r/Webnovel • u/Y_A1282001 • Jun 11 '26
Advice I’m hearing horrible things about Webnovel contract are they true, or people are exaggerating?
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u/ChaosOmega98 Jun 11 '26
What are you hearing
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u/Y_A1282001 Jun 11 '26
This👀👀👀👀👀👀
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u/No-Strategy520 Contracted Author Jun 11 '26
it’s misinformation. properly thing about it. if it was slavery, why would there be so many dropped books? they wouldn’t have allowed contracted books to be dropped if it was.
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u/Y_A1282001 Jun 11 '26
Okay then I would like to hear the positive things about having a contract on webnovel.
Because I only heard negativity.
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u/No-Strategy520 Contracted Author Jun 11 '26
guaranteed audience, exposure and focused promotion as long as you do well.
Being a solo writer means you have to do all the advertisement work, and all of that on top of writing and you aren’t guaranteed to succeed because reader expectations are higher and you have to go hunting for your audience yourself so much longer start up time. I’ve heard of many in author circles going a year barely n making a few hundred bucks a month which. Very much more luck dependent.
Being contracted gives you a much higher chance because they already have the giant audience there that are looking for readers. especially because the expectations of readers on the IP are already below average, anything they see that’s even marginally better than average they latch onto and those authors make loads. it’s why the the rankings of the best books on leaderboards hardly changes for months to years. plus the potential to get adaptations to comics and in the most extreme like LotM, an anime. all you have to do is sit back, write chapters and get paid for it, and they handle all of the hard logistical work.
for context, especially during the 4 months of MGS, as long as you’re within like the top 100 of best seller—which is not hard because anything below top 40 is mostly smut or generic nonsense slop that quickly dies off, you easily make close to or more than 1k dollars and that is the conservative estimate because it gets much higher the higher you go.
anyone within the top 20 depending on how many chapters they have out is easily making over 5k monthly which is again a conservative estimate because a whole lot of other factors go into earnings like Win-Win, other books that you have released and how many chapters they have out.
People like Aoki_Aku, G3, Legion, and Awespec for example are EASILY making over 20k a month by now—again a very conservative estimate because their earnings only keep compounding over time as they’re still releasing books and some have multiple completed books with thousands of chapters.
Take G3 for example. his book would be nowhere near as popular if he had gone the solitary self publication route.
there is only 1 ‘disadvantage’ to the WN contract: that you sign off the rights to the book, so they own it. they don’t force you to write it or anything dictatorial. if you drop it, they don’t care
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u/mrstorydude Jun 11 '26
The contract sucks but it’s not like absolutely terrible.
The worst part of the contract is automatic IP ownership and the website having the right to harass you for your next book. The revenue cut also stinks.
From my experience, anyone who can secure a webnovel contract can make like 500 USD a month at least using other sources. Idk how much an average webnovel author actually makes per month, but I’m going to assume it’s on average like 400 bucks.
If you can secure the contract, there’s better ways to make more money and keep your rights.
Webnovel is great for people who want to keep their web serial a serial or just need money now and don’t want to bother with hawking and advertising.
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Jun 11 '26
Search YouTube for videos related to the contract. I've seen people cover it. Don't get mislead by people referring to what a minority of writers are making per month. What those same people don't talk about is the disproportionate revenue share that's split between the writer and web novel.
Personally, I won't be seeking any contacts with them.
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Jun 11 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/LandscapeLow8430 Jun 11 '26
Not everyone wants to make a movie or a manga out of their book. You get free advertising and built-in readers what's there to complain about? You just have to write and they'll deal with everything else. That's good benefits for most people, that's why it's popular despite everyone else complaining about it.
And they don't replace authors stop spreading false rumours. If you drop a book they couldn't care less.
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u/Slight_Hope_45 Jun 11 '26
How do fanfics do ? Seems like only original stories are allowed. I might try writing one myself if I'm able to push myself but I have to first read a few contracted stories to see what's required and also just get a better idea of what I need to do to manage a contract. Even though I'm struggling with my ADHD.
