Nnaverage word count per page book

The first book in each series below was the authors first. Academic books might put 600 words on a page with works of reference squeezing in words. Minimum realistic word count of nonfiction book writing. Unfortunately, they dont offer word count so ive created an algorithm based on the number of pages, genre, and the dimensions of the book. The typical books words per page count tends to range between 225 and 275an average of 250. The industry standard for a manuscript page, however, is a firm 250 words. For most publishers, a book is novellength when its between 50,000 and 110,000 words. This line count includes blank lines between paragraphs as well as lines with just a single word. Word processing programs have a function that calculates the number automatically, but the results are not reliable in the publishing world. In contrast, word count is finite and usually i can calculate book length with about 99% accuracy in part because also included in any calculation is a count of figures, tables, etc. That said, this figure differs from book to book and organization to. At a writers conference i recently attended, publishing veteran jane friedman said 80,000 words is good for most fiction, below 60,000 isnt novel length territory, and above 120,000 is likely too much. What is the industry standard for the number of words per.

Neither too long nor too short, this book length signals a novelists competency and knowledge of the publishing market to prospective agents and editors. Im a retired ministry of defence police officer and was seconded to the united. How many words per page are there in a typical novel. Having said all that, there are a number of conventions regarding word count. When i started writing three years ago, the mg word count i kept hearing was no more than 30,000 words. Most ebooks i see are double spaced, which makes their pages clearer but also reduces the number of words per page. These were to do with whether the book would be categorised as a novel or a novella or an epic or something else. This is a true statement if your goal is to be published through traditional methods someday. Thus the total cost of the book without any kind of profit built in can end up being priced way too high. In the first book i wrote my chapters average about 6k words. Lets take a quick tour of copy fitting, casting off and related issues here.

Therefore, the word count of a novel is crucial if you want your book to be fit for publication. A manuscript for a novel is typically 500 words per page if singlespaced. Im 55 years of age and writing a book which covers 7 years, from 2001 until 2007, of my life. The average nonfiction book is about 50,000 to 75,000 words, which is about 153 to 230 ebook pages. Word count and column inches are difficult to determine without using the word processor that the publication. Page count is determined by the publisher, not the writer. My own word count per page fluctuates between 120150. Mar 07, 2005 the 250 words per page is an average figure that publishers use for quick, rough estimates of ms. The point is that the perpage count is an estimate that will average out over time, and its good enough for most purposes. Calculate book page count using word count for book design. All of these are average book word count ranges and should not be taken as the definitive word count you must reach in your book. Stephen king word count 112263 274,672 bag of bones 203,3 black house 252,270 blockade billy 15,917 carrie 60,718 cell 121,931 christine 193,602 cujo 121,150 cycle of the werewolf 15,955 desperation 195,011 doctor sleep.

Have you ever wondered how the average ebook page length or word count differs by book genre. You should be writing in size 12 font on standard sized paper, not trying to emulate the look of a published book. Most publishers have manuscript guidelines you can refer to for the correct formatting. Based on this list compiled by nicole humphrey cook. Shorter novels such as fahrenheit 451, the hitchhikers guide to the galaxy, the great gatsby, and slaughterhousefive are between 4050,000 words. Estimate your page count fiona raven book designer.

By using these three options to more accurately define your writing, the words per page calculator should provide a better estimate on how many words you need to write to fill a page. This is another common question, and for most writers it should be easy to answer by using. This is not a post for writers who say theyre going to write a short story and actually end up writing a short story. Line count varies depending on page size, font size, etc. How to increase your novels word count noveldoctor. Assuming you use the standard conventions for manuscript format 1 margins, 25 doublespaced lines per page, and a 12 point nonproportional font like courier, then a good rule of thumb is one page equals 250 words for the mathimpaired, that means you multiply the number of. They do not, however, require that you only have 250 words per page. Search for word count totals in books word counters. Victorian novels often ran over half a million words.

In the current one my longest chapters are 4,600 and my shortest merely journal entries 600. If the average length is 300 pages, youre looking at a 75,000 word manuscript approximately one reason its harder for a new author to sell a 140,000 word manuscript is the size of the book. How many words in a middlegrade book 20,000 55,000. On average, there are about 300 words per page in a book. A minimum count for a nonfiction ebook is about 10,000 words, as long as the content is solid. Learn the average wordcount for every type of novel, novella, genre, etc. There are times when it helps to know how many words per page youre writing. Novellas if you are writing a novella, youll probably want to know how many words are in a novella. Estimate your page count book designer linda parke. In an earlier post i discussed broad issues relating to word count and book length but didnt actually explain how the length of a book is calculated. Word count for book series the first book in each series below was the authors first. Like a general fiction novel, a good target word count for a memoir is 80,000 words. There is absolutely an industry standard, but it is a bit old school and some editors may not even care. In itself, no measure is perfect but personally i find word count the most useful.

