Word Counter

There's no magic number — it should be as long as the topic genuinely warrants. That said, the median page on the first page of Google for competitive informational queries is 1,400–2,000 words. Comprehensive guides routinely run longer. Don't pad to hit a target; pad and you'll get cut.

Any sequence of non-whitespace characters. Hyphenated terms like 'state-of-the-art' count as one word. Numbers count as words. URLs are a single word. We mirror Google Docs' behavior so the count matches what you see in your editor.

Google Docs sometimes counts headings and footnotes separately. We count everything in the input box together. The bigger discrepancy is usually with hyphenated words — different tools split them differently. We treat them as single words.

Not directly, but it's a good UX signal. Reading time gives readers a quick scope check before they invest. Google indirectly rewards pages that hold attention — the time-on-page metric correlates with rankings even if it isn't a direct factor. Display reading time prominently if your average is under 8 minutes.

Yes. Captions are part of the readable content and Google indexes them. They count toward word count for SEO purposes. The tool above counts whatever you paste in.