How Long Does It Take to Read 1000 Words? A Reading Time Chart

How long does it take to read 1000 words? For the average adult reading non-fiction silently, about 4 minutes. Fiction runs a little faster, at roughly 3 minutes 50 seconds, and reading aloud stretches it to about 5 and a half minutes. Those figures come from a review of 190 studies, not from the round 200 or 300 words per minute that get quoted everywhere.

Below you'll find a chart from 250 to 10,000 words and the source of the numbers. You'll also see what speeds you up or slows you down, and how to work out the time for your own text with the Reading Time Calculator.

How long does it take to read 1000 words?

About 4 minutes: 4 minutes 12 seconds at 238 words per minute (wpm), the average adult silent rate for non-fiction. A reader at the slow end of the typical range, 175 wpm, needs 5 minutes 43 seconds. One at the fast end, 300 wpm, needs 3 minutes 20 seconds. Read the same 1000 words aloud at the average oral rate of 183 wpm and it takes 5 minutes 28 seconds.

The arithmetic is plain division: words divided by words per minute gives minutes. Here 1000 ÷ 238 is 4.2, and 0.2 of a minute is about 12 seconds. Everything else in this article is about choosing the right words-per-minute figure.

Reading time by word count

Here is the same division run for the word counts people ask about most. The average column uses 238 wpm, the slow and fast columns use the ends of the typical range, and the last column is reading aloud.

Plan with the average column. Switch to the slow column when readers are learning something new or reading in a second language.

A bar chart of reading time at 238 words per minute: about 2 minutes for 500 words, 4 for 1000, 8 for 2000, 21 for 5000 and 42 for 10000 words.

Where the 238 words per minute figure comes from

Every number above rests on one source. It is a review by Marc Brysbaert of Ghent University, published in the Journal of Memory and Language. He pooled 190 studies of adult silent reading in English and found an average of 238 words per minute for non-fiction and 260 for fiction. The gap is mostly word length, because non-fiction uses longer words and longer words take longer to read. A separate pool of 77 studies of reading aloud averaged 183.

For silent reading, most adults fell between 175 and 300 wpm on non-fiction and between 200 and 320 on fiction. So 238 is a middle, not a limit, and plenty of normal readers sit well above or below it. Rates were lower for children, older adults and people reading English as a second language.

Brysbaert also notes that reading rates match the fastest speed at which people can follow speech. That suggests the limit comes from how we process language in general, not from anything special about reading, which is one reason the numbers hold up across so many studies. The British Psychological Society's research digest gives a shorter, plainer summary if you don't want the whole paper.

Averages and ranges from the 2019 Brysbaert meta-analysis: non-fiction 175 to 300 (average 238), fiction 200 to 320 (average 260), and reading aloud at 183.

Why 200 and 300 words per minute are everywhere

You'll see 300 wpm called the normal reading rate in textbooks and popular articles. Brysbaert's review found the real average lower, and he warns that 300 is an unrealistic target for most people. Meanwhile 200 wpm, a favorite of word count sites, sits inside the normal range but under the average. That makes it a cautious figure: it rounds your estimate up.

What speeds you up or slows you down

Three things move your number more than any trick.

The text matters. As the review found, fiction reads about 22 words per minute faster than non-fiction, mostly because its words are shorter. Dense, technical writing sits at the slow end of any range.

Your purpose matters too. Psychologist Ronald Carver proposed that people shift between reading gears. As Brysbaert reports them, his estimates were about 200 wpm when reading to pass a test on the material, 450 when skimming for ideas and 650 when scanning for one word. Treat those as proposals, not measurements, but the direction is right: reading to learn is slower than reading to get the gist.

Finally, the reader matters. The ranges above are for typical adults. Children, older adults and second-language readers tend to read more slowly.

Can speed reading get you to 1000 words per minute?

Not without paying for it. Brysbaert's review leans on earlier work by Keith Rayner and colleagues, whose review of speed reading explained why rates above 1000 wpm are impossible without a severe loss of understanding. Your eyes pause on a few words at a time and then jump, and there is only so much text you can take in during each pause.

That doesn't mean skimming is useless. Skimming a page for the one number you need is a different task from reading it, and it can be quick. Just don't count a skimmed page as a read page.