To get an idea of what your book will look like you need to match the number of words per page on your word processing page to the finished printed page. The binding, font and paper size establish how many pages a published book will be. When i started to work on novels i wanted to keep an estimate of how many words and book pages. At one extreme you get large print books with 250 words on the page. Im presently working on a novel and want to make certain my word count falls in line with what other authors produce. Your best bet is to figure out what books yours is comparable to, then sit down and count the words on 23 typical pages. Now im seeing a lot more mg books with up to 60,000 words, so i think the water has become a bit murky here. I just popped into my office and pulled a few books off the shelf.

Go play cricket or bake a souffle or save the whales. Word count is the devil you have to love, or at the very least, respect. Jan 10, 2007 page number revert to the printer andor the publishing housethey use different fonts shape and size, illustrations, different structure organization. Youll use the word count in your word document to calculate book page count. Use the copy of the publication to verify your word count. Most young adult novels fall between 55,000 and 70,000 words. Yes, its possible to break this model by having lots of staccato dialog, or paragraphs that are more than 250 words long, but those are extreme cases. How to calculate a word count per page pen and the pad.

We need to count words if we are writing for a publication that asks us to stay within a set number of words. If the word count of twilight is disregarded, the average becomes around 88,625. The actual word count for the hunger games is 99,750 and my utility calculates 94,743 words. If the editor doesnt care and you get paid by word for your articles, using publisher word count can increase your salary for an article by as much as 30% if you write for magazines or newspapers on a per word basis, this count is your friend. Novellas are about 20,000 to 50,000 words, with 30,000 words being the average. Part of the reason is that the createspace formula includes a costperpage component. So if youre writing something on any sort of word processor and want to know how many pages as a novel it would be than go to tools, then word count. Pick an article and use a ruler to map out a roughly 5inch section. This is an art rather than a science but here are a few tips. How to do word count for newspaper articles pen and the pad. Those of you who dont care about traditional publishing can leave the room now. Word count for famous novels, in ascending order by number of words.

First of all, find your word count in word by opening your. The typical books wordsperpage count tends to range between 225 and 275an average of 250. According to amazons great text stats feature, the median length for all books is about 64,000 words. Well, the answer is about one half page single spaced or one page double spaced.

You can use word to count how many words you have written in a document. This is not a post for the writers who have trouble writing books that arent long enough. Anyway, heres the figures and facts i have so far looks like big debut novels are anything but unusual in epic fantasy now. Well just see how it goes when im finished, i guess. As you can see, established authors get much more flexibility when it comes to the length of their book. Short stories the length of short stories can range from 1,000 up to 7,500 words. Stephen king word count 112263 274,672 bag of bones 203,3 black house 252,270 blockade billy 15,917 carrie 60,718 cell 121,931 christine 193,602 cujo 121,150 cycle of the werewolf 15,955 desperation. Length of a book is typically associated with its sizespecifically page countleading many to assume the largest and thickest book equates to its length. Now that you know the average number of words per page in your book, you can calculate the page count with a little arithmetic. Sep 20, 2009 how to calculate book length in an earlier post i discussed broad issues relating to word count and book length but didnt actually explain how the length of a book is calculated. Jun 16, 2017 part of the reason is that the createspace formula includes a costperpage component. Estimate a small reduction for the linesperpage and the numberofpages values. How do i get a total word count in my total document. As a result, a 100k manuscript can size up very differently on a shelf.

This is because i calculate all my jobs based on word count, not number of pages. The figure was found through looking at a number of books text stats, until brave new worlds 64,531 word count landed in the exact center of all books 50% of books have fewer words and 50% of books have more words. From my experience with latex, i know that a certain amount of characters per line is most pleasing to the eye and is. For manuscripts, the answer is about 250300 words per page if it is doublespaced.

I thought the average for a midsized novel would be around 100200 pages. Roughly how many pages would 50,000 words produce in a. Put simply, the sweet spot for a novels word count is generally said to be around 8090k. We all know of outliers within each genre that have been published well under, or well over, these word counts. Estimate a small reduction for the lines per page and the numberofpages values. Its the overall word count publishersagentsanyone cares about. Aug 21, 2019 for landing page content, id recommend a minimum word count of 350 words. Word count is a direct way to measure the length of a novel in a manner unaffected by variations of format and page size. I dont doubt that ill be able to fit it into the common page count window.

I use amazons data feeds to come up with the calculation. Word counts may also be used to calculate measures of readability and to measure typing and reading speeds usually in words per minute. Harry potter and the sorcerers stone has 17 chapters with titles, and about 4560 words per chapter. Well, calculating it out, that would mean the average book was 240480 pages. You must provide an accurate word count per page or by document when you are submitting a literary project.

