The short answer: a human line edit on a full-length romance novel typically runs $800–$3,500 — about $0.01–$0.04 per word. It sits between a developmental edit (more expensive) and a copyedit (cheaper), and it's the edit readers feel on every single page. Here's where the money goes and how to spend it well.
A line edit is sentence-level work across the whole book: clarity, rhythm, word choice, redundancy, filter words, flow. Done properly it means hundreds of individual changes in a typical novel — which is why it's priced like skilled labor: it is. If you're fuzzy on what those changes look like in practice, this guide shows before-and-after examples.
| Option | Typical cost (80k-word novel) | Turnaround |
|---|---|---|
| Freelance line editor | $800 – $3,500 (about $0.01–$0.04/word) | 3–8 weeks |
| Line edit + copyedit combined | $1,600 – $5,500 | 4–10 weeks |
| Editorial agency | $2,500 – $6,000+ | 6–12 weeks |
| AI line edit (Starport Line Edit) | $50 per run | Minutes |
Within the freelance range, the quote moves with the editor's experience, your genre, the state of your prose, and your deadline. Most line editors will sample-edit your first pages before quoting — take them up on it; it tells you the rate and whether their taste fits your voice.
Starport's Line Edit runs the same sentence-level pass in minutes — done for you. Every edit is rendered straight into your Word .docx as a real tracked change, up to 150,000 words in one pass, each change yours to accept or reject. Every change is measured against a Style Sheet reverse-engineered from your own prose, so the edit tightens your voice instead of flattening it.
After the line-level work — whoever does it — the last step is a proofread on the truly final file.
The Manuscript Scorecard grades your full manuscript on nine craft metrics, benchmarks it against professionally-edited books, and tells you exactly what to fix first. Free, in minutes.
Get your free Manuscript Scorecard →The biggest drivers are how heavy an edit your prose needs, the editor's experience, your genre and your deadline. That's why good line editors sample-edit your opening pages before they quote.
It's the edit readers experience on every page — the difference between prose that feels unedited and prose that reads professional. For a book you're asking strangers to pay for, it earns its keep.
Partly. You can hunt filter words, crutch words and echoes yourself with the search function. Rhythm and flow are much harder to judge from inside — that's where an outside pass, human or AI, earns its money.
As real tracked changes in your Word file — the work is already done, and you accept or reject each change one by one. Reject-all restores your original word for word.