How InkStak Works

InkStak generates original illustrated children's stories powered by AI. You set the age, character, style, and topic — InkStak writes the scenes, generates matching illustrations, and assembles them into a story your child can read or listen to.

Quick Start

The first time you sign in, InkStak asks how you would like to start:

• Quick Start — pick one of our ready-made characters and go straight to the Create screen with them selected. Everything else can be set right there.
• Customize — choose your author name, then your story settings (Kid Reads and reading level, or age; story length; genre; and illustration style), then pick a ready-made character or create your own. Turn on Advanced on the settings page to set everything else too — rhyming, the word page, minimum pictures and your Image Style Bible.

Whichever you choose, the settings you use for a new story don't have to be set up in advance: after a story made with settings that differ from your defaults, InkStak asks Use these settings next time? Save them as your default (or, with Advanced features on, update the set you are using or save a new one), choose Not now, or tick Don't ask again. You can turn the question off or back on at any time with Offer to save new settings in Account → Story Defaults.

1. Go to the Characters tab and create at least one character — give them a name, what they are, and how they look — or add one of ours.
2. Return to Create and set Kid Reads and the reading level (or age level if reading aloud).
3. Select a character, pick an Illustration Style and Genre.
4. Type your story idea (or topic, for Explainer) in the Plot / Topic field.
5. Tap Tell Me A Story. Images generate scene by scene — you can read along while they load.

Kid Reads & Reading Level

The Kid Reads toggle is the first control in the story form — it changes the entire reading experience.

Kid Reads ON — Reading Level selector

When Kid Reads is ON, InkStak uses only words the child can actually decode and read independently. The slider is replaced by four reading levels, aligned to the UFLI Foundations scope and sequence — the order its 128 phonics lessons teach reading from Kindergarten to Grade 2. Each level covers a block of those lessons and adds a few new sound patterns to everything the levels before it use, plus a set of common sight words.

How far into a level

Under the reading level there is a slider, How far into Level N, from Easier to Harder. Each step is the next UFLI Foundations lesson that teaches a new sound pattern within that level — for Level 2, blends (lesson 35), then ff/ll/ss/zz (42), then ck (44), then sh (45), and so on — and the line under the slider names the lesson and what it adds. If your child's class uses UFLI Foundations, set it to the lesson they are on: the story then uses only the sounds taught through that lesson. All the way right is the whole level. It is saved with your defaults, and a story keeps its setting when you continue or regenerate it (changing the level starts that level from the top). Level 1 starts once there are enough letters to make a sentence (a, m, s, t, p, f, i, n).

Every word in a Kid Reads story is one your child can read at the level you chose. Character names are always allowed. Words that change their spelling when an ending is added (stopped, smiled, running) come after Level 4, so they only appear in read-aloud stories.

Every page moves the story on rather than saying the same thing over and over ("Sam sat. Sam sat."). A short refrain can come back a few times, as it does in real early readers. Words a child could sound out but that don't belong in a children's book are never used.

Shorter stories early in a level. At the very start of Level 1 there are only a few dozen words a child can sound out, so a Kid Reads story there keeps to fewer pictures (as few as 3) and fewer words (about 30), and the story length choices above what a learner can manage in one go are greyed out. Both grow as you move the slider right: the whole of Level 1 allows up to 22 pictures and about 125 words, and Levels 2–4 allow up to 30 pictures and about 175, 250 and 350 words. The time shown under Story Length is how long a child at that point would take to read it themselves — slower than reading aloud. For a KDP picture book (10+ spreads), choose a lesson that can fill them.

Plots are simplified to the level. If your plot uses words the child can't read yet, or has more going on than the level can tell, the story tells a simpler version of it, in words they can read. Your plot is kept as you typed it in your library.

Word page. A Kid Reads story starts with a Words to look for page: the story's own words grouped by sound, then its heart words — the words your child learns by sight. Read them together first, then spot them in the story. It is on by default; turn Word page off on Create (under the reading level) or in Account → Story Defaults. It is included when you print or save a PDF, download a Word document, or make a KDP book, and it is skipped when the story is read aloud to you. Every story in a printout, PDF or Word document starts with its own title page, then its word page, then the story — also when you export All stories of a character together. In a KDP collection, each Kid Reads story keeps its own word page, straight after that story's title page. A colouring book has no word page. Adventure stories and stories made before this page existed don't have one.

UFLI Foundations is a program of the University of Florida Literacy Institute. InkStak's reading levels follow its published scope and sequence; InkStak is not affiliated with or endorsed by UFLI or the University of Florida.

Kid Reads OFF — Age Level slider

When Kid Reads is OFF, an adult reads the story aloud. The control becomes an Age Level slider (2–12) that sets vocabulary richness and scene complexity for the listening experience.

Age levels 8+ are chapter books — longer stories broken into chapters with a summary and moral.

Picture book or chapter book (ages 5–7). With Kid Reads off and an Age Level of 5, 6 or 7, Book type lets you choose. A picture book has a picture on every page. A chapter book tells the story in chapters, with a picture at the start of each chapter and on about every other page after that, and you can keep adding chapters. Either way the words, the story and the length of each chapter suit your child's age. Chapter books are on the Creator plan, and they can rhyme. Explainer stories and Choose Your Adventure stories are picture books at these ages — turning on Adventure switches Book type back to Picture. Book type is also a Story Default.

Story Length

Choose 5 or 10 minutes, or Custom to set a length in minutes or pages. InkStak converts this to a target word count.

Age caps apply automatically — very young children are capped at shorter lengths regardless of your selection (e.g. a 3-year-old is capped at ~200 words even if you ask for 20 minutes). With Kid Reads on, the length follows the reading level and lesson instead, and the time is how long a learner takes to read it — see Shorter stories early in a level.

For Explainer stories, the cap is 1,200 words across all scenes.

Minimum Pictures

Minimum Pictures sets how many illustrated scenes a picture-book story will have. Default is 10 — the minimum a picture book needs to qualify for KDP export later.

Adjustable between 3 and 30:

• Higher counts — more illustrations, shorter scenes.
• Lower counts — fewer illustrations, longer scenes.

With Kid Reads on, the slider stops at what the lesson can fill without repeating itself — as few as 3 pictures at the very start of Level 1 (see Shorter stories early in a level). Your saved default is kept for later lessons.

Your total story length stays the hard limit either way — per-scene word counts adjust to fit. The control appears between Story Length and Characters in the create-story form, and only on picture-book ages (chapter books use the separate Minimum Chapters control).

Characters

Characters are the heart of InkStak. The more detail you give, the more consistent and vivid every story becomes.

