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Can I change the cover of a mobi/epub book so that in Kindle or Aldiko reader software, the book cover is shown as my own customized cover?

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  • Use calibre for editing the epub. Pls note Changing Metadata of ebook imported in calibre is not changing the ebook files' cover. Though you can edit the epub files in calibre and change it in that interface. Saved ebook will have changed cover
    – v_sukt
    Mar 18, 2017 at 12:34

5 Answers 5

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Yes we can do that using opensource software like Calibre.

  1. Install the Calibre software and start the program.
  2. Copy the ebook.mobi file to your PC.
  3. Drag the book onto the Calibre software UI. It will get imported.
  4. Right click and select "edit metadata" for individual book you want to change.
  5. There is option to browse and select the cover that you want.
  6. Save the file.
  7. Right click on the book and select open in directory, now copy the ebook.mobi file.
  8. Go to kindle directory on your device and delete the original ebook.mobi file and paste copied file in that location.

The cover will be updated in your Kindle device. If its not updated try restarting the device. It will work after some time.

The steps for epub files are similar, you will just need to copy the file to a different directory.

(There are other programs like Cigil to edit epub files but Calibre can be used for both formats.)

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  • In my case, there was no "Save" option for step 6. So instead of saving, I clicked "Convert" to the right format (can be the same). And there is an option there of using the cover earlier added to the metadata. Worked like a charm.
    – Dr_Zaszuś
    Jan 27, 2022 at 21:10
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Actually, there's an easier way of changing the content:

  1. Change the file extension of your epub book from ".epub" to ".zip"
  2. You will be able to access all content because, now, the file became just a regular zip file
  3. Alter any file you want (including the cover image)
  4. Change the file extension from ".zip" back to ".epub"

Voilà!!!

Extra: You can do the same thing with a ".docx" or ".xlsx" MS Office file... Pretty cool, huh??

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    Excellent! What I fond VERY important was to copy files out of the zip, amend, then COPY them back in. DO NOT UNZIP, MODIFY THEN REZIP as renaming the zip to an epub then produces an invalid epub. Also any new images must be referenced in content.opf.
    – SharpC
    Jan 4, 2019 at 21:06
  • yes, keep in mind that changing only the content and not the filenames works more or less out of the box, but if you modify the filenames you must also modify the metadata in order to recognize the new content.
    – mau ♦
    Apr 29, 2022 at 16:53
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If you're using Apple iBooks you can just select the Get Info command from the book's context menu then clicking the cover picture will bring up a Finder window for you to choose the new cover from an image.

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As far as I understand, an epub basically is a web page + css styles + images, etc. compressed. You can modify everything. I've done it with some epub files. It worked.

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0 How can we do it online or through android device. My books have cover pages but when I email them to kindle, it doesn't show the cover page. Just the title.

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    This should have been posted as a new question (or possibly a comment, once you have enough rep), not as an answer to an existing question.
    – beaker
    Aug 28, 2021 at 14:42

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