Aug 05, 2019 for most publishers, a book is novellength when its between 50,000 and 110,000 words. When we talk of copy fitting, generally we think of a publishers production editor or typesetter looking at fitting the delivered. Wordprocessing programs have a function that calculates the number automatically, but the results are not reliable in the publishing world. Jun 27, 2019 put simply, the sweet spot for a novels word count is generally said to be around 8090k. If youre writing a blog post that you want to position, the minimum in most cases would be 500 words. While a general guideline is one page is 500 words single spaced or 250. If theres a business book you admire, why not count the pages, tot up the words on an average page, and see how long it is in total. I tend to write 500 word articles on a page roughly and that is using. There might be an international standard, but it does not make a difference i. Better to have solid, clear information than rambling to make a page count. What is the generally accepted number of words per page for a published novel. Use these numbers as a baseline for your writing goals.

Nope, this is a post for writers who set out to write a nice little 100,000word noveland find themselves at the finish line with a 200,000word behemoth on their hands. I use microsoft word and a print page is different then a book page. In any case, assuming the book is published, what you submit to a publisher. Word count to page comparison creative writing forums. When the final work is printed for sale and published, the number of words per page will differ. Sep 11, 2010 i was looking online and most of the sources i found said the average number of words per novel page is 250, and the average words per book were 60,000120,000. Count up the total number of words on 10 random full lines from different places and divide by 10 to get the average words per line count the number of lines on each page to get the lines per page check that the book actually starts on page 1 sometimes the stuff before it starts is counted then.

Harry potter and the sorcerers stone has an average of 4,560 words per chapter. In the opposite direction, it can give a more accurate estimate of how many pages you have created if you only know the word count. The true best word count for a post or landing page depends on many factors. Word count for famous novels organized commonplace book. In this post, id like to share some thoughts on word count considerations. When you query a publisher, its customary to include your novels estimated word count.

Of course, when youre writing the first draft of your story, you want to just get your words out on paper. This of course depends on what font size, line spacing and page margins you are using, but on average a word count of 250 words will yield around half a page single spaced and a whole page double spaced when set in either times new roman or arial at a 12 point font size. Word count is commonly used by translators to determine the price of a translation job. Jun 15, 2006 im 55 years of age and writing a book which covers 7 years, from 2001 until 2007, of my life. As a publisher who has laid out dozens of books for printinga 50,000 word manuscript should end up somewhere between 180 and 220 pages. When converting character counts to words, a measure of 5 or 6 characters to a word is generally used for english. Average word count per page creative writing forums. The longest is the order of the phoenix with a word count of 257,000 words. Simply divide the total word count from your word document by the number of words per page. Literary agent paula munier says a 90,000 word count is the sweet spot for debut fiction.

Feb 26, 2008 each page one sided in novel format averages 250 words. Publisher word count for magazine writing word counter blog. That would put your 150,000word novel at say 300400 pages, not an inordinate length. Many category editors find it easier to judge the length of a book in the way theyve always done. Generally, there are 300 words per typed doublespaced page, using a 12 point font. For paperbacks you get 2550 lines per page, with 35 being a good average. For average word counts based on genre, see this handy reference.

The daily word counts of 39 famous authors writers write. Oct 18, 2017 therefore, the word count of a novel is crucial if you want your book to be fit for publication. Because dialogue requires paragraph breaks, there will be fewer words than if you have a few pages of full paragraphs instead of dialogue. But the word count of a chapter matters if you want your story to flow right.

Ultimately, you can expect there to be roughly 300 words per page in a book you write as a whole. Amazon ebook page length by genre kindle page length klytics. Im just getting nervous the closer i get to the end. Sharp objects has a word count of 80,565 and my utility. That will give you a good guide if you want to emulate it. If you have 6 panels, stick to a maximum of 35 words per panel.

Using e publisher word count will almost always give you more words than the straight word count. But chapter word count is something that you want to keep in. Tips from raven book design for writers estimating word counts. Im a retired ministry of defence police officer and was seconded to the united nation mission in kosovo on three occasions. Using your current word count and the appropriate formula below, calculate the number of pages you can expect in your finished book. What is the average number of actual words in comic books or. Of course, rules are made to be broken, especially in literature. Ive been doing some research into epic fantasy word counts recently, especially to get an idea of debut novel figures over recent years. Twilight has 24 titled chapters, or 26 if you count the preface and epilogue, and about 4580 words per chapter. Each page one sided in novel format averages 250 words. How do i get a total word count in my total document created.

Failing to mention the word count, or committing the faux pas of stating the page count instead, will also see a quick rejection. That will be the rough number of words per column inch. Of course, word count wont matter if a story doesnt hook the target audience. Assuming you use the standard conventions for manuscript format 1 margins, 25 doublespaced lines per page, and a 12 point nonproportional font like courier, then a good rule of thumb is one page equals 250 words. This trim size is good for only 200 to 250 words per printed book page. This reduction will be very small, like maybe 12 lines less per page, and 510 pages less for the book. But, if you want to be old school you will use oneinch margins all around, and a monospaced font like dark courier by hp or courier 10. How long are the chapters in books by famous authors. Heres how the wordcount of your book will decide what category your masterpiece falls in.