Armed with these word counts, i now have a range of lengths that have been proven popular. The average across a sample of 50 books in august 2015 showed 172 words per kindle edition normalized page. How many words are in the average philosophy book answers. It only takes a quick scan of a handful of ebooks, say in the kindle store, to notice that the number of pages that constitutes an ebook is almost as wide as the pacific.
The hunger games uses 3,700word chapters, dividing each chapter into three parts. Estimate your page count book designer linda parke. This 90,000word guideline for how many words in a novel is just that, a guideline. Paperback books typically contain how many words per page. Right now, when it comes to novellength word count, its all about 90,000 words. According to amazon s great text stats feature, the median length for all books is about 64,000 words. Most agree that under 1,000 words would be rather short and that over 5,000 might be rather too long. These are basic learning books that creatively teach colors, numbers or simple, fun stories for bedtime. Targeted for 2 to 8yearold kids, this type of book typically has between 400 800 words. The 250wordsperpage rule is a copysetting estimate. If you are selfpublishing, you do have some leeway but remember that you want to be competitive in the market with all the other picture books. Thats the level where publishers may suggest dividing a story into multiple volumes. This is because printers print on large sheets of paper and fold it.
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. Young adult novel 60,000 words on average, young adult novels usually fall around 55,000 and 70,000 words. Some 6090k ya books get classified as hilo, but i dont think they were specifically written for the category. This number was significantly different from the average we had seen for the estimated print length that had been given in the product details of each books amazon sales page. The average singlespaced document typed in 12point font contains about 500 words per page, but that can vary pretty drastically depending on. A story that is over 40,000 words is generally considered a novel. Avoid i, we, this writer, and other selfreferential words and phrases. Average the count by taking the total number of words counted and divide by three. Harry potter and the halfblood prince 168,000 words. About how many words of that size are in your average 250 300 page book. All books vary on words, especially in a teens novel. For most publishers, a book is novellength when its between 50,000 and 110,000 words. Harry potter and the sorcerers stone has an average of 4,560 words per chapter.
Therefore, a 55,000 word book should be about 200 manuscript pages. The hunger games has 27 untitled chapters, and about 3700 words per chapter. The average wordcount for adult fiction is between 70,000 to 120,000 words. Perkins agency in new york says its much easier to market a firsttime novelists book if the word count falls between 80,000 and 100,000 words, or roughly 300 doublespaced, typed pagesthe average novel length. For example, if your book has about 20 chapters, you can put. Long book length at the other end of the spectrum a book of 80,000 to 100,000 words has significant heft, 320400 pages.
The total page count excluding appendices and index is 204 pages, thus about 93,000 words. Better to have solid, clear information than rambling to make a page count. May 11, 2009 for a printed book, 37,000 words is definitely on the short side less than 150 pages so publishers may not be interested as pricing will be low and volumes needing to be correspondingly high. On the upper end, a novel over 110,000 words is considered an epic. Roughly how many pages would 50,000 words produce in a. The average words from 60,000 words to 200,000 or more words in a whole novel.
Ensure all pages were included in the count and adjust the count if necessary. Harry potter and the deathly hallows 198,000 words. Although the average size of a kindle ebook is a useful bit of information to file away for any aspiring or experienced ebook writer, it is really just thatan average. The typical books wordsperpage count tends to range between 225 and 275an average of 250. Virtually every book i try to shop by a debut author thats any longer than thatregardless of categoryreceives the same response from editors. Id guess that the actual average number of words in a novel was. Stick to 500 words to increase your chances of acceptance. How long are the chapters in books by famous authors.
If the book is an edited collection, give the reader an overview of the book. This number can vary depending on if youre writing dialogue or how short each. Some will tell you 2,500 words is the average, while others will say that 3,000 to 5,000 word chapters are more likely to be the norm. Jun 27, 2019 a story that is over 40,000 words is generally considered a novel. A minimum count for a nonfiction ebook is about 10,000 words, as long as the content is solid.
