How do you calculate reading time for a blog?
Every reading time calculator does the same sum: divide the post's word count by a reading speed in words per minute (wpm), then round up to a whole minute. A 2019 review of 190 reading studies put the average adult's silent reading speed for English non-fiction at 238 wpm; many sites use a rounder 200 or 225. At 225 wpm, a 1,000-word article takes about 4.4 minutes, which shows as 5 min once you round up. Our word counter uses 200 wpm, which gives exactly 5 minutes.
Which reading speed to use
The most complete source I know of is Marc Brysbaert's 2019 meta-analysis in the Journal of Memory and Language, which pooled 190 studies with 18,573 participants:
- Silent reading of English non-fiction: 238 wpm on average, with most adults between 175 and 300 wpm.
- Silent reading of fiction: 260 wpm, with most adults between 200 and 320 wpm.
- Reading aloud: 183 wpm.
The review notes that its estimates are lower than the figures often quoted, and that reading is slower for children, older adults and people reading in a second language. Blog posts are non-fiction, so 238 wpm is a fair average. I round down to 200 or 225 to leave some slack for tables, code and readers who go back over a sentence.
The same math works for scripts. At 183 wpm, a 1,000-word video or podcast script runs about 5.5 minutes read aloud.
Reading time at common lengths
Each figure is the word count divided by the speed, rounded up to whole minutes:
| Words | 200 wpm | 225 wpm | 238 wpm |
|---|---|---|---|
| 300 | 2 min | 2 min | 2 min |
| 600 | 3 min | 3 min | 3 min |
| 1,000 | 5 min | 5 min | 5 min |
| 1,500 | 8 min | 7 min | 7 min |
| 2,000 | 10 min | 9 min | 9 min |
| 3,000 | 15 min | 14 min | 13 min |
In this table the speed only changes the label from 1,500 words up. For any length up to 1,000 words, the 200 and 225 wpm labels match three times out of four, because rounding up absorbs most of the difference.
Using our word counter as a reading time calculator
- Open the word counter and paste only the body of your post, without navigation, author box or comments.
- Read the "Min. Reading Time" card. It's the word count divided by 200 and rounded up, with a minimum of 1 minute for any text.
- For a different speed, take the word count from the same screen and divide it yourself. For 1,500 words at 238 wpm: 1,500 ÷ 238 = 6.3, so 7 minutes.
The counter treats anything between spaces as one word, so "150-160" counts once and so does a long URL. It runs in your browser, so the text you paste isn't sent anywhere. If you only know a character count, start with how many words 1,000 characters is.
The "min read" label at the top of posts on this blog uses 225 wpm, so the same post can show a minute less here than in the word counter. A 1,500-word post shows 7 minutes on the blog and 8 in the counter.
Read time vs speaking time
If the text is a script for a video, podcast or talk, use the reading-aloud speed from the same review, 183 wpm, instead of a silent reading speed. Rounded up to whole minutes:
| Words | Read aloud at 183 wpm |
|---|---|
| 500 | 3 min (2.7) |
| 750 | 5 min (4.1) |
| 1,000 | 6 min (5.5) |
| 1,500 | 9 min (8.2) |
| 2,000 | 11 min (10.9) |
Turned around, a 5-minute talk at 183 wpm is about 915 words and a 10-minute one about 1,830. Real speakers pause, take questions and slow down for slides, so treat these as the upper end of what fits.
Reading time for pages, books and PDFs
A reading time calculator for pages or books needs one extra figure: how many words sit on a page. That varies with the font, margins and page size, so count one typical page and multiply. If a page holds about 300 words, a 300-page book is about 90,000 words. At 238 wpm that's roughly 6.3 hours of reading; at 200 wpm it's 7.5 hours.
For a PDF or a document, copy the text into the word counter and use its word count; for a printed book, count the words on three pages and take the average. Most readers don't read a book in one sitting, so the total is more useful for planning than as a label.
If all you have is a character count, for example from a CMS field limit, the character counter gives the exact characters and our characters-to-words guide converts them to an approximate word count.
Mistakes that make read time estimates wrong
- Counting the whole page. Menus, footers, related-post lists and comments can add hundreds of words nobody reads as part of the article.
- Rounding down. A 1,010-word post at 225 wpm is 4.49 minutes; showing "4 min" promises less than the reader gets.
- One speed for every post. Dense technical guides, tables of numbers and code are read more slowly than a short opinion piece.
- Ignoring difficulty. A post with long sentences and long words takes longer to read at the same word count; the readability score checker shows its Flesch Reading Ease and grade level so you can decide whether to lower the speed.
Adding reading time to your own blog
If your platform doesn't add a reading-time label, a few lines of JavaScript make a reading time calculator for every post. Count words in the article text only, so menus and footers don't inflate the number:
function readingTime(text, wpm = 225) {
const words = text.trim().split(/\s+/).filter(Boolean).length;
return Math.max(1, Math.ceil(words / wpm));
}
const article = document.querySelector('article');
const minutes = readingTime(article.innerText);Rounding up with Math.ceil means a 1,010-word post shows 5 minutes at 225 wpm, where Math.round would show 4. I'd rather overestimate by a minute than promise a 4-minute read that takes 5.
Adjusting for technical content
If you're writing about complex topics like JWT decoding or cron expressions, your readers will move slower. For technical guides I lower the speed to 180 wpm to give a more realistic estimate. On a 1,500-word guide, that turns 7 minutes at 225 wpm into 9.
Why I show reading time
I believe people are more likely to start a post when they know how long it will take. A reading-time label sets that expectation before the first paragraph, and it only helps if the number is close. I show it for readers. I'm not aware of any Google documentation that treats a reading-time label as a ranking signal. If you're still deciding how long the post itself should be, see how long a blog post should be for SEO.
Frequently asked questions
Is reading time a ranking factor?
I'm not aware of any Google documentation that says so. Show it because it helps readers decide whether to start, and keep the estimate honest.
How long does it take to read 1,000 words?
About 4 to 5 minutes for an adult reading non-fiction silently: 4.2 minutes at 238 wpm, 4.4 at 225 and 5 at 200. Reading aloud at 183 wpm takes about 5.5 minutes.
How many words per minute does the average person read?
For silent reading of English non-fiction, Brysbaert's 2019 meta-analysis found an average of 238 words per minute, with most adults between 175 and 300. Fiction was faster at 260 wpm, and reading aloud averaged 183 wpm.
Is there a free reading time calculator for text I paste in?
Yes. The word counter on this site works as one: paste your text and the "Min. Reading Time" card shows the minutes at 200 wpm, updating as you type. It also shows characters, sentences and paragraphs, and the text stays in your browser. For any other speed, divide its word count yourself.
Why does the word counter show a different time from this blog's label?
The word counter divides by 200 wpm and the blog's "min read" label divides by 225, and both round up. On short posts they often match; on longer ones the counter shows a minute or two more.
