Changes save in the background. If a save fails, the editor shows the error and keeps retrying. If your session expires, a copy of the unsaved text is kept in this browser.
Revision History
Open an earlier revision of a chapter, see what changed compared with the current text, and restore it.
Chapters, Folders & Targets
Organise chapters in folders, give each chapter a status (draft, beta, published) and set a word-count target for the session.
Private to your workspace•Autosave
FEATURE 02 · WORLD KNOWLEDGE BASE
A living Story Bible that keeps your universe consistent.
Keep characters, places and events for each book in a searchable panel right beside your chapters.
Character Profiles
Record each character’s role, age, appearance and biography.
Timeline of Events
Add story events with an in-story date, so you can check the sequence of what happens when.
Lore Wiki
Write entries for locations, factions, magic, items, history and culture, and find any entry with the panel’s search or the global search.
FEATURE 03 · READER FEEDBACK HUB
A private beta reader portal. Real feedback before launch.
No more emailing Word files. Invite readers by email or link, choose which chapters they can read, and collect their feedback in your console.
Inline Feedback
Readers highlight text to leave a comment and tag it as loved, confusing, pacing, typo or plot hole. You can reply and mark notes resolved.
Private Links & Watermark
Each reader gets a unique private link. The reading page carries a watermark and blocks copy and print shortcuts. These are deterrents, not a guarantee against leaks.
Reading Progress
See how far each reader got and how many opened and finished each chapter.
YOUR HOME ONLINE · WEBSITE
A bio link gets you found. A website gets you taken seriously.
When a brand wants to work with you, a podcast wants to book you or a fan wants to know who you are, they search your name. Give them a real site: your story, your work, your contact, your newsletter, on a domain that is yours. Every layout is a starting point, so change it until it looks like you. Pick one, drag things where you want them, publish. No code and no agency.
8 STARTING LAYOUTSDRAG-AND-DROP EDITOR
Every block
Add, move, duplicate and delete
Colours and fonts
Set once, applied site-wide
Pages and menu
Add the pages you need
Live on yourname.pencanvas.com in minutes, on your own domain with SSL on the Creator and Studio plans
Blog, newsletter sign-up and contact pages built in, so one site does the job of four tools
Preview every page on phone and tablet before you publish
SELL DIRECT · YOUR PAYMENT LINK
Sell direct. Keep every dollar.
Create a payment link with the provider you already use, such as Stripe Payment Links, PayPal, Gumroad or Ko-fi, and attach it to a button on your site, a bio link or a blog post. The buyer pays you directly, and PenCanvas never takes a cut.
One button or link, anywhere: your site, a post or your bio page
A price badge on bio links and a click count on every one, so you see what gets tapped
Store and retailer links for anywhere else you already sell
YOUR VOICE · NEWSLETTER
The only channel where every one of your people hears from you.
On social, a fraction of your followers see any post. In an inbox, it is one to one. Publish your newest work, your launch, your weekly letter straight to the people who asked for it, from your own address. They confirm by email, so the list is real, and it is yours to export any day. Your first few thousand sends are included in every plan.
From your name, not a platform's
Send from you@yourdomain.com once your domain is verified. Tag and segment subscribers, schedule a send, import the list you already have from a CSV.
Welcome them while you sleep
Automations start when someone subscribes or gets a tag: a welcome series, a delay, a condition, the next email. A ready-made welcome sequence is included to start from.
YOUR FRONT DOOR · BIO LINK
One short link for everything you are.
You get one link in your bio. Make it pencanvas.com/you: your latest drop at the top, your site, your newsletter box, your free download, your socials, your contact form. Every tap is counted, so you finally know what your audience actually clicks when they land.
Everything important, one tap away
Link cards, a featured block for what matters most this week, a newsletter sign-up, a lead magnet, polls, scheduled links that appear on launch day and disappear after, and a QR code for the real world.
Clicks, not guesses
A click count beside every link and a view count on the page, so you can see which network sends people and what they do next.