How to write a highquality ebook in 30 days copyblogger. For debut books in this field the average word count tends to be 35k and it has therefore become the marker many industry professionals look for in queries from new writers. Using your current word count and the appropriate formula below, calculate the number of pages you can expect in your finished book. Oct 18, 2017 as with everything else when it comes to writing a book, these are only guidelinesnot rules. Frequently asked questions getting published meg cabot. After all, if you peruse the shelves of any school or public library, youll see that books come in all different sizes, just like they come in different genres. Your guide to book word counts fiction and nonfiction. Onethird of the novels that come into the agency are rejected because theyre too long or.
On average, there are about 300 words per page in a book. Nonfiction wordcounts sit between 70,000120,000 words. However, it will be on the short side, as the average length of a novel hovers. Depending on your genre, having too many or too little can not only hurt your book sales, but also cause fewer 5star. Most adult books are about 90,000 words, and no longer than 100,000 words unless youre jk rowling. Jun 07, 2017 in my opinion, if your nonfiction book is fewer than about 30,000 words 120 pages, it does not feel substantial enough to be real book. For average word counts based on genre, see this handy reference. The 57 year old reading range straddles a few different categories of books. As with everything else when it comes to writing a book, these are only guidelinesnot rules. Publishers want to know the overall length of your book. This may particularly be the case in academia, legal proceedings, journalism and advertising. Lewis the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe, roald dahls charlie and the chocolate factory. How does your book measure compare to whats succeeding in todays marketplace. Most adult books are about 90,000 words, and no longer than 100,000 words unless.
Word count for famous novels organized commonplace book. Pages by paperback uses an industry standard formula for english language publishing of taking the average number of words per page and multiplying it by the average number of characters per word five including a space, for six total, the product of which is then used to divide against the total character count of the project. For the book hatchet, the actual word count is 41,672 and i give you 41,212. Obviously, my point is not that you should submit a first book of anywhere near. May 07, 2018 right now, when it comes to novellength word count, its all about 90,000 words. Also, the chapters are evenly divided into 3 titled parts. Its too much hassle and timeconsuming time you couldve spent refining and perfecting your book content. The word count is the number of words in a document or passage of text. General rule of thumb is that a novel is 80k to 100k, but you can have 120k on larger novels. I asked agents elizabeth pomada and michael larsen of larsen pomada literary agency to add their thoughts to the subject. Based on this list compiled by nicole humphrey cook. Somewhere around 20, one author shared a letter from amazon on one of the popular forum for kindle readers and writers, that said, content that is less than 2,500 words is often disappointing to our customers and does not provide an enjoyable reading experience. Oct 09, 2008 so far, i have about 35,000 words typed for the book i plan to publish.
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 books50% of books have fewer words and 50% of books have more words. Once you have a vision for your booksmall, standard, or wide formatyou can move on to the second step in deciding how many words you should write. Sep 20, 2019 how many words in a novel vary depending on genre, audience, and the story itself but in general, the average words in a novel is between 60,000 and 90,000 words for most genres. By most peoples standards, 40,000 words would be pretty short for a novel. It only takes a quick scan of a handful of ebooks, say in the kindle store, to notice that the number of pages that constitutes an. Oct 23, 2017 6 the average young adult author writes 3. That is saying a page with 12point font and double spaced with 1inch margins all around will average about 250 words, which were averaged at i believe 5 letters per word. Word counting may be needed when a text is required to stay within certain numbers of words. Word count for famous novels, in ascending order by number of words. How to find out the number of words in a book pen and.
Between 80,000 and 89,999 words is a good range you should be aiming for. Before our book page count calculator, you had to dig around through multiple sources to figure out how many words per page for your exact font size and then do the math. In fact, the large majority of young adult books are 70,000 90,000 words and. If the industry standard is 250 words per page and the book you read contains 200 pages then you could reasonably expect that the number of words read is 50,000.
