How the words and characters are counted
Every count updates as you type. Your text is kept in this browser's local storage, so it is still there if you close the tab. It is never sent to a server.
| Count | What it includes |
|---|---|
| Words | Anything between spaces that contains a letter or a digit. "Well-known", "don't", "3.5%" and "COVID-19" each count as one word, as in Microsoft Word. A dash on its own, an emoji or a bullet point is not a word. Words joined by an em dash (yes—no) count as two. |
| Characters | Every character, including spaces, line breaks and punctuation. A letter with an accent, or an emoji such as 👍🏽, counts as one character. |
| Characters without spaces | The same count with spaces, tabs and line breaks removed. |
| Sentences | Text ending in . ! ? or …, and each line. A full stop after "Mr", "Dr" or "e.g." doesn't end a sentence, and neither does one followed by a small letter. |
| Paragraphs | Lines that contain at least one word. Blank lines are ignored. |
Chinese, Japanese and Thai
These languages don't put spaces between words. In modern browsers the counter uses the browser's built-in word segmentation (Intl.Segmenter) to find word boundaries, so 我喜欢学习中文 counts as four words: 我, 喜欢, 学习, 中文. In older browsers, each Chinese character or Japanese kana counts as one word. Treat word counts in these languages as estimates; character counts are exact.
Reading time and speaking time
Reading time assumes 238 words per minute. That is the average silent reading speed for English non-fiction found in a 2019 review of reading-rate studies by the psychologist Marc Brysbaert. Speaking time assumes 150 words per minute, a steady pace for a talk or a presentation. If you speak slowly, or the material is technical, allow more time.
Worked example: a 1,500-word article takes 1,500 ÷ 238 = 6.3 minutes to read (about 6 min 18 sec), and 1,500 ÷ 150 = 10 minutes to read aloud. To plan a speech, work backwards:
| Speech length | Words at 150 per minute |
|---|---|
| 1 minute | 150 |
| 3 minutes | 450 |
| 5 minutes | 750 |
| 10 minutes | 1,500 |
| 20 minutes | 3,000 |
Character limits worth knowing
- X (Twitter): 280 characters for a standard post. X weighs some characters as two (most emoji, and Chinese, Japanese and Korean characters) and counts every link as 23, so a post near the limit may count differently there.
- SEO title: about 60 characters. Google cuts titles by pixel width, so a title full of wide letters (W, M) is cut sooner.
- Meta description: about 155 characters. Google may show more or less, and sometimes writes its own snippet from the page.
- Instagram caption: 2,200 characters. Only the first line or two show before "more".
- LinkedIn post: 3,000 characters. The feed shows roughly the first few lines before "see more".
Using the keyword list
The keyword table lists the ten words you use most, ignoring common words such as "the", "is" and "with". Density is the share of all your words: a word used 6 times in a 300-word text has a density of 2%.
Use it to spot repetition. If one word dominates, try a synonym or rephrase. There is no ideal keyword density for search engines. Google's spam policies treat keyword stuffing as spam, so write for readers and use your main phrase where it fits naturally.
Tips for hitting a word count
- Too long? Cut filler words ("really", "very", "in order to"), merge sentences that repeat a point, and turn long lists of examples into one good one.
- Too short? Add a concrete example, a number, or an answer to the question a reader would ask next. Don't pad.
- Check the rules. Schools and journals differ on whether titles, headings, footnotes and references count toward a limit.
- Fix capitals in bulk. To turn a heading into Title Case or Sentence case, paste it into the case converter.
Frequently asked questions
Is my text saved or uploaded?
How many pages is 1,000 words?
How long does it take to read 1,000 words?
Are hyphenated words counted as one word?
Why is my count different from Word or Google Docs?
Does the character count include spaces?
Last updated . How we check our tools.