Word & Character Counter
Words, characters, sentences, paragraphs and reading time, counting as you type.
Nothing you type here is uploaded, stored or sent anywhere. It all runs in your browser.
What counts as what
- Words are runs of non-whitespace, so hyphenated compounds count once and "don't" counts once.
- Sentences are split on . ! and ? — an abbreviation like "e.g." will inflate the count slightly.
- Paragraphs are blocks separated by a blank line.
- Reading time uses your chosen speed. 238 wpm is the median for adults reading prose on screen.
Length targets that actually matter for SEO
There is no word count Google rewards. What matters is covering the question completely enough that nobody needs a second result. Long content ranks because thorough content ranks, not the other way round.
Questions people ask
Why is this count different from the one in Google Docs?
Because every tool draws the word boundary somewhere slightly different. An em dash with no spaces around it, a hyphenated compound, a number written 1,200 — each of those is one word here and sometimes two elsewhere. The gap is usually under one percent. Pick one tool for a project and stick to it rather than reconciling two.
Is there a minimum word count for a page to rank?
No, and the 300-word rule people quote has never been a Google threshold. What gets called thin content is content with nothing in it, which correlates with being short but is not caused by it. A 250-word page that answers the question completely will outrank a 2,000-word one padded to hit a number.
How long should a guest post be?
Look at what the host site already publishes and land in the same range — usually 900 to 1,500 words. A placement that is visibly shorter than everything else on the blog reads as a placement, which is exactly what you do not want an editor, or a reader, to notice.
Does the word count work for Chinese, Japanese or Thai?
No. Those languages do not separate words with spaces, so a whitespace-based count collapses a whole sentence into one or two words. Use the character count instead, which is what editors working in those languages brief against anyway.
Is the text I paste in here sent anywhere?
No. The counting happens in JavaScript on your own machine. There is no request to a server, nothing is stored, and closing the tab is all it takes to get rid of it.
Guides for this tool
Related tools
Writing content that needs links?
Good content still needs authority behind it. That is the part I do.