How to display your book cover as your Kindle Lock Screen?

Learn how to display book covers as Kindle Lock Screen for books that you have downloaded from external sources.

Photo by Jasmin Whiscy on Unsplash

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I have always wanted to keep custom lock screens on my Kindle. Calibre didn’t exactly provide ways to change lock screens and I am not ready to jailbreak my device. Kindle had become a kind of boring, yet essential device in my life.

That is when Amazon came out with a firmware update v5.13.5 wherein they had included a flip switch under Settings > Device Options > Show Cover to display the cover of the book you are reading as your Kindle lock screen. I was overwhelmed with excitement. I couldn’t wait for the day when I would get the firmware update and enjoy the beautiful lock screens with my many pretty book covers.

At last, that day arrived and I got firmware update v5.13.5, but alas! I couldn’t display my book covers as my lock screen, how much ever times I flipped the switch, restarted my kindle, turned airplane mode on and off, and at last reset my kindle (after backing it up through Calibre, of course).

At last, I wanted to give it one more try before giving up. I resorted to Reddit threads, google searches, and e-book reader forums. But I couldn’t find a single How-to column written in plain language in a step-by-step manner that a normal tech-savvy reader would understand without resorting to too much jargon or technobabble. That is when I decided to write this article if I succeeded in my endeavor.

So, after much research, trial and error using my Kindle and Calibre, I managed to display my book covers as my Kindle lock screen as below. (The book I have shown here is The Little Shop of Found Things by Paula Brackston):

Lock screen of my Kindle Paperwhite 7th Generation (image by the author)

I am writing this article to help those like me so that you can also make your Kindle beautiful without wasting much time on further research. Here is how I set my book cover as my Kindle Lock Screen:

(For reference, I am using a Kindle Paperwhite 7th Generation with firmware version Kindle 5.13.6. My Calibre version is v 5.26. You can buy the latest basic version of Kindle here.)

1. Download the books you want and add those books to Calibre, as you normally do.
2. In Calibre, go to Preferences > Change calibre behaviour (Note: Do not connect to Kindle till Step 11.)

Change calibre behavior (screenshot by the author)

3. Go to Interface > Toolbars and Menus.

Toolbars and menus (screenshot by the author)

4. Select The main toolbar from the dropdown.

Select from the dropdown (screenshot by the author)

5. Scroll through the Available actions and choose Polish books. Using the right arrow button on the screen, move this to Current actions. (Note: You can use the up and down arrow buttons on the screen to position Polish books menu in the toolbar as you like) Click Apply and close.

Move from Available actions to Current actions using the highlighted right arrow button. Position using highlighted up/ down arrow button (screenshot by the author)

6. Now you can see Polish books menu in your toolbar.

Polish books menu (screenshot by the author)

7. You can Edit metadata as you normally do. Make sure you add a cover to your book using the Edit Metadata > Edit metadata individually window.

Edit metadata individually (screenshot by the author)

8. Go to Convert Books > Convert individually as you normally do. (Note: 1. Choose AZW3 as output format. Polish books plugin does not work with books in MOBI format. 2. Make sure Enable sharing of book content via Facebook etc. is enabled in the AZW3 Output tab of the convert window.). Now you can see AZW3 has been added to formats in your book’s detail area.

Output format must be AZW3 (screenshot by the author)

Formats available include AZW3 now (screenshot by the author)

Checkmark this box (screenshot by the author)

9. Click on Polish books. Select options Update metadata in the book files and Update the cover in the book files under Select actions to perform. Click OK and wait for the magic to happen.

Checkmark these boxes (screenshot by the author)

10. An acknowledgment window will appear. Behold it and be happy :) Now your book formats will have ORIGINAL_AZW3 added to them. (Note: Polishing only works on EPUB and AZW3 formats. Hence, do not use MOBI.)

Acknowledgement window (screenshot by the author)

11. Now, connect your Kindle device and send the .azw3 formatted book to the device. (Note: If you have more than one format available, Right Click on the book > Send to device > Send specific format to > Main memory (or relevant partition, as the case may be). Choose AZW3 format in the next window.). Eject your Kindle.

Send to Kindle device if you have multiple formats (screenshot by the author)

Choose AZW3 only (screenshot by the author)

12. Now you can see that the book cover is visible in the Kindle library (This might take a while depending on how many books you have on the device). Confirm that your book cover is available in the book by turning the pages. Now, press the power button and your book cover will be available as your lock screen. The book I have shown here is The Prisoner of Heaven by Carlos Ruiz Zafón.

Enjoy your beautiful lock screen (Image by the author)

Note: Make sure the flip switch under Settings > Device Options > Show Cover is turned ON.

Flip switch for Show Cover (Image from Amazon website)

Bonus Tip: If you want to keep any lock screen other than your book cover, make sure you select that image from your device while you do Edit Metadata > Edit metadata individually > Change cover > Browse.

Hope this article helped you save some time. If you have further queries, let me know in the comments. Enjoy reading :)