Finding a character. On the Characters tab, type in the search box to find characters by name, look, outfit, what they carry or personality; every word you type must match. Sort them by Name A–Z (the starting order), Newest, Oldest, Recently edited or Most used. Filter narrows the list by type (people and animals, or things), where the character came from (made by you, a starter, or saved from a story), whether they are in a story yet, whether they have a portrait, and, on the Publisher plan, Deep Traits. Your sort and filters are remembered on that device. Once you have six or more characters, the character list on the Create screen has the same search and sort; characters you have already picked stay in the list while you search.

Start from one of ours. At the top of the Characters tab there are six ready-made characters — a scientist, a princess, an otter, a weather robot, a young explorer and a small dragon. Press Add and one is yours in a click, portrait already drawn. They open automatically if you have no characters yet, and you can change anything about them afterwards; your copy is independent of ours.

Making your own. Three fields are required, and are marked with a *: the name, what the character is, and a line about how they look (a photo counts as the look). Everything else is optional. When you press Save, InkStak fills in whatever you left blank — it writes the Character Bible, checks it against the image safety rules, and paints the portrait — and shows each step as it goes. Keep the tab open until it finishes. If your character slots are full, it tells you before anything is generated.

Deep Traits (Publisher)

On the Publisher plan, each character has a Deep Traits switch under Backstory. Turn it on to give that character five more fields, each up to 200 characters:

In a chapter book, a character's traits shape how they grow across the chapters. In a shorter story, one of them shapes the story where it fits the plot. In an adventure, a choice may test a strength or a weakness. Supporting characters can have them too. Explainers don't use them, because an explainer is about its topic.

Press Suggest to fill the empty fields from the character's details and backstory. Anything you have already written is kept. Turning the switch off hides the fields and stories stop using them, but your words are kept for when you turn it back on. The same goes if your plan changes from Publisher: the traits come back when Publisher does. On other plans the switch is locked.

Main vs. Supporting Characters

The first character you select is the main character. Any additional characters you select appear as supporting friends. How many characters a single story can include (the main character plus supporting friends) depends on your plan:

This is separate from how many characters you can save in your library (see Tiers & Limits).

Each picture shows up to 4 of the story's characters: the ones that moment is about. In a story with more, the others appear in other pictures.

Saving a character the story invented

Stories often introduce characters of their own — a new friend, a baker, a dragon who lands in chapter one. Their look is kept consistent inside that story, but they belong to that story only: the next book in a series starts without them. To keep one, open the story and find Special guest appearances by under the title, then press Add to my characters. The character is saved with the same look and portrait they had in the story, uses one of your character slots, and can then be picked for any story like a character you made yourself — handy for a series of chapter books. Available on the Creator and Publisher plans.

InkStak also writes the character's history from everything they did in that story — who they are, what they went through with your main character, how it changed them, and something they still wonder about — plus their personality and any habits the story showed. Later stories use it to give them depth. To write it again (say, for a character saved before this), open the character and press Write from the story under Backstory, then Save.

On the Publisher plan, a saved character also gets Deep Traits from what the story showed, with the switch on. Write from the story fills any empty Deep Traits too, while the switch is on.

Auto-linking Characters

When you name one of your saved characters in the plot, InkStak can automatically add them to the story as a supporting character — up to your per-story limit. Auto-linked characters appear at the bottom of the character list before you generate, each with a so you can remove any you don't want. If your manual picks already fill your plan's limit, nothing is auto-added. You can turn auto-linking off entirely in Account → Story Defaults → Auto-link characters.

Character Portrait

Generate a portrait for your character in the Characters tab, or let Save paint one for you. The portrait is how your character looks, and it keeps them looking the same across all scenes and stories.

Photo-to-Character

Build a character from a real photo. Open the Characters tab, tap + New Character, then choose From a photo. Upload a clear shot of a child, pet, or favourite toy — InkStak reads the photo and auto-fills the Character Bible (species/type, age, body type, face shape, skin / fur / scale tone, eyes, hair, distinguishing features).

A stylised portrait preview renders in your chosen art style before you commit — so you see what the character will look like inside stories before the slot is used:

• Use this character — saves the character with the auto-filled Bible and the stylised portrait.
• Try again — re-rolls the stylised portrait (the Bible stays).
• Edit — adjust any auto-filled field before saving.

Character Bible

The Character Bible describes exactly how your character looks, one feature per field, so they look the same in every scene, cover and portrait. Where the main Appearance field is a free-form description you wrote, the Bible breaks it down into short, precise fields you can adjust one at a time.

The fields

Carried item

Accessories are things your character wears or keeps on them: a crown, glasses, a satchel. Something they hold in a hand, like a wand, a staff or an umbrella, goes in Carried item. A Carried item appears in the pictures where the story uses it, and the story can bring it in when it matters. Listed in Accessories instead, it would be in their hand in every picture.

When Accessories lists something held, a note under the field offers Move to Carried item. Nothing moves unless you tap it. Bibles InkStak writes for you already keep the two apart. Your character's portrait shows them standing relaxed with their hands free. A portrait you already have changes only if you regenerate it.

Gender

Under Species you can choose Female, Male, Non-binary or Not set. It tells the story which pronouns to use (she, he or they), and the same goes for Surprise me plots and written backstories. Left as Not set, the story uses the character's name. Gender does not change the pictures: they follow the description fields, so if Species says "girl" and Gender says Male, the form points it out.

Simpler wording

Each field has a character limit, and the pictures can only use what can be drawn: the thing, its colour, its shape, its material or pattern. Filler ("made of", "featuring"), opinions ("obnoxious", "magnificent"), words like "slightly" or "often", and detail too fine to show ("ornate", "encrusted") use up the limit without changing the picture. When a field has some, a Simpler version appears under it. When you finish typing in a field, InkStak also reads it for anything else the pictures do not need, and the suggestion updates a moment later. Tap Check wording for the pictures to have every field read at once.

Tap Use this to take a suggestion, or Use simpler wording in all fields to take them all. Nothing changes unless you tap. Where only you can decide, such as "barefoot or pink flats", you get a tip instead. Bibles InkStak writes for you already follow these rules. A field does not need to repeat what it is: Eyes can say "bright blue, alert" and Face shape "long oval".

Before a picture is drawn, InkStak checks the Bible against the image safety rules. It only asks you about fields you have changed yourself. Anything InkStak wrote for you, including suggestions you accept, is already checked and adjusted without asking.

What locks and what stays editable

Once a character has appeared in any story, the first eight fields (everything except Signature outfit, Accessories and Carried item) are locked. This is the same lock that protects Name, Species, and Appearance — it preserves visual continuity across your saved stories.