A single novel can be longer, but once the length is above 110,000 words publishers may look at cutting it back, unless it is a particular kind of book books over the. This book is probably either a classic or written by an established author. It contains 38 lines per page, with an average of 12 words per line, thus 456 words per book page. This is a 100% safe range for literary, mainstream, womens. For a printed book, 37,000 words is definitely on the short side less than 150 pages so publishers may not be interested as pricing will be low and volumes needing to be correspondingly high. 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. The average fiction book is about 80,000 to 100,000 words, which is about. Mind you that great classic, the little prince, was such a work. Though the average word count of a chapter is around 2,000 5,000 words, it all depends on your story. Nonfiction books tend to be shorter, around 45,000 words on average, and novels ten to be longer, around 80,000 words on average. Each page contains about 34 lines, with an average word count of 11 words per line, thus 375 words per page. So, the average wordcount for a typical novel is anywhere from 70,000 to 120,000 words. This number was significantly different from the average we had seen for the estimated print length that had been given in the product details of each book s amazon sales page. We all know of outliers within each genre that have been published well under, or well over, these word counts.
Before diving into the specifics of genrebased word counts, lets look at the broader picture of average book length. I have a few books with varying numbers of words in them. That will give you a good guide if you want to emulate it. Using this exercise, you should end up with a good idea of book length expectations for a novel like yours.
The average nonfiction book is about 50,000 to 75,000 words, which is about 153 to 230 ebook pages. After all, if you peruse the shelves of any school or public library, youll see that books come in all different sizes, just. Feb 18, 2008 general rule of thumb is that a novel is 80k to 100k, but you can have 120k on larger novels. Word count is commonly used by translators to determine the price for the translation job. How many words in a novel vary depending on genre, audience, and the story itself but in general, the average words in a novel is between 60,000 and 90,000 words for most genres. Novels for adult readers fall between 80,000 and 120,000 words. Discover the average number of words on a page by counting the number of words on three randomly picked full pages distributed throughout the book. According to amazons great text stats feature, the median length for all books is about 64,000 words.
Apr 01, 2020 how long does it take to write a 300 page book. Today, however, while the physical size of a book may still matter in a bookstore, ebooks have no dimensions. A 300 page book can take 4 9 months to write at an average of about 80,000 words, writing 1500 or more per week. Amazon ebook page length by genre kindle page length. When i started writing three years ago, the mg word count i kept hearing was no more than 30,000 words.
Oct 10, 2016 most of the data ill be using throughout this article was sourced from writers digest and the manuscript appraisal agency, with any differences split to find the average. Search for word count totals in books word counters. Book page count calculator how many pages is my novel. Also, heres another list i may swipe and add in here. This averages to about 22 to 23 chapters per novel, with the average chapter length around 4,280 words. For childrens fiction, the general rule is the younger the audience the shorter the book, and for ya novels the average is 50,00070,000 words. Having said all that, there are a number of conventions regarding word count. Some editors charge a minimum fee for their services to cover the cost of their time and energy spent on a particular project in lieu of other work. The first alone has sold more than 120 million copies, and the rest have sold at least 65 million each. There are plenty of books that purposefully play with the word counts of their chapters. Here are the average novel word counts in the top five genres in the book publishing industry in no particular order. Writing for young adults a look at the numbers hannah holt. 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. On average, how long is a childrens book for children.
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. However, it will be on the short side, as the average length of a novel hovers around 50,00070,000 words. It depends on the font you are using, of course, but in general, 250300 words per page. An approximate word count round numbers based on what your wp tells you enables them to estimate costs and other factors involved in printing a book. This should capture the authors writing style and provide a reliable estimate of the number of words used by the. So itll be off on occasion, but it still works well for the average book. Generally, 50,000 would be considered the minimum word count, and ideally a novel should be over 70,000 words.
Illustrate your points with examples from one or more chapters. The 250 words perpage rule is a copysetting estimate. So far, i have about 35,000 words typed for the book i plan to publish. No more than 90,000 words seems to be the editors mantra these days. Books can be as short as 25,000 words, around 100 pages, or as long as 3 million words, or about 1,000 pages. Each genre and subgenre has its own word count range.