Word Counter

A word counter counts the words, characters, sentences and paragraphs in your text as you type. It also estimates reading time at 238 words per minute, scores readability, lists your most-used words and checks your text against common limits such as 280 characters for an X post or 160 for a meta description.

By Editorial Team Updated 19 Oct 2026

How to use the word count tool

Paste or type your text. Click in the box and paste from any document, email or web page, or start typing.
Watch the counts update. Words, characters, sentences, paragraphs and timings refresh instantly as you type.
Check limits and repetition. Scroll down to see which character limits your text fits and which words you repeat most.
Copy the summary. Use Copy result to paste the counts into a brief, form or message.

How words are counted

A word is any run of letters or numbers. Contractions such as it’s, hyphenated words such as well-known and numbers such as 3.5 or 2,000 each count as one word, matching how Microsoft Word and Google Docs count. Punctuation, emoji and symbols on their own are not words.

For Chinese, Japanese and Korean text, where words are not separated by spaces, the counter uses your browser’s built-in language segmentation to find word boundaries.

Character counter: with and without spaces

Characters with spaces counts everything, including spaces and line breaks. This is the number most social platforms and form fields limit. Characters without spaces is often used by translators and for some academic limits.

Where	Typical limit
Page title shown in Google	About 60 characters
Meta description	About 155–160 characters
X (Twitter) post, standard account	280 characters
Single SMS text	160 characters (GSM)
Instagram caption	2,200 characters
LinkedIn post	3,000 characters

The table under your result shows whether your text fits each one and how many characters you have left.

Reading time calculator: how long will this take to read?

Reading time uses 238 words per minute, the average silent reading speed for non-fiction found in a 2019 review of 190 studies by Brysbaert. A 1,000-word article takes about 4 minutes 12 seconds. Speaking time uses about 140 words per minute, a comfortable pace for presentations and voice-overs, so a 5-minute talk is roughly 700 words.

Sentence counter and readability

Sentences are counted at full stops, question marks and exclamation marks, ignoring decimal points and common abbreviations such as “e.g.” and “Dr.”. Once you have 30 or more words, the tool shows the Flesch reading ease score:

206.835 − 1.015 × (words ÷ sentences) − 84.6 × (syllables ÷ words)

Score	Reading level
80–100	Easy: short sentences, everyday words
60–79	Plain English: right for most web pages
50–59	Fairly difficult
30–49	Difficult: academic or technical
0–29	Very difficult

Long sentences hurt the score most. Splitting one 35-word sentence into two or three shorter ones usually lifts it by several points. Syllables are estimated, so treat the score as a guide.

Word count guidelines for common writing

Tweets and short posts: under 280 characters.
Email: 50–125 words tends to get the most replies.
Blog post or article: whatever fully answers the question; for most how-to topics that is 800–2,000 words.
College application essay: the Common App personal essay is capped at 650 words.
UK personal statement: UCAS uses a 4,000-character limit, including spaces.

Write for the reader first, then trim. Repeated words shown under your result are a quick way to spot padding.

Word counter FAQs

Is my text saved or uploaded?

No. Counting happens in your browser. Nothing you type is sent to a server or stored, so it is safe to paste private documents.

Why is my count different from Microsoft Word?

Programs treat a few cases differently, such as slashes (and/or), em dashes without spaces and URLs. Differences are usually just one or two words.

How many pages is 1,000 words?

About 2 pages single-spaced or 4 pages double-spaced in a 12-point font with standard margins.

Do numbers count as words?

Yes. 2026, 3.5 and 2,000 each count as one word.

How long does it take to read 2,000 words?

About 8 minutes 24 seconds at an average reading speed of 238 words per minute, and around 14 minutes to read aloud.

Sources and methodology

Words are runs of letters and numbers, allowing internal apostrophes, hyphens, decimal points and thousands separators; CJK text uses Intl.Segmenter. Sentences end at . ! ? … (ignoring decimals and common abbreviations). Paragraphs are separated by blank lines. Reading time uses 238 wpm (Brysbaert, 2019) and speaking time 140 wpm. Flesch reading ease uses an estimated syllable count. Most-used words exclude common stop words and words of two letters or fewer.