Signature outfit, Accessories and Carried item remain editable at any time, on all plans, because changing what a character is wearing doesn't break the narrative of earlier stories. Gender stays editable too. A change you make here shows up in the pictures of your next story; stories you already made keep their pictures.

Deleting a character

Characters that have never appeared in a story can be deleted freely at any time. If a character has appeared in one or more stories, InkStak will ask you to confirm — the character and all stories it appears in will be permanently deleted. There is no undo.

Share Character

Send a copy of one of your characters to another InkStak user. Open the character card and tap Share, then start typing the recipient's display name — the dropdown suggests matching users. Pick one and tap Send. They'll see the offer in their notification bell and can accept or decline. On accept, a new independent copy lands in their library (including a copy of the portrait if you've generated one). Changes either of you make afterwards stay separate — it's a true copy, not a link.

Requesting a character from another user

When you're reading someone else's story in the Community feed, or viewing their author profile, you can tap Request Character to ask for a copy of their character. The author sees the request in their notification bell and can approve or decline. If they approve, a copy lands in your library. Only one pending request per character is allowed at a time.

Character add-on packs

Need more than your tier's included slots? Additional character slots are a one-time purchase and are permanent — they survive plan changes, downgrades, and cancellations. Pricing depends on your current plan:

Purchase add-ons from Account → Characters.

Story Cover

Every story you generate gets a cover image that shows your character as they look in the story.

Refine the cover

Not happy with the cover? Open the story's card menu in the Library and tap Refine cover. Add a short note describing what to change — for example:

• warmer lighting
• brighter palette
• softer pastel tones
• more whimsy

Tap Regenerate and the new cover replaces the old one on the library card. The refinement is saved with the story — future KDP exports automatically use the approved cover.

Library Tools

The ⋯ button at the top of your Library opens the batch tools. Each one lets you tick several stories at once, then act on all of them together:

• Create group — collect the ticked stories under a name.
• Share to community — share them all in one go.
• Archive stories — tidy them out of your Library. Archiving is reversible: switch to Archived in the Library to bring any of them back.
• Make KDP Collection — desktop only.

While you are picking stories, the buttons at the top show an icon and the number you have ticked. The × leaves without doing anything.

The ? help button and your account button always sit together at the far right of the header, so they stay in the same place whichever screen you are on.

Illustration Style

The illustration style picker controls the artistic medium for a specific story — the core rendering technique applied to every generated image.

Your characters match the story's style. Whatever style you pick, your characters keep their face, colours and outfit, drawn in that style. For a character made a while ago, the first story in a style you haven't used with them can take a little longer to start its pictures; after that it is instant. Stories you already made keep their pictures.

See a style before you use it

In Account → Story Defaults there is a Style Preview panel. Pick any style — including your own Image Style Bible — and tap Display Preview to see it drawn, without making a story.

Every style previews the same scene, so you can tap between them and compare like for like. Nothing is drawn until you press the button. The first time a particular style is previewed it can take up to a minute; after that it appears instantly.

Previews do not use any of your story allowance.

Advanced Features

Advanced features require an active Creator or Publisher subscription.

InkStak keeps the Create screen simple by default. If you want more control, turn on Advanced features in Account → Story Defaults. It unlocks three things:

• A separate set of defaults for each child — and the row of names at the top of Create for switching between them.
• Several saved image styles
• A narration voice per character — so a character is read aloud in their own voice.

Turning it off changes nothing you have made. Your sets and styles are kept, and whichever ones were in use carry on driving your stories exactly as before — the extra controls simply go away. Turn it back on and everything is where you left it. The setting follows your account, so it is on across your devices.

Without it, you still have one set of story defaults and one Image Style Bible — which is all most people ever need.

Defaults for Each Child

Requires Advanced features (Creator or Publisher).

If you make stories for more than one child, you can keep a separate set of defaults for each — different age, reading level, story length and art style. Switch between them with the row of names at the top of the Create screen.

There are two ways to make one:

• Define a new one — go to Account → Story Defaults and tap + Add a new set. Give it a name, then set it up using the settings below; the heading tells you which set you are editing. Tap Save changes when you are done.
• Save what you already have — if you have just set up the Create screen the way you like it, tap + Save these as a set at the top to keep those settings under a name.

The set highlighted on the Create screen is simply the one matching the settings shown. Change any setting and no set is highlighted, because the settings are no longer any set's; change it back and the set lights up again. When nothing is highlighted, + Save these as a set keeps exactly what is on screen under a new name.

To edit a set later, open Account → Story Defaults and tap the set you want. The settings underneath always belong to the highlighted set. You can also rename, duplicate and delete sets there.

Saving Your Own Styles

Requires Advanced features (Creator or Publisher).

You can save the Image Style Bible under a name and keep several — one per child, or one per kind of story. Named styles appear in the style picker on the Create screen alongside the built-in ones, so you can pick any of them for a single story.

In Account → Story Defaults there are two ways to make one, matching how defaults sets work:

• + Add a new style — name it, then build it up using the Image Style Bible further down. The bible heading shows which style you are editing.
• Save current bible as a style — if the bible is already set the way you want, keep it under a name.

A new style's name starts as your latest story's main character and the medium — for example Rose's Watercolour. Change it to anything you like before you save.

To edit a style, tap it in the list; the Image Style Bible below then belongs to it, and saving writes your changes back to that style.

• Each defaults set remembers its usual style, but you can still choose a different one for any individual story.
• Hiding built-in styles is for everyone — see Shown in Create.
• Renaming or deleting a style never changes stories you have already generated — each book keeps a snapshot of the style it was made with.

Send a style to someone, or ask for theirs

Styles can travel between InkStak users, the same way characters do.

• To send one: in Account → Story Defaults, tap the person icon beside any saved style and search for the person by username. They get it in their notifications and can accept or decline.
• To ask for one: open an author's profile from the Community feed and tap Request Style. They decide whether to send it.
• To ask for the style of a story: on a Community story drawn in the author's own style, tap Request Image Style next to Request Character. You ask for the style that story was drawn in. Stories in a built-in style (Watercolour, Storybook and so on) don't show it — those styles are already yours. A style drawn in the author's own My Style arrives named after the story's main character and medium, such as Tully's Gouache.

If you already have a style with the same name, the new one gets a number on the end, starting at 2 (Soft pastel 2).

Either way the result is an independent copy. Editing your style afterwards does not change theirs, and what you send is what they see — changing or deleting a style after sending it does not alter the offer they already have. If you both have a style with the same name, the new one arrives as "Name (2)" rather than replacing anything.

