Word and Character Counter
Paste your text. See words, characters, sentences, paragraphs, reading time, and speaking time update as you type. Nothing leaves your browser.
- Live
- Private
- No signup
- Free
- 0Words
- 0Characters
- 0No spaces
- 0Sentences
- 0Paragraphs
- 0mReading time
- 0mSpeaking time
How to use it
- Paste or type into the box above.
- Watch the chips update on every keystroke: words, characters, characters without spaces, sentences, paragraphs, reading time, speaking time.
- Copy the summary, share a private link, or clear and start again.
What each count means
Words are whitespace-separated tokens. Contractions and hyphenated words count as one. Characters counts every character; the second chip strips spaces for platforms that ignore them. Sentences splits on period, question mark, and exclamation, with abbreviation handling for Dr., Mr., e.g., etc. Paragraphs counts blocks separated by a blank line. Reading time uses 250 words per minute for silent reading. Speaking time uses 130 words per minute for a natural presenter pace.
Advanced stats
Open the advanced panel under the counter for Flesch Reading Ease, Flesch-Kincaid grade level, longest word, longest sentence, average word length, unique words, and a top-10 keyword frequency table with a stopwords toggle. Useful for readability audits, keyword density checks, and catching overused words.
Platform character limits
Every platform counts a little differently. Pick the counter that matches where you are posting.
280 characters
Live count with the t.co URL rule (every URL is 23 characters).
2,200 characters
Feed caption limit. Bio is a separate 150-character counter.
3,000 characters
Feed post limit. Only the first two lines show above the fold.
Threads
500 characters
Meta-owned. Longer than a tweet, shorter than a LinkedIn post.
Essay word count guides
Essay word count guides
Guide
Essay word counts, every type
Common App, TOK, extended essay, college essay: real word counts and the rule behind each.
How-to
Count words in a PDF
Three ways to get a word count out of a text-layer PDF or a scanned one.
Reference
Words per page tables
12pt, 11pt, single or double spaced. How many words fit on one page, on ten.
Related counters
Text
Word and Character Counter
The flagship live counter. Words, characters, sentences, reading time.
File
PDF Page Counter
Drop a PDF and see the page count. Nothing uploads.
Time
Reading Time Calculator
Silent, spoken, and podcast reading times with adjustable WPM.
Analysis
Word Frequency Counter
Top 10 most-used words with a stopwords toggle and CSV export.
Common questions
How does the counter work?
Everything runs in your browser. The text never leaves your device. Close the tab and it is gone.
What counts as a word?
Whitespace-separated tokens, with extra spaces ignored. Contractions count as one word. Hyphenated words count as one.
Why is the character count different with and without spaces?
Some platforms count spaces toward the limit (Twitter, SMS). Others do not (a few SEO tools). The counter shows both so you can match whichever rule applies.
How is reading time calculated?
250 words per minute for silent reading, 130 for speaking. Both are adjustable in the settings drawer.
Can I count words in a PDF?
Yes. The PDF page counter reports the page count and, for text-layer PDFs, the word count too.
What about Chinese, Japanese, or Korean text?
Use the Chinese character counter for CJK-aware tokenization that treats each Han glyph as one character.
Is my text saved anywhere?
No. Everything is in-browser and cleared when you close the tab. There is no signup and no history.
Does the counter strip hidden characters?
Yes. Zero-width and control characters are stripped before counting, matching Microsoft Word behavior.