What the Speech Time Calculator does
This calculator tells you how long a speech, presentation or video script takes to say out loud. Paste the script, or just type a word count, choose a speaking pace, and it gives the time at that pace and at four others, the pauses you plan to leave, a start time for every section, and the silent reading time. It also works backwards: give it a time limit and it tells you how many words fit.
A 500-word speech takes about 3 minutes 51 seconds at 130 words a minute, a common pace for presentations, and from about 3 to 5 minutes across the usual range of 100 to 160 words a minute. Those paces are planning conventions used by speechwriters and presenters rather than measured norms, so the most accurate pace is your own: read for one minute and count. Words are counted in your browser with the same tokeniser as the site's word counter; the script is never uploaded.
How to use it
- Paste your script into the box, or type a word count in the field below it.
- Choose a pace: slow (100 wpm), relaxed (120), average presentation (130), conversational (150) or fast (160). Pick "My own pace" to enter a rate you have measured.
- Open "Pauses" to allow time after each sentence and between paragraphs. Write [pause] in the script where you will stop for effect, or [pause 3s] for a specific length; markers are not counted as words.
- Start lines with # to mark sections (# Opening, # Main point, # Close). The heading lines are not counted as spoken words, and each section gets its own start time - useful for slides or a teleprompter.
- To write to a limit, enter the target minutes and seconds. The tool shows the words that fit at each pace and how far over or under your script is.
Reading the results
The headline is speaking time plus pauses. The pace table shows the same script at other speeds, which is the honest range to plan for: most people speak faster on the day than in rehearsal, so leave a margin if a hard time limit applies.
Section times start at 0:00 and run on, including a paragraph pause between sections, so you can write them next to slide numbers or chapter markers in a video.
Silent reading time uses 238 words a minute, the average for non-fiction found in a 2019 review of reading-speed research. It is how long the same text takes to read, not to say - useful for comparing a blog post with its spoken version.
Worked example: how long is a 500-word speech
At 130 words a minute, 500 words take 500 ÷ 130 × 60 = 230.8 seconds, which is 3 minutes 51 seconds. At the slower 100 wpm it is exactly 5:00; at 120 wpm 4:10; at 150 wpm 3:20; at 160 wpm 3:08.
Add pauses: a script with 25 sentences in 6 paragraphs, half a second after each sentence and 1.5 seconds between paragraphs, adds (25 − 6) × 0.5 + 5 × 1.5 = 17 seconds - taking the 130-wpm time to about 4:08.
Working backwards, a 5-minute slot at 130 wpm holds 5 × 130 = 650 words; at 150 wpm it holds 750. If you also want 20 seconds of pauses, the 130-wpm figure drops to 4 min 40 s × 130 = 606 words.
Formulas and scoring rules
- Speaking time
seconds = words ÷ wpm × 60 + pauses- Pauses
pauses = (sentences − paragraphs) × sentence pause + (paragraphs − 1) × paragraph pause + Σ [pause] markersA paragraph pause replaces the sentence pause at the end of each paragraph; [pause] alone counts as the marker length you set (2 s by default).- Words for a time limit
words = (target seconds − pause allowance) ÷ 60 × wpm, rounded down- Silent reading time
seconds = words ÷ 238 × 60238 wpm is the non-fiction average reported by Brysbaert (2019).- Word counting
letters or digits joined by apostrophes or hyphens are one word (don't, twenty-five); # heading lines and [pause] markers are not counted
How to find your own speaking pace
Take a passage you have not rehearsed, set a timer for one minute and read it aloud as you would on the day. Count the words you got through - or paste the passage into this tool and use the count. Do it twice and take the average, then choose "My own pace". A pace measured from a real rehearsal of your script is better still: time the whole run-through and divide the word count by the minutes.
If you will be speaking through an interpreter, to a large room, or to listeners in a second language, plan for the slower end. Recorded narration for video and podcasts usually sits at the conversational end.
Why scripts run long
Applause, laughter, audience questions, a slide that will not advance and the habit of adding asides all add time that a word count cannot see. For anything with a strict limit - a competition, a broadcast, a wedding schedule - aim to finish about 10% under the target in rehearsal.
Limitations: what the result does not prove
- The paces are conventions for planning, not research norms; actual speaking rates vary widely between people, languages and occasions.
- Numbers, dates, abbreviations and URLs take longer to say than their written word count suggests: "1,250" is one word on the page and five spoken (one thousand two hundred and fifty).
- Word counting is designed for languages with spaces between words. For Chinese, Japanese, Thai and similar scripts the browser's word segmentation is used, and words per minute is a less useful measure for those languages.
- It does not detect speaking difficulty, emphasis or tone; it times words, not delivery.
Privacy: where your data goes
Everything you paste, type or drop is processed in this browser tab. It is not uploaded, logged, stored or sent to analytics. Session recording and tag-manager scripts are switched off on this page.
Standards and sources
- Brysbaert, M. (2019). How many words do we read per minute? Journal of Memory and Language, 109, 104047
- Unicode Standard Annex #29 - Unicode Text Segmentation (word boundaries)
Frequently asked questions
How long is a 500-word speech?
About 3 minutes 51 seconds at an average presentation pace of 130 words a minute, ranging from about 3 minutes at a fast 160 wpm to 5 minutes at a slow 100 wpm. Pauses, applause and laughter add to that, so rehearse it once with a timer.
How many words is a 5-minute speech?
About 650 words at 130 words a minute, or 500 to 800 words across the usual range of 100 to 160 wpm. If you plan pauses for effect, subtract them first: with 30 seconds of pauses, a 5-minute slot at 130 wpm holds about 585 words.
How many words per minute is normal when speaking?
Planning guides commonly use 120 to 150 words a minute for presentations and conversation, with 100 for slow, careful delivery and 160 or more for fast, energetic speech. These are conventions rather than a fixed norm; timing yourself reading for one minute gives your own figure.
How long does it take to say 1,000 words?
About 7 minutes 42 seconds at 130 words a minute, 6 minutes 40 seconds at 150 and 10 minutes at 100. A 1,000-word article takes about 4 minutes 12 seconds to read silently at 238 wpm, which is why a written piece feels shorter than the same text spoken.
How do I time a script for a YouTube video?
Paste the script, choose the conversational pace of 150 wpm (or your own measured rate), and mark each chapter with a # heading. The section table gives a start time for every chapter that you can use for video chapter markers, then adjust after recording.
Do pauses count in speech length?
Yes - a script read with natural pauses takes noticeably longer than its word count suggests. Add a sentence and paragraph pause under "Pauses", or write [pause] or [pause 3s] at the points where you will stop, and they are added to the total and to each section's time.
Last reviewed by the A2Z.Tools team against the sources listed above.