A style you accept appears straight away under Illustration style on Create, on any plan. Renaming or deleting saved styles is part of Advanced features.

Image Style Bible

The Image Style Bible is a persistent visual identity that applies to every image InkStak generates for your account — scenes, covers, and character portraits — regardless of which story you're making.

Think of it as your personal illustration fingerprint. Where the story's style picker controls the broad rendering technique (watercolour, pencil, etc.), the bible controls all the finer dimensions: how light falls, which colour family anchors every scene, how much texture is present, and what mood the images project.

How it works

The story's style picker sets the Artistic Medium (or the bible's medium default, if the story has no style set). Everything else you choose in the bible — lighting, palette, texture, atmosphere and the rest — applies on top of it, in every picture. Your stories are written with your chosen look in mind, too.

The eight dimensions

Tips for building your bible

• Start with just two or three dimensions — Lighting and Color Palette have the biggest visible impact.
• Combine the in-app style picker with your bible: e.g. Watercolour + Golden Hour + Warm & Earthy + Paper Grain creates a warm, sun-drenched, handmade storybook feel.
• A live preview at the bottom of the style bible section sums up the choices you have made.
• Changing your bible affects the pictures of new stories — pictures in stories you have already made don't change.
• The Artistic Medium default in the bible also pre-selects the style picker when you open the Create screen, saving you a click every time.

Image Generation

There is no quality setting to choose: every illustration is drawn at the same high quality, on every plan, for regular and KDP stories alike.

Fixing a picture you don't like

Tap the refresh icon on any illustration to redraw it. You get a one-tap fix for the most common problem, Remove extra limbs, or you can type your own note, like warmer lighting or add a hat.

Each redraw gives you a genuinely different picture, guided by your note, rather than the same one again. If the first try doesn't fix it, tap again — hands and arms are the hardest thing to get right, and a second or third try usually lands. Your note is saved with the scene, so the corrected picture stays after you close the story.

Scene-to-scene character consistency

Your character looks the same from page to page. The two things you can do to help most are to generate a portrait and to fill in the Character Bible.

KDP picture books

When KDP mode is enabled on a story, every scene is rendered at 300 DPI matched to the selected trim size and layout. For example, a full-spread 8.5×8.5″ book generates images at approximately 2560×1280 px, while a single-page 6×9″ layout uses ~1536×2048 px. Choose your book trim size and minimum spread count when you turn KDP mode on in the create form.

Rhyming Stories

Tick Rhyming on the Create page and the whole story comes back in verse instead of prose. It changes how a story reads aloud completely, and costs nothing extra to try.

• Where it appears. The toggle only shows for younger audiences — any Kid Reads level, or Read-Aloud with an age of 7 or under, for a picture book or a chapter book. The story is still written for your child's age: the same words and the same length, just in verse. Move the age past 7 in Read-Aloud and Rhyming switches off; if you come back to a younger age, turn it on again.
• It is a Story Default. Set it once in Account → Story Defaults and every new story starts with it on.
• Layout is handled for you. Each line of verse sits on its own line and stanzas are separated, in the reader and in every export — print, PDF, Word and KDP.
• It carries through. Continue a chapter, regenerate, or carry on an adventure and the new text stays in verse to match what came before.
• Narration reads it as verse — the line breaks become real pauses. See Listen.

Genres

Genre sets the tone, mood, and story style. Pick the one that matches what you're in the mood for.

Plot / Topic

For story genres — enter the basic idea: a situation, a problem, or a place. Keep it simple. InkStak fills in the scenes, dialogue, and illustrations.

For the Explainer genre — enter any real-world topic. See the Explainer section below.

Surprise me

Stuck for an idea? Pick your character, then press Surprise me beside the plot box. InkStak writes a fresh plot starring them, in the genre you chose — or, for an Explainer, a topic to explain. With Kid Reads on, it is built from words your child can read at the level and lesson you set.

You never get the same surprise twice: each one is made from a new combination of ideas, and it won't repeat one you've had before or one of your own stories. Changed your mind? Undo puts back what was in the box.

On the Publisher plan, if your main character has Deep Traits switched on, a surprise may grow from their goal, fear or secret.

A day is the last 24 hours, so each one comes back 24 hours after you used it. The button shows how many you have left.

Explainer Mode

How to use it

1. Select Explainer as the genre.
2. The Plot field changes to Topic to Explain. Enter any curiosity topic.
3. Choose your character, age, and art style as normal.
4. Tap Tell Me A Story.

What topics work well?

Almost any "how", "why", "what", or "who invented" question works. The more specific, the better.

How age affects the explanation

How the character shapes the explanation

The character's personality, species, and quirks define how they explain — not just what they say.

Scene structure

Explainer stories are always 10 scenes or fewer:

• Scene 1 — Character introduces the topic with excitement and a hook question
• Middle scenes — One distinct fact or concept per scene, building from simple to surprising
• Final scene — Character wraps up, delivers a "wow" fact, and sparks further curiosity

Tips

• Explainer Mode requires a Token, Creator, or Publisher plan — not available on Free accounts.
• Adventure Mode is not available for Explainer stories.
• KDP mode works with Explainer — you can publish your explainer as a picture book.
• Explainer facts are written from general knowledge, not looked up live. For very young children the simplifications are intentional; for older children you may want to verify specific claims.

Adventure Mode

Adventure Mode turns the story into an interactive choose-your-own-adventure. At key moments, the story pauses and presents 2–3 choices. The child picks one, and the story continues based on that choice.

How many decisions?

Same story vs. New story

Same story each time — InkStak saves each path the first time it's read. Re-reading the same choice replays the saved version. Great for younger children who love familiarity.

New story each time — Always generates fresh content. Every re-read is a different adventure even if the same choice is made.

Tips

• Adventure Mode requires a Token, Creator, or Publisher plan — not available on Free accounts.
• Adventure Mode is not available with the Explainer genre.
• Adventure Mode and KDP Export cannot be used together.

KDP Export

KDP mode formats the story as a print-ready picture book for Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing. Every scene gets a full-spread illustration. You can choose book size and minimum page count, then export a PDF ready to upload to KDP.

Format: Paperback or Hardcover

The export workflow (for both single books and collections) starts with a FORMAT choice and a BOOK SIZE picker:

• Paperback — all four sizes below; from 24 pages.
• Hardcover — KDP doesn't offer the square picture sizes, so the size list switches to KDP's hardcover trims (5.5×8.5, 6×9, 6.14×9.21, 7×10, 8.25×11) and needs ≥75 pages. If your book is too short, the Hardcover option is disabled with the page estimate shown. Hardcover covers use a different wrap-around spec, which InkStak builds as a best-effort wrap — confirm the exact size in KDP's hardcover template generator.