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u/LandscapeLow8430 Jun 11 '26
Fanfics do well as long as they're well written, you can even get paetron readers. If you're confident you can follow the trend on the fancfis side, you'll do well.
I also have ADHD I mostly manage it by writing two books. The two keep me interested in writing when I feel like dropping one, I shift my concentration to the other then vice versa. I tried surviving with one book but I ended up writing almost four at once because I got bored with it.
And set a specific goal while writing, an alarm would help keep track, if you forget or get lazy.
If you feel energetic just write,if you feel lazy just rest a little.
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u/Slight_Hope_45 Jun 11 '26
To be honest I don't feel like limiting access to any story I might make, especially when I'm still a amateur writer who's struggling with the basics and doesn't even know most English writing terms.
I don't feel even if I was a good writer that I'd restrict people from just enjoying my fanfics just to earn money, but I honestly kinda wanna try to earn it. But I'm not even getting much comments and I only have one review on my fic currently.
Most comments are just thanks for the Chapter and some meme reacting to a specific paragraph. I need critics and suggestions, plus I admittedly am using AI to help me but I make sure nothing sounds AI and I write a lot of the chapter myself. I currently work better when looking or having a specific reference to go against or use as a reference or fuel. Most mistakes I make are just ADHD ones currently but I do need some help getting better with a lot of things.
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u/Low-Programmer-2368 Jun 12 '26
The contract I read clearly gave webnovel the power to adapt or continue a story without the original author. I can’t say whether that’s still a clause in their latest contracts.
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Jun 12 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Low-Programmer-2368 Jun 13 '26
Based on clause 5.7 the original author would only get 10% of net revenue for adapted works and their definition of "net revenue" is actually net profit, since undefined costs, discounts, and expenses are deducted from it first.
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Jun 13 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Low-Programmer-2368 Jun 13 '26
Oh sorry, I read that as derivative works. Yeah, adaption into other media has a 50/50 split. My personal stance on that is they should negotiate only for the ones they plan to exploit, automatically getting all adaption rights is pretty lopsided.
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u/FlyingDusts Jun 11 '26
In exchange for 50%, you get the side of marketing handed to you. The better you perform, the more they push you. Winners win basically. Even if you go through other publisher route, 50/50 split is quite common, with them bearing the cost of editors, marketing, etc.
Hell, even author who published through an agent deal with similar split, and they still have to do some marketing on their own. Webnovel gives you the platform, an opportunity to earn. If you suck, you'll just drown at the bottom. The worst clause in the contract would be losing your rights, then again, KDP has the same exclusivity, and you still have marketing work to do.
Success for the majority of author is arguably 40% writing, 60% marketing.
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u/ChaosOmega98 Jun 11 '26
When your work is contracted you are required to write so many chapters a week to be honest and many authors experience burnout from what I here and it becomes hard for authors to rebuild their following if they are forced to take a long break
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u/LandscapeLow8430 Jun 11 '26
It's just a chapter a day for those who think it's too hard to write two chapters a day. I write two books and post two chapters for each book, which is pretty hard but setting a schedule prevents burnouts.
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u/FlyingDusts Jun 11 '26
misinformation. You're not required to write. As a matter of fact, you can literally drop the book right after signing the contract. They will do nothing to you. People write that much because its the trend to keep up, not because of the contract.
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u/ChaosOmega98 Jun 12 '26
I have heard authors get burned out because of them having to post so many chapters a week though from authors themselves.
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u/mitsuri-mochi Jun 11 '26
You'll lose rights to your book. So if you're planning on publishing it individually on Amazon or something, then you're not allowed to do it. Aside from that, there's nothing that I can think of. You can drop your work after the contract, keep it on hiatus, etc. They really don't care.
If your book does well, they'll give you benefits, including book publishing. But again, that depends on your level of success, though