4 Ways AI Could Change Book Publishing In 2026: Experts Weigh In

There is an old joke that if you give a monkey a typewriter, it could eventually recreate the works of Shakespeare. That feels especially prescient for book publishing in the age of artificial intelligence—how long until AI is writing bestsellers?

It won’t happen anytime soon, is the consensus among industry experts. But AI is making a bigger and bigger impact on book publishing, as it is on all branches of media. In 2026, most of those changes will come behind the scenes, in areas such as editing and marketing.

But in coming years, AI’s impact could grow. And yes, we will see artificial intelligence writing books, though they’re not going to win the Booker Prize or anything of consequence. AI’s a great mimic, but it lacks original ideas and nuance, two qualities of critical importance to a good book.

1. AI-Written Books—But Not Too Many

Right now, AI is being used for publishing, but not to write major releases for the big houses (or at least not that anyone will admit). It’s considered bad form to use it for anything but ideation—and even then, you need to be careful. A publisher can’t own a copyright for copy that wasn’t written by a human, for one thing.

Still, some smaller publishers and self-publishers are experimenting with it. You can find a number of AI-written books on Amazon, quality notwithstanding.

Crystal Foote, founder and head of partnerships at Digital Culture Group, an adtech company that analyzes audience behavior, also notes that there are creative dangers in over-automation. It can saturate the market with too many books on the same theme, making readers grow tired of the subject.

2. More Automated Editing (And More Mistakes)

Look to newspapers as a bellwether for book publishing—first they came for the copy editors. The advent of Grammarly and Ginger has made it easier to catch errant apostrophes. Alas, however, as poorly edited copy increasingly makes its way into papers, it is clear that copy editors did a lot more than fix rogue commas; they also caught factual errors and storyline inconsistencies.

Still, as AI technology improves, smaller presses may try to save money by replacing the human element with automated editing programs that they see as doing the same thing—this is probably an overcorrection that will straighten back out with reader complaints about errors in grammar and continuity. As Foote notes, quality control and editorial rigor can suffer without human oversight, and that’s a major downside to AI.

3. Greater Author Involvement In Branding

AI can (but should not) take the place of a marketing department, especially for authors either working with limited budgets due to self-publishing or lacking financial support from their publisher. In the past, they’ve been tasked with building their own marketing plans. Now AI can do it for them.

“AI is already used in audience targeting, but its real impact in publishing is shifting marketing power from publishers to authors themselves,” Foote says. “AI now enables authors to create their own messaging, build campaigns, and test positioning across platforms — something that once required a full marketing team. Authors can tailor copy, generate video concepts, personalize outreach, and identify which audiences are most likely to engage before spending money.”

4. Significant Opportunities For Self-Publishing

Self-publishing has been on the rise for years. According to the Association of American Publishers (AAP), total publishing revenue rose 4.1% in 2024, to $32.5 billion, and other estimates put self-publishing totals at around $1.25 billion. In the current media environment, social media has ushered in an era of greater trust in user-generated content. Self-published authors like Colleen Hoover and Frieda McFadden have been discovered and mainstreamed by writing what audiences want, not necessarily what publishers want.

“AI won’t replace traditional publishing — but it will fuel a massive rise in credible, data-informed self-published authors who treat books like products with built-in audiences,” predicts Foote.

“Today, an aspiring author can use AI to analyze reader demand, identify the topics people are most concerned about, study top-selling books by genre, and understand how tone, structure, and pacing differ by audience. AI can also guide authors through formatting, distribution, pricing, and launch strategies—allowing them to bypass traditional publishing houses entirely and go directly to market.”