Reading time estimates answer a simple question: how long will this take me? The calculation is one division, but the words-per-minute rate you choose changes the answer a lot. Using bands instead of a single rate gives readers an honest estimate rather than a false precise one.
The formula
Reading time (minutes) = word count / words per minute (WPM). Adult silent reading averages roughly 200 to 250 WPM for ordinary prose; one cited meta-analysis puts the average near 238 WPM. Technical or unfamiliar material reads slower, light fiction faster. Children, language learners, and readers on small screens are slower still.
Example: an 1,800-word article. At 200 WPM: 1,800 / 200 = 9 minutes. At 250 WPM: 1,800 / 250 = 7.2 minutes, about 7 minutes. Reporting “7-9 min read” is more honest than picking one number, and most platforms show a range or round to the nearest minute.
Slow, average, and fast bands
Slow readers, around 150 WPM, take 12 minutes for that 1,800-word article. Average readers at 200-250 WPM take 7-9 minutes. Fast readers at 300 WPM take 6 minutes. If your audience includes learners or older readers, lean toward the slower band. If you publish a single figure, 200 WPM is the safer default because it under-promises and readers finish early rather than late.
Skimming changes everything: a reader scanning headings and first lines may cover the same article in 2-3 minutes without really reading it. Reading time estimates assume actual reading, not scanning.
Adjusting for images and layout
Images pause readers. A common planning allowance is about 10 seconds per image for a quick look, more for charts and diagrams that need study. Five images add roughly a minute. Code blocks, tables, and long lists slow readers too, since they require a different kind of attention than prose. Video embeds are separate: add the video length only if you expect readers to watch, not just scroll past.
Worked example: a 1,800-word article with 6 images at 200 WPM. Text: 9 minutes. Images: 6 x 10 seconds = 1 minute. Total: about 10 minutes. Round to the nearest minute for display; nobody trusts “10 minutes 12 seconds”.
Counting words honestly
Count the words a reader actually reads: body text, captions, and list items. Exclude navigation, footers, and related-article teasers. Word processors count everything in the document, so paste only the article body into the count. And if your article is mostly a table or a photo gallery, a word-count estimate is misleading: say so, or give a time based on the content type instead.
Reading time on different devices
Reading speed changes with the medium. On a phone, readers scroll, get interrupted, and read in shorter bursts, so effective speed drops below desktop reading. A 9-minute desktop article can easily take 12 minutes on a phone with interruptions, even though the word count is identical.
Listening is slower still: spoken narration runs around 150 words per minute, so an 1,800-word article takes about 12 minutes as audio, versus 7 to 9 minutes read silently. If you publish an audio version, quote its length separately. And for video, the runtime is the runtime: reading time estimates do not apply at all.
Try it faster with the tool
You can follow every step above by hand, but the free Reading Time Calculator does the arithmetic for you. Enter your numbers and it gives the answer right away, so you can check your hand calculation or skip straight to the result.
Quick tips
- Minutes = word count / WPM.
- Default to 200 WPM for a safe single figure.
- Add about 10 seconds per image.