Included in every plan•Themes that match your site
YOUR ASSETS · MEDIA LIBRARY
Upload it once. Use it on your site, your posts, your emails and your bio.
Your brand lives in your images: the headshot, the logo, the thumbnail, the behind-the-scenes photo. Keep them in one library that every part of PenCanvas can reach, instead of re-uploading the same file to five apps and hunting through camera rolls when a post is due. Storage is included on every plan.
Folders, search, a safety net
Photos, clips, logos, covers and downloads in one library with folders, search, a trash you can restore from and a storage meter.
Crop and resize in place
Fix a photo before you use it. Smaller preview versions are generated for you, so pages stay fast.
Focal point
Mark the part of a photo that matters and every banner, card and thumbnail crops around it.
Pull from a URL or Unsplash
Paste an image address, or search Unsplash from inside the library, and it is yours to use.
YOUR VISIBILITY · BLOG & ARTICLES
A post on Instagram lasts a day. A post on your site gets found for years.
The behind-the-scenes story, the how-I-made-it breakdown, the opinion your audience keeps asking for: write it once on your own site, where Google can find it and nobody can bury it. Share the link everywhere, email it to your subscribers in one click, and watch it keep bringing new people in long after the feed has moved on.
Built to be found
A meta title, description, canonical URL and social preview image for every post, at a clean address on your own domain. The things that make search engines and link previews work, without a plugin.
Public, subscribers-only, or scheduled
Organise with categories and tags, keep a post for subscribers only, schedule it for launch day, keep every revision, and moderate the comments yourself.
Email any post to your list•No separate blog subscription
YOUR NUMBERS · ANALYTICS
See which post, which network and which link actually brought people to you.
Likes tell you what the algorithm liked. Your own numbers tell you what your audience did next: which network sent them to your site, which page they read, which bio link they tapped, who opened the newsletter and clicked. All of it in one panel you can open from anywhere, so you double down on what works instead of guessing.
Socials, site and list, side by side
Visits, top pages, referrers, countries and devices for your site; clicks on every bio link; opens and clicks for every email; the results of every scheduled post.
Respectful of your audience
No cookies, no ad trackers, no banner to click away. Visitors are counted with a hash that changes every day, so you get the numbers without selling your people.
TRACKING
No cookies
Daily-rotating visitor hash
INCLUDED
Every plan
Site, links, email and social
PRICING FOR AUTHORS
One workspace for the whole book, priced like a tool, not a career change.
Every plan includes the full author toolkit below. The plans differ only in how many sites you run, whether you use your own domain, and how much you send and store.
Starter
For authors drafting their first book.
$5/ month
- 1 website, on a pencanvas.com address
- Drag-and-drop website builder with templates and a built-in blog
- Newsletter with double opt-in, segments and automations
- Social Studio: schedule posts, one shared inbox and keyword auto-replies
- Bio link page with click and view analytics
- Media library with folders, crop and focal point
- Analytics for your site, links, email and social posts
- Add your own payment link to any button, page or bio link
- 2 GB storage
- 2 team seats: you plus helpers who manage your site, blog and domain
- 3,000 newsletter emails per month
- PenCanvas badge on your site
On this plan
- One author site on a pencanvas.com address, with book pages and a blog
- 3,000 newsletter emails a month, enough for a monthly letter to a 3,000-reader list
- 2 GB for covers, sample chapters and downloads
Start Starter Plan
Cancel or change anytime
MOST POPULAR
Creator
For released authors with their own domain.
$15/ month
- 1 website with your own custom domain
- Drag-and-drop website builder with templates and a built-in blog
- Newsletter with double opt-in, segments and automations
- Social Studio: schedule posts, one shared inbox and keyword auto-replies
- Bio link page with click and view analytics
- Media library with folders, crop and focal point
- Analytics for your site, links, email and social posts
- Add your own payment link to any button, page or bio link
- 20 GB storage
- 5 team seats: you plus helpers who manage your site, blog and domain
- 20,000 newsletter emails per month
- Live chat with your readers, on your site and bio page
- PenCanvas badge removed
On this plan
- Your own domain, such as yourname.com, with SSL
- 20,000 emails a month for launch-week sequences and a weekly letter
- 20 GB for covers, maps and extras, and no PenCanvas badge on your site
Start Creator Plan
Cancel or change anytime
Studio
For series writers and authors with several pen names.
