How is a word defined?

Any run of non-whitespace characters separated by spaces, tabs or line breaks. Hyphenated compounds count as one word and punctuation attached to a word does not create another.

Why does my essay word count differ from Word?

Word excludes some constructs — text boxes, footnotes, headers, and hyphenated or numeric tokens depending on version. A whitespace split is a slightly different definition, so small differences are expected.

How many words is a five-minute talk?

About 650 at a 130-word-per-minute delivery pace, or 1,000 if your audience is reading it silently. Use the speaking figure when you are filling a timed slot.

Does it count emoji and non-Latin scripts?

Yes. Counting is code-point aware, so emoji and characters outside the Latin alphabet are not inflated into multiple units the way a naive byte count would.

Text & Data Ready to use

Word Counter

Count words in any text as you type, with unique words, sentences, average word length and reading time. Runs entirely in your browser.

Text

All statistics are computed instantly, entirely in your browser.

Focus metric

The selected metric is highlighted first.

This tool runs entirely in your browser. Your input never leaves your device.

About Word Counter

Word counts are not one number. This tool splits on whitespace for a running count and shows the supporting figures that make the count usable: unique words (and so the ratio between the two, which is roughly how repetitive a passage is), average word length, the longest word, and the character, sentence, paragraph and line tallies that editors and submission forms ask for alongside it.

Reading time comes from the same numbers. Silent reading is modelled at 200 words a minute and speaking at 130 — the figures presentation calculators have settled on — so a 900-word talk reads in about four and a half minutes but takes nearly seven to deliver out loud. Use the speaking figure when you are timing a script, not the reading one.

Everything is computed in your browser tab on every keystroke, so nothing is uploaded and there is no submit button to press. That also means the count never lags behind what you are typing, and the tool works with the network disabled.