Reading Time Calculator: How Long to Read a Book
This reading time calculator tells you how long a book will take to read. Enter the pages and the kind of book, or the word count, plus your reading speed and how many minutes a day you read. You get the total time in hours and minutes, the number of days and your finish date. Then print four reading plan bookmarks with a page target for every day.
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Average adult speeds: Brysbaert, M. (2019). How many words do we read per minute? A review and meta-analysis of reading rate. Journal of Memory and Language, 109, 104047. doi.org/10.1016/j.jml.2019.104047
Reading plan bookmarks
How long does it take to read a 320-page book?
A 320-page paperback takes the average adult about 6 hours 10 minutes to read. At 275 words a page the book has about 88,000 words, and the average adult reads about 238 words a minute. Enter your own speed and minutes a day above to see your days and finish date.
Estimated reading time calculator by kind of book
If you know only the page count, the calculator estimates the words from the kind of book: about 275 words a page for a mass-market paperback, 300 for a hardcover or trade paperback, and 175 for a children's chapter book. If you know the exact word count, enter that instead and the page size no longer matters.
Questions
How is the reading time worked out?
Reading time is the number of words divided by your reading speed in words per minute. For a page count, the calculator first multiplies the pages by the words per page for that kind of book. Days are that time divided by your minutes a day, rounded up.
How many words are on a page?
Words per page depend on the format of the book. A mass-market paperback usually has 250 to 300 words a page, a hardcover or trade paperback about 300, and a children's chapter book 150 to 200.
What is an average reading speed?
A 2019 review of 190 studies by Marc Brysbaert found that adults read English nonfiction silently at about 238 words a minute and fiction at about 260. Children read more slowly, and the reading speed test gives your own number.
How do the reading plan bookmarks work?
Each row on a plan bookmark is one day, with a box to tick, the date and the pages to read. A long plan runs across all four bookmarks in order; plans longer than about four months show one row per week.
What if I am already partway through a book?
Enter the page you are on in Start on page. The calculator then counts only the pages you have left.
Is the reading time calculator free?
The reading time calculator is free for personal and classroom use. It runs in your browser, with no sign-up.
Measure your speed with the reading speed test. Track the books themselves with the free reading trackers, or make a book bingo card.