Trim size & ink/paper

The export modal offers KDP's full trim-size list (grouped Standard / Large, filtered to the sizes your binding supports) plus an Ink / Paper picker — Premium Color, Standard Color, B&W on white, or B&W on cream. KDP's allowed page count depends on the trim, binding, and ink, so if your book's page count falls outside the valid range the export is blocked with a note (e.g. an 8.5″×8.5″ premium-colour paperback allows 24–590 pages). Picture books default to Premium Color; chapter books to B&W.

Common sizes

…plus many more in the picker (5″×8″ up to 8.27″×11.69″ for paperback; 5.5″×8.5″, 6″×9″, 6.14″×9.21″, 7″×10″, 8.25″×11″ for hardcover).

Min spreads

KDP requires a minimum page count. You can set 10, 12, 14, or 16 minimum spreads. InkStak generates enough scenes to meet the minimum.

Collection illustrations

Every collection export includes a set number of print-quality illustrations at no extra charge — roughly 15–45 depending on your book's trim size (smaller trims fit more). If your collection has more illustrations than that, the story-order step shows how many extra it has and gives you two choices: remove stories to fit (tap the beside a story and the count updates instantly), or export the whole collection for a small additional charge — payable by card or from your token balance. Chapter books can be exported without illustrations (text-only) to avoid any illustration charges.

Cover preview & refine

After picking size and layout, InkStak shows you a high-resolution preview of the printable cover. From the preview you can:

• Add a refinement — a short note like softer pastel palette or warmer lighting.
• Regenerate — re-render the cover with your refinement.
• Edit the back-cover summary — a short paragraph that prints on the back of the book. InkStak auto-drafts a 55–75 word blurb from the story's characters and scenes; you can edit it in the textarea before approving. The text is saved with the story, so re-exporting later uses the version you approved.
• Elaborate — tap to expand any seed phrase you type into a full back-cover blurb (e.g. "a quiet bedtime story about courage" → a 55–75 word paragraph that builds on the seed). Empty textarea + Elaborate = generate from scratch.
• Use this cover — accept the cover and back-cover summary, then build the PDF.
• 📄 Download KDP Description & Keywords (.txt) — generate a companion text file with paste-ready listing metadata (see below).
• Back — return to the size / layout pickers without exporting.

The approved cover (and back-cover blurb) is saved back to your library card, so re-exporting the same story keeps the same cover and summary.

KDP Description & Keywords companion file

When you publish on Amazon KDP, the setup form has several text fields you have to fill in by hand — the book Description, search Keywords, categories, and more. From the cover-preview step, tap 📄 Download KDP Description & Keywords (.txt) and InkStak writes a plain-text KDP Setup Sheet for you, built from your story (or collection).

The file contains a ready-to-paste block for each KDP field, with short embedded instructions (lines starting with >> are notes for you and are not meant to be pasted):

• Title & subtitle — your title plus a suggested subtitle.
• Series — a series-name suggestion, for when you plan to publish more books with similar themes, sequels, or grouped by the same main character.
• Description — warm, sales-focused listing copy using KDP's allowed light HTML (<b>, <i>, <br>, <ul><li>). It is always kept under KDP's 4000-character hard limit, so it pastes without errors.
• Keywords — exactly 7 search phrases (one per KDP keyword box), each within the 50-character limit and chosen for discoverability.
• Categories — three suggested browse-category paths to search for in KDP.
• Age & grade range and language.
• Content step — ISBN advice (Get a Free KDP ISBN), the right interior/paper choice (Premium Color for picture books, Black & white on white paper for chapter books), your trim size, the matching bleed setting, a Glossy cover-finish suggestion, and the AI-generated-content disclosure answers KDP asks for.
• Rights & pricing step — territory and primary-marketplace defaults, the 60% royalty plan, list-price guidance (set at or above the minimum KDP shows you), and an Expanded Distribution explainer.

The print options and bleed setting are filled in automatically to match the files you just exported, so they stay consistent with the actual PDF.

For a collection, the Description and Keywords are written about the whole bundle's connecting theme, not any single story. The file downloads as Your Title - KDP Setup Sheet.txt. Re-tap the button any time to regenerate it.

High-resolution scene images

KDP exports render every scene illustration at 300 DPI for the selected trim size and layout. Full-spread layouts get wider images (double the page width) while single-page layouts match the page dimensions. PDF and Word exports use 2048×1152 px (screen-optimized 2K resolution).

The printed pictures match what you saw on screen — same composition, same character, only sharper.

The first KDP export for a story takes longer while every picture is prepared at print resolution. Exporting the same story again is fast.

Image composition

Pictures are composed so that faces and key details stay clear of the middle of the page, so full-spread images print cleanly across the book's fold.

KDP Collection mode

Bundle multiple stories into a single KDP-ready PDF. Open the Library on a desktop or laptop. Tap Collection Mode, select two or more stories, then tap Export Collection:

• Reorder the stories — drag any row to a new position, or use the ↑ / ↓ buttons. The order in the modal becomes the order in the printed PDF.
• Set a collection title and author — these print on the top-level cover and the title page.
• Theme-aware collection cover — the cover features the bundled books' main characters (up to 4) and reflects the collection's shared theme, not just the first book. Refine + regenerate it the same way as a single-book cover, then approve.
• Edit the back-cover summary, with Elaborate — InkStak auto-drafts a theme-level blurb (e.g. a five-senses bundle gets a blurb about "the human body", not "how taste works"). Edit it freely. Tap Elaborate to expand any seed phrase you type into a full blurb. An empty textarea + Elaborate = fresh draft.
• 📄 Download KDP Description & Keywords (.txt) — the same companion KDP Setup Sheet is available for collections; its Description and Keywords describe the whole bundle's theme. See KDP Description & Keywords companion file above.
• Auto Table of Contents — the PDF includes a Contents page with each story's title, main character, and real page number (dotted leaders, classic trade-book look).
• Per-story dividers — every story gets a divider page using its existing library cover (so each one looks consistent with what's in your library).

The collection title prints as crisp, sharp text over the cover illustration.

Exporting — interior + cover (two files)

KDP wants your interior and your cover as two separate uploads. After approving the cover, InkStak opens one tab with an Interior ⇄ Cover toggle at the top (one tab so it works reliably with pop-up blockers):

• Interior — the toggle's first view. Click Save current as PDF and the PDF downloads directly at the correct trim size, named Your Title - KDP Interior.pdf. Upload it as your manuscript / interior file on KDP. The interior holds only your front matter, story pages, and (if your story has one) a moral page — no front or back cover, since those belong on the separate cover file.
• Cover — switch the toggle, then Save current as PDF (it saves as Your Title - KDP Cover.pdf), and upload as your cover file. This is a single wrap-around — back cover, spine, and front cover in one image — sized to your trim with bleed, reusing the cover image and blurb you just approved. The spine width is calculated automatically from your interior's page count and paper type (per KDP's cover spec); spine text is added only when a book has more than 79 pages.