Sets the 238 words per minute adult average against claims of more than 1000, which a review by Rayner and colleagues says come with a severe loss of understanding.

How to calculate reading time for your own text

You need two numbers: how many words the text has, and how fast the reader goes.

1. Count the words. Paste the text into the Word Counter for an exact total.
2. Pick a speed. Use 238 for adult non-fiction, 260 for fiction, 183 for reading aloud.
3. Divide and round up. Words ÷ speed gives minutes. A 1,742-word article is 7.3 minutes at 238, so label it 8 minutes.

The formula words divided by words per minute equals minutes, with a worked example: 1742 words at 238 per minute is 7.3 minutes, which rounds up to 8.

So how long does it take to read 1000 words in our own calculator? It shows 5 min read, with "Exact: 4 min 12 s" printed underneath. The Reading Time Calculator uses the same research averages as the chart above, 238 wpm for silent reading and 183 for reading aloud. The large figure rounds up to whole minutes, the way a "min read" label does, and the exact time sits beneath it:

Rounding up can add nearly a minute, as the 5000 word row shows: 21 minutes 1 second becomes 22. That is deliberate, and the exact line is there for when you want the unrounded figure.

How many words fit in a 5, 10 or 20 minute read?

Sometimes you need the reverse: a time budget, and the word count that fits it. Multiply the minutes by the speed.

Writing a script you'll read word for word in five minutes? Aim for about 900 words. Want a blog post people finish in about five minutes? Roughly 1,200 works. A talk you deliver from notes will differ, since pauses and slides add time, so rehearse with a timer.

A reference card showing that 1190, 2380 and 4760 words fit 5, 10 and 20 minutes of silent reading at 238 words per minute, and 915, 1830 and 3660 words aloud at 183.

How to label reading time on a post

Readers glance at the label once, so keep it simple. Show whole minutes, because "7 min 18 s read" promises a precision no reader needs. Round up too. A reader who finishes early feels fine, and one who runs over feels the label was wrong.

Pick one speed and keep it across your site, so a 5 minute post always means about the same length. The Reading Time Calculator does this for you: it divides your word count by 238 and rounds up, which is why even a ten-word draft says 1 min read. The blog you're reading uses the same rule for its own labels.

Last, count the words people will actually read. Code samples and long tables are worth leaving out of the count, or worth a few extra minutes if readers will study them line by line.

Frequently asked questions

How many words per minute does the average person read?

In a review of 190 studies, the average adult silent reading rate in English was 238 words per minute for non-fiction and 260 for fiction. Reading aloud averaged 183. Most adults fall between 175 and 300 words per minute on non-fiction.

How long does it take to read 2000 words?

About 8 minutes 24 seconds at the average silent rate of 238 words per minute. A faster reader at 300 needs 6 minutes 40 seconds, a slower one at 175 needs 11 minutes 26 seconds, and reading aloud at 183 takes about 10 minutes 56 seconds.

Is 300 words per minute a good reading speed?

It is a fast one. 300 sits at the top of the typical adult range for non-fiction (175 to 300), well above the 238 average. The researcher behind the review calls 300 an unrealistic target for most people.

How long does it take to read 10000 words?

About 42 minutes at the average silent rate of 238 words per minute. That becomes 33 minutes 20 seconds at 300 words per minute and 57 minutes 9 seconds at 175. Reading aloud at 183 takes about 54 minutes 39 seconds.

Why does the Reading Time Calculator say 5 minutes when the chart says 4 minutes 12 seconds?

Both use the same 238 words per minute. The calculator rounds up to whole minutes, the way a min read label does, and shows the exact time underneath, which for 1000 words is 4 minutes 12 seconds.

Check the reading time of your own text

You now know that the answer to "how long does it take to read 1000 words" is about four minutes, give or take two, and why. Paste your draft into the Reading Time Calculator for a quick estimate. It uses the same research averages as the chart and prints the exact time under the rounded label. Reading time also depends on how hard the text is, so check it with the Readability Checker, which scores sentence and word length and lists the sentences that run long.

If the draft feels slow to read, the Sentence & Paragraph Counter shows how long your sentences run, which is usually the first thing to trim.