Growing an audience
Running the business
Both cover self-publishing. Here is what separates them on price, billing, what you can take with you, and coverage.
| Plottr | PublishDrive | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | From $9.99 | From $13.99 |
| Pricing model | Paid subscription | Free plan, paid tiers |
| Free tier | No | Yes |
| Billing | Monthly or annual | Annual only |
| Free trial | Not stated | None |
| API | Not stated | Not stated |
| Data export | Not stated | Not stated |
| Their cut | Not stated | None |
| Runs on | macOS, Windows | Web |
| Covers | Self-Publishing, Project Management, Writing & Scripts | Self-Publishing, Digital Products & Storefronts |
| Works with | Nothing in particular | Nothing in particular |
| Founded | Not listed | Not listed |
| Reader rating | No reviews yet | No reviews yet |
| Live deals | None right now | None right now |
Story structure on a timeline, before the draft
Plottr is for the part before the writing: scenes on a timeline, characters and places as cards, and templates built from the story structures people actually teach. It does not want to be your word processor and exports to the tools that are. Buying it once is an option, which is unusual in this corner now.
Our note
Buy the lifetime licence if you write more than one book, because the yearly price pays for it in under three years and the software is finished enough not to need reinventing. Pair it with Dabble or a plain word processor for the drafting.
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Ebook distribution with no cut of royalties
PublishDrive charges a subscription and then takes nothing from sales, which inverts the usual aggregator deal and pays off the moment a book sells steadily. One upload reaches over 50 retailers and a library network most authors never get near. Plans are capped by title count, so a back catalogue costs more than a single book does.
Our note
Draft2Digital takes 10 percent and costs nothing up front, so it wins on a book that barely sells and loses on one that does. Work out your annual royalties before choosing: the crossover for the Starter plan is somewhere around $1,700 a year in sales.
Ratings are the average of reviews readers left. The facts are stated by each tool’s own listing and are not verified by CloutStack. How we make money.
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