Each view shows its full size, spine width, and page count, plus on-screen trim guides. For chapter books the page count is an estimate (flowing text) — verify it against your saved interior PDF and re-export if it differs. Allow pop-ups for the site the first time. No additional software required.

Print-ready & margin-safe

InkStak formats the interior to pass KDP's print review:

• Safe margins & gutter — text is kept ≥0.375″ from the trim plus a binding gutter that grows with page count (0.375″ up to 150 pages, 0.5″ to 300, and so on), so nothing reads "outside the margins."
• Auto-fit text — any page whose text would overflow is shrunk just enough to fit inside the safe area (never below KDP's 7-pt minimum), so a long scene can't spill past the edge.
• Amazon Endure font — interiors are set in Amazon's own print font (embedded in the PDF, which is what KDP requires) for crisp, compliant text.
• KDP page order — title, copyright, dedication, contents, then the story, with sections starting on right-hand pages.
• Portrait illustrations — on taller (portrait) trim sizes, full-page illustrations are scaled to fit the page width so the whole picture shows, instead of cropping the sides.

Limits

• KDP exports (single and collection) are limited per plan (see Tiers & Limits below).
• Adventure Mode cannot be used with KDP Export.
• For picture book ages (≤8), every scene gets an image and 25–55 words of text per page.

Colouring Book Export

Turns a story you have already made into a colouring book. Choose Colouring Book in the story's Export Story menu and tap Export Now, or pick it from the ⋯ actions menu on its Library card, and each of the story's pictures is redrawn as a black-and-white outline, with that scene's text underneath, ready to print.

The outlines match your story's own illustrations — the characters, their poses and the scene are the pictures your child already knows from reading it.

• The drawings are simplified on purpose: background detail, texture and shading are dropped and small shapes are merged into large areas, so there is room to colour inside the lines. Younger reading ages get bigger, bolder shapes; older ages keep more detail.
• Colouring Book export is on the Creator and Publisher plans.
• The first export redraws every picture, which can take a few minutes — the Export Story menu says roughly how many pictures that is before you tap Export Now. After that it is instant, because the outlines are saved.
• Your original colour illustrations are not changed or replaced.
• Stories created in the Colouring Book art style are already line art, so they show Print to Colour instead.
• Publishing one to KDP: the KDP export modal has a Colouring book tick-box. It produces the same outlines, but print-resolution and laid out for the trim size you picked, so you can sell it as a colouring book. Pages are white and the drawing is fitted whole to the page rather than cropped.

Download the Narration

Saves the story's narration to your device as MP3. Tap Download narration — in the story's Export panel, or from the ⋯ actions menu on its Library card.

Not the same as “Save audio for offline”, which keeps the narration inside the app for listening without a connection. This one puts real files on your device that you can play anywhere.

This is the on-device voice — the same one you hear when you tap Listen in the reader. It is made on your own device, so it uses none of your monthly listening allowance, no matter how long the book is.

• Turn on Narrate on this device in the reader first — the voice has to be downloaded before it can be exported.
• A picture book is one chapter, so you get a single MP3 named after the story. A chapter book gives you one MP3 per chapter, numbered (01-…, 02-…) in a zip so they play in reading order on any music player.
• Long books take a few minutes to narrate and encode. Keep the tab open while it works; the screen is held awake for you.
• Prefer a studio-style voice for publishing? Use Audiobook Export below instead — that one is narrated on our servers and formatted for Audible/ACX.

Audiobook Export

Turn any finished story into a narrated audiobook file you can upload to an audiobook store such as Audible / ACX — a companion to the KDP print export. From the story's Export panel, tap Audiobook. InkStak narrates the whole book and downloads a single .zip containing:

• A short title / credits track (00_title.mp3).
• One MP3 per chapter, in reading order — the layout ACX expects (one file per chapter).
• An acx-notes.txt sheet with the ACX technical spec and a checklist.

Re-exporting the same book (or exporting after listening in-app) is fast, and narration you already have is reused. Higher-quality (neural) narration voices for Publisher are planned as a future upgrade.

Exporting a whole book draws on your monthly audio allowance (only the parts not already narrated count). A large book can exceed the free allowance — you'll be asked to confirm using tokens (~10,000 words each) to cover the rest before the export runs.

Continuity Check

Long chapter books can drift — a character's eye colour changes, a resolved problem reappears, a place is renamed. Continuity Check reads your book against what earlier chapters have already established and flags anything that contradicts it, scene by scene.

Running a check

The Continuity Check button appears in several places for a chapter book:

• On the last page of the reader (Library page reader), even for a finished book.
• At the end of a chapter in the active-story view.
• From a story's ⋯ menu in the Library.
• As an optional pre-publish step in the KDP export flow.

Reviewing findings

Each issue lists the problem and a suggested corrected version of just that scene (continuity only — your writing style is never rewritten). For every finding you can:

• Accept — replace the scene text with the fix (undoable).
• Reject — leave the scene as-is.
• Refine — edit the suggested text before accepting.

Checks are incremental: only chapters changed since the last check are re-examined, so re-runs are quick (a "Full book review" option re-checks everything). If a fix changes the final chapter, InkStak flags the "next chapter plan" so you can review it before continuing the story. What a book has established also carries forward when you start the next book in a series, so characters and world details stay consistent across books.

Custom Groups

Organize your Library into named groups — by theme, by series, or a particular child's favourites. Toggle the Library to By Custom (next to By Character / All Stories) to see your stories under their group headings.

• Create a group — open the ⋯ Library tools menu (top bar) → Create group, tick the stories, then name it. Or use a story card's ⋯ → Add to group for one-off adds (and "New group…").
• Manage — in By Custom view each group header has Rename, Delete (your stories aren't deleted), and Export as Collection, which opens the KDP Collection export pre-filled with that group's stories.
• Groups sync to your account, so they're there on every device.

Save for Later

Bookmark any story — your own, or one you find in the Community feed — to come back to it later.

How to save a story

• Tap the bookmark icon on a story card in the Library or Community feed.
• Or open the story and tap the bookmark icon inside the reader header.

Finding your saved stories

Tap the Saved chip at the top of the app to surface every story you've bookmarked — your own and community stories side by side in one place.

