Text Analysis
Word Counter
Count words, characters, sentences and reading time. Free online word counter with keyword density analysis.
Keyword density
About the word counter
Paste or type in the box and the counts update as you go: words, characters with and without spaces, sentences, paragraphs, lines, unique words and average word length, plus how long the text takes to read and to say out loud. Under the counts, the keyword density list shows the ten words you use most. Filler words such as the, and, of and to are skipped there, so the words that carry meaning float to the top. A word is any run of letters or digits, in any alphabet. An apostrophe, hyphen, full stop or comma between two of those keeps them together, so don't, well-known, e.g. and 3.5 each count once, and a document pasted from Word with curly apostrophes gives the same total as one with straight ones. Languages written without spaces, such as Chinese or Japanese, count as one word per unbroken run of characters. For those, the character count is the number to use. Reading time assumes 200 words per minute and speaking time 130, both rounded up to the next whole minute. That is on the careful side: a review of 190 studies by Marc Brysbaert (2019) put the average adult at 238 words per minute for silent reading of English non-fiction. The sentence count splits on full stops, question marks and exclamation marks, so an abbreviation or a decimal point adds one. Your text is counted in the browser and never uploaded.
Frequently asked questions
How is reading time calculated?
The word count is divided by 200 and rounded up, so 450 words shows as 3 min. Speaking time works the same way at 130 words per minute. Real speeds vary a lot from person to person: in Brysbaert's 2019 review most adults read English non-fiction at 175 to 300 words per minute.
Are spaces counted as characters?
In the Characters box, yes: spaces, tabs and line breaks all count. The No spaces box leaves out every kind of whitespace. Most emoji count as two characters in both, because that is how browsers measure text length. When a site gives you a limit, check its help page to see which count it uses.
Why does my word count differ from Google Docs or Word?
Every program draws the line between words a little differently. Here a slash or an ampersand splits words, so and/or counts as two, while an apostrophe or hyphen inside a word doesn't split it. Numbers count as words, and so does a lone letter such as a list marker. Small differences on long documents are normal.
What does keyword density show?
Your ten most frequent words after 23 common ones like the, and, is and with are removed. Each row shows the count and that word's share of all words, so a word used 12 times in 400 words shows 3.0%. It is a quick way to catch a word you lean on too often. There is no ideal percentage to aim for.
Is my text stored anywhere?
No. The counting runs in your browser, and nothing is saved when you close the tab. The page does record that the tool was used and how many characters went in, but never the text itself.