$35/ month
- Up to 3 websites, one per brand
- Custom domain
- Drag-and-drop website builder with templates and a built-in blog
- Newsletter with double opt-in, segments and automations
- Social Studio: schedule posts, one shared inbox and keyword auto-replies
- Bio link page with click and view analytics
- Media library with folders, crop and focal point
- Analytics for your site, links, email and social posts
- Add your own payment link to any button, page or bio link
- 50 GB storage
- 15 team seats: you plus helpers who manage your site, blog and domain
- Add more storage: +10 GB for $2/month
- 75,000 newsletter emails per month
- Live chat with your readers, on your site and bio page
- PenCanvas badge removed
On this plan
- Up to 3 sites, one per pen name, each with its own look
- 75,000 emails a month across your lists
- 50 GB, with 10 GB packs for $2 a month if you need more
Start Studio Plan
Cancel or change anytime
Need more than 50 GB? Studio can add 10 GB for $2/month.
Included for authors on every plan
- Manuscript editorChapters and folders, focus mode, word targets, autosave and a revision history you can restore.
- Story bibleCharacters, lore entries and a timeline for each book, searchable beside your chapters.
- Beta reader portalA private, watermarked reading link. Readers highlight and comment, and you see how far each one got.
- Import and exportBring in DOCX, EPUB, PDF, Markdown or plain text. Export a book as DOCX, EPUB or HTML.
- Book and series pagesCover, blurb, retailer links and reviews on your site, with series pages that list your books in order.
- A newsletter you ownDouble opt-in list, segments, scheduled sends and a welcome series to start from. Export the list any time.
- Sell with your own payment linkAttach a link from the provider you already use to any button, page or bio link. The buyer pays you directly and PenCanvas never takes a cut.
- Social studio and bio linkSchedule posts, reply from one inbox where the network allows it, and share one short link with click counts.
Same plans and prices for every kind of creator. Questions about billing, domains or payments are answered on the full pricing page.
BUILT TO OUTLAST ANY PLATFORM
You own it. All of it.
Platforms come and go. A brand built on an address you own, with a list you can export, does not.
Your name on the door
Start on yourname.pencanvas.com today. On the Creator and Studio plans, point yourname.com at it by adding the DNS records we show you; the SSL certificate is issued automatically.
Leave any time, with your audience
Export your subscriber list as a CSV whenever you like. Your audience belongs to you, and it never sits behind a subscription lock.
Fast from anywhere
Your media is stored on Cloudflare R2 and your pages are served through a global CDN, so a visitor in Lagos or Lisbon gets the same quick load as one next door.
A bad edit is never final
Pages and posts save automatically and keep revisions you can restore, so you can experiment with your site without fear.
FOR EVERY CREATOR
Your audience is already out there. Give them somewhere to land.
Publish your site, claim your bio link and send your first email this week. 14 days free, no card, and your name on the address from day one.
✓ 14-Day Free Trial, No Card✓ Free address on pencanvas.com✓ Export your subscriber list any time
Post to every network. Reply to the ones that talk back.
Write a post once, adjust it per network and schedule it to 11 networks, from Instagram and TikTok to Bluesky and Telegram. Comments and DMs from the networks that share them arrive in a single inbox, and keyword rules answer the repeat questions while you make the next thing.
One draft, per-network tweaks, a live preview and a calendar
6 networks share comments and 4 share DMs
"Link?" in a comment can send the link by DM on Instagram and Facebook
What works where
Every network can be scheduled to. Replies depend on what each network lets other apps do.
Instagram needs a Professional account. Meta allows one private reply per comment within seven days, and DMs within 24 hours of the person's last message. YouTube, Bluesky and Mastodon are checked every few minutes rather than pushed live.