Removing a bookmark

Tap the bookmark icon again to remove it. Removed bookmarks drop out of the Saved chip immediately.

Archive (clearing the main Library)

The Library card menu also includes an Archive action. Archiving a story keeps it in your account but hides it from the main Library list — useful for tidying without deleting. Archived stories can be restored from the Archived view at any time.

Community

The Community tab lets Creator and Publisher subscribers discover stories shared by other InkStak families, follow authors, and share their own stories with the community feed.

What you can do

• Browse the feed — filter by age range, art style, genre, adventure mode, chapter books, and more
• Filter with chips — open the Filter button to combine genre, art style, emoji, age range, and reading-mode toggles into a tight feed view.
• Page-turn reading for community stories — opening a linear community story now uses the page-turn reader, with the same swipe / arrow / page-counter controls as your own library. Adventure-mode community stories still display as scroll view so you can see the branch history.
• Share a story — tap Share on any of your stories to publish it to the community feed
• Follow authors — follow other families to surface their stories in your feed
• Rate and comment — stories can be liked and reviewed by other subscribers
• Request Character — when you find a character you love in another author's story or on their profile, tap Request Character to ask for a copy. The author can accept or decline from their notifications.
• Request Image Style — on a story drawn in the author's own style, ask for a copy of that style (Creator and Publisher). The author can accept or decline from their notifications.

Display name

Your community display name is set in Account → Profile. Once set it cannot be changed. Leave it blank to appear as "An InkStak family".

Notifications & the bell

The bell in the top right surfaces three kinds of updates in one place:

• Stories shared by authors you follow — tap to jump straight to the Community feed
• Incomplete drafts in your library — tap to resume where you left off
• Character offers — Accept, Decline, or Cancel Request Character / Share Character offers without leaving the page

Returning to the feed

Tapping Community in the bottom navigation always returns to the feed list, even if you're already reading a community story or viewing an author profile — a single tap brings you back.

Page Reader

When you open a story from your Library, it displays one scene at a time — like turning pages in a physical book. Each page shows the scene's illustration and text. Both picture books and chapter books use the page reader.

Navigating pages

The current page and total page count are shown in the top-right corner of the reader — for example 3 / 12.

Exporting from the reader

The last page of every story in your Library has the same Export Story menu as the Create screen. You no longer need to open a story in Create to export it. Adventure stories have it at the end too.

Using Export Story. Open it and tap one export: Word Document, Print / Save PDF, Colouring Book, Amazon KDP, Download Narration or Audiobook. Tapping a choice only selects it (it gets a tick) and shows what it will do. Nothing starts until you tap Export Now. Tap the choice again to clear it.

Every export is named after the story and what it is, such as Your Title - Word.docx, Your Title - Print at Home, Your Title - Colouring Book, Your Title - KDP Interior and Your Title - KDP Cover, so saving one never replaces another.

• Choices your plan doesn't include show a lock. Tap one to see which plan has it. Colouring Book and Amazon KDP are on the Creator and Publisher plans; Download Narration and Audiobook are on the Publisher plan.
• Amazon KDP sits next to Colouring Book. Choosing it opens the KDP settings right in the menu (format, book size, ink and paper, layout, author name). Export Now then shows the cover. Approve it to download the interior and cover PDFs. It is the same KDP export as the Library card's menu, and it needs a desktop or laptop: on a phone or tablet, tapping it explains why instead.
• For Word, Print / Save PDF and Colouring Book, you can also choose which stories or chapters to include once you have picked the export.
• Share to Community is its own button, just above Export Story.

Reading progress

InkStak automatically saves where you left off in every story. When you re-open a book from the Library, the reader jumps to the last page you read — no scrolling back to find your place.

• Progress is saved per story. Each book remembers its own position independently.
• Saved positions persist between sessions — closing the app or reloading the page doesn't lose your place.
• To start from the beginning, simply navigate back to page 1 using the ‹ arrow or swipe.

The first page

The first page of every book shows the story's title, character name, age, illustration style, and creation date — giving you a cover-page feel before the story begins. After page 1, this header is hidden so the reading experience stays clean.

The last page

The final page of every story shows The End, followed by any available actions:

• Continue → Chapter N — generates the next chapter for chapter books (Creator & Publisher plans)
• Share to Community — publish the story to the community feed (Creator & Publisher plans)
• Regenerate Current Image — regenerates the image on the current page (visible in Edit mode)
• Back to Library — returns to the Library without losing your reading position

Select-to-Refine

In Edit mode, highlight a sentence or phrase in any scene and tap the floating Edit pill to refine just that selection. Type what you'd like changed and submit — only the highlighted text is rewritten, the rest of the scene stays exactly the same. If the change has a knock-on effect on later scenes (a character's name, a place, a key plot event), InkStak updates only the later scenes that mention what changed. Refining with no selection still works the way it always did: the whole scene is rewritten.

The pictures stay as they are when you change the words. On Creator and Publisher, tick Also redraw the picture before you submit to redraw the picture of every scene the edit changes. On any plan you can still redraw a single picture yourself with the refresh icon on it.

Undo

After any scene refine or image regen, an Undo pill appears at the bottom of the screen with a 60-second countdown ring. Tap it to restore the previous scene text and picture, and undo any changes it made to later scenes. Once the ring drains, the pill disappears and the change becomes permanent. Only the most recent change can be undone — taking a second action replaces the first.

Chapter Navigation

Chapter books show a floating CHAPTERS button adjacent to the navigation bar. Tap it to open a table of contents and jump to any chapter at a glance.

Finding the button

Using the Table of Contents

• Each chapter is listed with its title and starting page number (e.g. p.7)
• The chapter you're currently reading is highlighted in yellow
• Tap any chapter row to jump directly to its first page — the dialog closes automatically
• Tap the dimmed background area or the button to close without jumping

Listen (Audio Narration)

Have any story read aloud inside the app. Open a book from your Library and tap Listen at the top of the reader. InkStak narrates the current page, then keeps playing straight through — turning pages and moving from one chapter to the next without stopping — so a child can listen to a whole book hands-free.

Controls

• Listen / Pause — start or pause narration. It resumes right where it left off.
• Stop — end narration.
• Start from any chapter — open the CHAPTERS table of contents and tap the beside any chapter to begin narration from the top of that chapter and continue onward.
• The page turns automatically as narration advances; turning the page yourself while it's playing moves the narration to that page.

