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Word Counter — Live Word & Character Count

Count words, characters (with and without spaces), sentences, paragraphs, reading time, and keyword density — live as you type. Set a word goal and track progress. 100% in-browser, your text never leaves your device.

Words

0

Characters

0

No spaces

0

Sentences

0

Paragraphs

0

Reading time

0s

Speaking time

0s

Longest word

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How to use

  1. Step 1: Paste or type text into the editor
  2. Step 2: Watch counts update live
  3. Step 3: Set a target word count to enable Goal mode
  4. Step 4: Review keyword-density top 10
  5. Step 5: Copy or clear the text when done

How the counts work

Words are counted by splitting the text on whitespace (spaces, tabs, newlines) and dropping empty entries. This matches the convention used by Microsoft Word, Google Docs, and most academic style guides.

Characters with spaces is the raw text length. Without spaces excludes all whitespace (newlines included).

Sentences are split on terminal punctuation (., !, ?). This works for most prose but undercounts run-ons and overcounts decimals or abbreviations like "Mr." — a known limitation of any rule-based sentence splitter.

Paragraphs are separated by one or more blank lines.

Reading time uses 200 words per minute (the average adult silent reading rate). Speaking time uses 150 wpm (typical TED-talk pace).

Keyword density excludes 70 common English stopwords ("the", "a", "and", etc.) and reports the top-10 most-frequent remaining words as a percentage of all keyworded tokens.

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Examples

Example 1 — Tweet
TextJust shipped a new feature. Try it out!
Words8
Characters39
Reading time~2s
Example 2 — Blog post
Words1,500
Sentences~85
Reading time7m 30s
Speaking time10m 0s
Example 3 — Academic essay
Words3,000
Paragraphs~20
Reading time15m 0s
Top keyword density~3-5% recommended

Frequently asked questions

A word counter is a text-analysis tool that counts the number of words, characters, sentences, and paragraphs in a piece of text. Many counters also estimate reading and speaking time and analyze keyword density.

Why use a word counter?

  • Essays & assignments — hit minimum and maximum word limits exactly
  • Blog posts — Google's top-ranking pages average 1,400-2,000 words
  • Social media — Twitter (280 chars), Instagram captions (2,200), LinkedIn posts (3,000)
  • Speeches — 150 wpm × minutes gives you a target word count
  • Translation & freelance writing — paid by the word, count must be precise
  • SEO content — keyword density tracking helps avoid keyword stuffing

Writing for the web? Pair this with our SEO tools to check meta-tag length, then turn the finished article into a shareable QR code for print. Need to fill a layout while drafting? The text tools hub has a lorem-ipsum generator and case converter that pair nicely with this counter.

Common length limits

PlatformLimitUnit
Twitter / X (free)280characters
SMS (1 segment)160characters
Instagram caption2,200characters
LinkedIn post3,000characters
Meta description (SEO)~155characters
Page title (SEO)~60characters
Google Ads headline30characters
Common essay500-2,000words
Blog post (long)1,500-3,000words
Bachelor's thesis10,000-15,000words

Common mistakes & tips

  • Trusting Word's count exactly. Different tools count hyphenated words and contractions differently — there's no universal standard.
  • Pasting from Word with formatting. Pasted hidden characters can inflate the count; this tool ignores invisible Unicode but it's worth a sanity check.
  • Reading time ≠ comprehension time. 200 wpm is silent reading; complex technical material reads slower.
  • Keyword stuffing. Aim for 1-3% density on a primary keyword; over 5% is a red flag for search engines.