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Free Online Word Counter

Count words in real time as you type or paste your text. Get sentences, paragraphs, average word length and reading time — all in your browser, nothing uploaded.

  • Real-time word count with reading and speaking time
  • Accurate Unicode counting for Japanese, Chinese, Hindi and Arabic
  • 100% private — your text never leaves your device
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Words
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Characters
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Sentences
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Paragraphs
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Avg. word length
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Reading time
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Speaking time
Complete Guide

Whether you are trimming an essay to a word limit, billing a translation per word, or planning content length for SEO, an accurate word count is the number everything else depends on.

How to Use the Word Counter

  1. Paste or type your text
    Drop your draft into the box above — the counter updates instantly with every keystroke.
  2. Read the live word count
    The big number is your word total; characters, sentences and paragraphs update alongside it.
  3. Check structure at a glance
    Use sentence and paragraph counts to spot walls of text or fragmented writing before you publish.
  4. Plan with reading time
    Reading and speaking time estimates help you fit articles, speeches and presentations into a time budget.

Who Uses a Word Counter?

Students & academics

Meet essay and thesis word limits precisely — most institutions count words, not characters.

Writers & journalists

Hit editorial budgets and keep articles within the assigned length without guesswork.

Translators

Quote and bill per-word jobs accurately across any source language, including CJK scripts.

SEO & content marketers

Match content length to search intent and compare your word count against ranking pages.

Example: What Gets Counted

Take this short passage:

The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. It was faster than anyone expected — 20% faster, in fact.

That is 20 words, 2 sentences and 1 paragraph. Numbers like “20%” count as one word, and hyphenated compounds count as one word each.

Frequently Asked Questions

A word counter is an online tool that counts the words in a text instantly, along with sentences, paragraphs and reading time. It is used to meet word limits for essays, articles, translations and any writing task where length matters.

It uses the browser's built-in Unicode segmenter (Intl.Segmenter) to split text into words following the same dictionary rules as your operating system. Counting happens locally in milliseconds — even for book-length documents.

Yes — completely free, with no signup, no usage limits and no premium tier. Paste as much text as you like, as often as you like.

Each editor applies slightly different rules to numbers, hyphenated words, apostrophes and symbols. Differences are usually under 1–2%. Our counter follows the Unicode text segmentation standard, which is the most consistent rule set across languages.

Yes. Languages without spaces between words (Japanese, Chinese) are segmented with dictionary-based rules, and scripts like Devanagari and Arabic are fully supported — something simple space-splitting counters get wrong.

Completely. The tool runs 100% in your browser using client-side JavaScript. Your text is never uploaded, stored or logged — it never leaves your device.

Numbers count as one word each (“2026” is one word). Hyphenated compounds like “well-known” are counted per segmentation rules — typically as separate word parts, matching how most style guides treat them.

How the Word Counter Works

Four things happen every time you type a character:

Segment
Your text is split into words with the browser's Unicode segmenter — the same rules your operating system uses.
Count
Words, characters, sentences and paragraphs are tallied locally in milliseconds, even for very long documents.
Estimate
Reading time uses about 200 words per minute; speaking time about 130 — accepted averages for adult readers and speakers.
Stay private
Everything runs in your browser. The text is never uploaded, stored or logged.

Made for Everyday Writing Tasks

The word counter fits naturally into workflows like:

  • Essays, term papers and dissertations with strict word limits
  • Blog posts and landing pages with SEO length targets
  • Speeches and presentations timed to the minute
  • Translation and copywriting jobs billed per word

Tips for Working with Word Limits

Three habits that make word limits painless:

  1. Write first, trim later — Draft freely, then cut — trimming 10% almost always makes text stronger.
  2. Watch sentence length — If your word-to-sentence ratio climbs above 25, readers start to struggle.
  3. Use paragraphs as checkpoints — Aim for 3–5 sentences per paragraph for comfortable on-screen reading.

Privacy First

The word counter runs entirely in your browser using client-side JavaScript. Your text never leaves your device — nothing is uploaded, stored or shared.

Count Words with Confidence

Fast, accurate and private word counting for any language. Need character-level detail too? Pair it with our character counter and readability statistics.