Narrate on your device (free & unlimited)

At the top of the reader you'll see "Narrate on this device — free & offline (~96MB)". Tap it to cache a narration voice inside the app (a one-time ~96MB store in your browser — not a file in your Downloads; best on Wi-Fi). After that, narration is generated on your device: completely free, unlimited (no monthly limit or tokens), and it works offline. The voice differs slightly from the server voice. You can remove the cached voice any time to free the space. If you don't cache it, narration keeps using the server voice with the monthly limit below.

Narration settings (Account > Narration)

Under Account > Narration you can choose:

• Where narration is generated — Ask me (prompts on the first Listen), On-device (free & unlimited, after caching the voice), or Server (uses your monthly limit).
• Voice — once the on-device voice is cached, pick from several narrator voices and tap to preview each one (generated instantly on your device).
• Narration speed — a slider from slower (storyteller pace) to faster.

You can also remove the cached voice here to free the space. A tip for pacing: the narrator takes a longer breath at paragraph breaks, and you can add [pause] in a scene's text to insert an extra beat.

These settings follow you. The engine, voice and speed you choose are saved to your account, so a voice picked on your phone is the voice you get on your tablet. The ~96MB voice itself is still cached per device — each device downloads it once, and until it does, that device keeps using the server voice.

Give a character their own voice

Requires Advanced features (Creator or Publisher).

A character can have their own narrator. Open the character in Characters and pick a Narration voice — tap to hear each one say their name first. Any story that character leads is then narrated in that voice, in the reader, in offline saves and in the MP3 download alike.

Leave it on My default and the character narrates in your usual voice — which is what every existing character does, so nothing you have already made changes. The voice belongs to the character who leads the story, so a book keeps one narrator throughout rather than switching mid-scene.

Monthly audio limit

Each plan includes a monthly audio allowance for narration, measured in words: Creator ~10,000 words/month, Publisher ~60,000 words/month. Only newly generated audio counts — replaying a page, offline playback, and re-exporting a book you've already narrated are free. If you reach the limit, you can use a token to add ~10,000 words (you'll be asked to confirm first); purchased words carry over month to month, while the free allowance resets each month.

Save for offline

Tap the download button (⤓, next to Listen) to store the whole story's narration on your device in one step — you do not need to play it first. A progress counter shows it saving page by page; when it finishes the button turns into a ✓. After that the entire book plays back with no connection. Any narration you simply listen to online is also kept, but the download button is how you save a full book ahead of time (for a flight, a car trip, etc.).

To keep space in check, saved audio auto-expires 60 days after it was created and is cleared from the device — just download or press Listen again to re-create it.

Offline Reading

Install InkStak to your home screen (Add to Home Screen), and once you've opened it online at least once, your Library and its stories are available offline — on a plane, in the car, anywhere without a connection.

• Story text is always available offline. Scene and cover images are available offline once they've loaded online — so browse your Library and open the stories you want on hand before you lose signal.
• Audio narration you've played is also kept for offline listening (Creator & Publisher) and auto-clears after 60 days — see Listen (Audio Narration).
• While offline the app opens to the Library and stays there: you can read any saved story, but Create, Characters, Community and Account are paused until you reconnect (they need the internet).
• Everything you read or resume offline stays in sync — the moment you're back online the Library refreshes and any changes catch up automatically.

Paused While You're Away

Leave an InkStak tab open and untouched for about 30 minutes and it stops checking for updates in the background, showing a Paused while you were away message. Tap Reconnect (or anywhere outside the message) to carry on.

• You stay signed in. Reconnecting doesn't ask you to log in again — it just picks up where you left off and refreshes your Library.
• Nothing is lost. Your stories, characters and settings are all saved; only the background update check pauses.
• It won't interrupt a story. Turning pages, typing or tapping resets the timer, and it never appears while narration is playing — a whole book can read aloud without being interrupted.
• A tab in the background is already quiet, so this only appears on a tab left open in front of you.

User Settings

Tap the Account icon (bottom-right) to open your settings. There are five tabs:

Profile

Shows your current tier badge (Free, Creator, or Publisher), monthly story usage, and remaining character slots. You can set your Community Display Name here — this is the name other users see on any publicly shared stories. Your account ID is also shown for support purposes.

Story Defaults

Save your preferred settings so every new story starts with the right values. You can store a default for:

• Kid Reads — on or off
• Reading Level (L1–L4) or Age Level (2–12)
• Word page — on or off, for Kid Reads stories (see Word page)
• Book type — picture book or chapter book, for Age Levels 5–7 (see Picture book or chapter book)
• Story Length — 5 or 10 minutes, or Custom (any number of minutes)
• Minimum Picture Count — default scene count for new picture-book stories (3–30; 10 recommended for KDP-readiness). See Minimum Pictures.
• KDP Author Name — the author name pre-filled in KDP exports. Set it once here and every new KDP story starts with it.
• Art Style — sets the default Artistic Medium; can be overridden per-story in Create
• Genre
• Image Style Bible — your persistent visual identity across all images (see Image Style Bible)

Tap Save changes to apply, or Reset to return to factory values. Defaults are applied automatically when you open the Create screen.

Shown in Create. Choose which illustration styles and genres appear on the Create screen, on any plan. In Account → Story Defaults, tap a style or genre under Shown in Create to hide it, and tap it again to bring it back. To start with, Create shows Watercolour, Storybook, Ghibli-Inspired and Colouring Book, and the genres Bedtime, Fantasy, Sci-Fi, Friendship, Silly & Fun and Explainer. Show the default lists returns to these. A style or genre your defaults already use stays on Create even if it is hidden, and stories you already made keep theirs either way. Colouring Book and Explainer are still on the Creator plan.

Offer to save new settings (on by default) — after a new story made with settings that differ from your defaults, InkStak asks Use these settings next time? Switch it off to stop being asked, or back on if you ticked Don't ask again. It takes effect straight away, on all your devices.

At the bottom, Run setup again takes you back through the welcome steps: start with a ready-made character, or set your reading level, story length, genre and illustration style again. Your stories and characters stay as they are. Skip it at the first step and you stay on Story Defaults.

Billing

Shows your active subscription and renewal date. From here you can upgrade, purchase Token Packs, or open the Stripe Billing Portal to update your payment method, download invoices, or cancel.

Subscriptions

Token Packs — pay per story

Tokens never expire. 1 token = 1 story or chapter generation. Image regenerations and scene edits cost fractions of a token.

Characters

Displays how many character slots you have used out of your tier's limit. If you need more slots, tier-specific character pack add-ons are available here.

Danger Zone

Delete Account permanently removes your account and all associated data — stories, characters, and billing records. This action is irreversible. InkStak complies with GDPR and PIPEDA deletion requirements.

Tiers & Limits

For current pricing and exact limits, go to the Account tab in the app.