Word counter
Type or paste your text to instantly see how many words, characters, sentences and paragraphs it has, plus roughly how long it takes to read.
- Free
- No sign-up
- In your browser
Words
0
- Characters
- 0
- Characters without spaces
- 0
- Sentences
- 0
- Paragraphs
- 0
- Reading time
- 0 sec
- Estimated at about 200 words per minute
- Speaking time
- 0 sec
- Estimated at about 130 words per minute
How to use this tool
- Type or paste your text into the box. You can also drag selected text in from another window.
- The figures update as you type: words, characters with and without spaces, sentences, paragraphs and estimated times.
- If the text repeats terms, you'll see the most frequent words below, leaving out articles, prepositions and other very common words.
- Press “Copy stats” to take the summary with you, or “Clear” to start over.
How words are counted
The counter uses your browser's text segmentation rules (Intl.Segmenter), the same ones used to select a word when you double-click it. So punctuation, stray dashes and emoji don't count as words, and contractions such as “don't” or “it's” count as one word.
A few specific cases worth knowing:
- Numbers count as one word, including decimals and thousands: “3.5” and “1,000,000” are one word each.
- Hyphenated words are counted separately: “well-known” is two words.
- Web and email addresses are split into several parts, because they contain slashes, @ signs and other separators.
Characters, sentences and paragraphs
Characters are counted the way a person sees them: an emoji with a skin tone (👍🏽) or a flag (🇺🇸) counts as a single character, even though it's stored internally as several code points. The “without spaces” figure leaves out spaces, tabs and line breaks.
A sentence ends with a period, an exclamation mark, a question mark, an ellipsis or a line break. That's why a heading without a final period counts as a sentence, and an abbreviation such as “Dr.” followed by a space may add an extra sentence.
Each line with text counts as a paragraph. Blank lines separating blocks don't count.
Reading and speaking time: an estimate
Reading time assumes about 200 words per minute of silent reading, and speaking time about 130 words per minute for reading aloud. These are round reference values, not exact measurements: real speed varies a lot depending on the person, the difficulty of the text and the purpose of reading.
If you're preparing a talk or a presentation, use it as a guide and time yourself reading the text aloud at least once.
Examples
An essay with a 1,500-word minimum
Paste the text and check the main figure. If you're short, the list of most repeated words helps you spot terms you could vary as you expand it.
A 5-minute speech
At 130 words per minute, a 5-minute speech is around 650 words. Write your script and check the estimated speaking time.
A summary with a character limit
Many forms limit characters, not words. Check “Characters” (with spaces), or use the character counter if you need a limit bar.
Frequently asked questions
Why does another program give a different word count?
Each program applies its own rules: some count everything between spaces as one word, so “well-known” or a web address count as one, while here they're split. In normal text the difference is usually small.
Do numbers and emoji count as words?
Numbers do. Emoji and punctuation aren't words, but they're included in the character count.
How many words can you read in a minute?
It varies a lot from person to person and text to text. This tool uses 200 words per minute for silent reading and 130 for reading aloud as a reference, and shows the result as an estimate.
Is there a length limit?
There's no fixed limit. You can paste long texts; with very long documents the figures may take a moment to update, depending on your device.
Is my text sent to a server?
No. The count happens in your browser and the text you type or paste is not sent to any server or stored.
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