Speech Time Calculator

How it works

How this speech time calculator works

Speaking time is the word count divided by a pace in words a minute. The calculator does that sum for your speech, and also runs it backwards: give it your time slot and it tells you how many words fit, after the time you want to keep for questions, pauses and slide changes.

• Words to time and time to words

  Paste your speech to see how long it takes. Or enter your slot, such as 10 minutes, to see the most words you can say. A 10 minute slot holds 1,500 words at 150 words a minute before any margin.

• A plan, not just a count

  Add time for questions, a safety margin, planned pauses and slide changes. The tool takes them off your slot first, then tells you whether you fit, by how much, and how many words to cut.

• Timeline by paragraph

  See when each paragraph starts at your pace, and which paragraph crosses the limit. Add cues like [pause 3s] in the text to place a pause where you want one.

• Your own pace

  Press Start, read your speech aloud, press Stop, and use your measured words a minute instead of a general average. Nothing is recorded.

• Paces from sources

  Every preset shows where its figure comes from. Where a figure is only our planning value, such as the 130 words a minute Safe plan preset, the page says so.

• Private by design

  The sums run in your browser. Text you type or paste, and files you upload, are not sent anywhere. The only exception is loading a web page, which uses a small page-reading service.

The paces

The speaking paces behind the numbers

Here is every pace the tool offers and where it comes from. There is no single correct speaking rate, so the tool defaults to the average in the McGill guide and lets you change it.

Pace	Words a minute	What it is	Source
Average speaking	150	The average pace given for short talks in a university presenter guide. This is the default.	McGill 3MT guide
Speaking, most people	110 to 160	The range at which most people speak normally. In the same paper, five experienced speakers had average rates between 106 and 158.	Whitwam (1970)
Speaking to an audience	100 to 140	The range the paper says appears to cover an acceptable rate for most people addressing an audience.	Whitwam (1970)
Safe plan	130	Our planning value for a cautious pace. It sits inside the 100 to 140 range above, and no study gives 130 as an average.	Whitwam (1970)
Reading aloud	183	Average for adults reading English text aloud, from 77 studies with 5,965 readers.	Brysbaert (2019)

The 1970 paper is old, so treat its ranges as guides rather than rules. The 130 words a minute Safe plan preset is there for people who want to plan cautiously, for example when the time limit is strict. Because the same sum underlies the words to time converter, the two tools use the same paces and give the same answer for the same pace.

Words to minutes

How long does a speech take? Words to minutes table

Speaking time for common word counts at four paces. Times are minutes and seconds, from the same sum as the tool.

Words	Slow 110 a minute	Safe plan 130 a minute	Average 150 a minute	Fast 160 a minute
100	0:55	0:46	0:40	0:38
250	2:16	1:55	1:40	1:34
500	4:33	3:51	3:20	3:08
750	6:49	5:46	5:00	4:41
1,000	9:05	7:42	6:40	6:15
1,500	13:38	11:32	10:00	9:23
2,000	18:11	15:23	13:20	12:30
2,500	22:44	19:14	16:40	15:38
3,000	27:16	23:05	20:00	18:45
4,000	36:22	30:46	26:40	25:00
5,000	45:27	38:28	33:20	31:15

These are plain speaking times. Pauses, slide changes and questions add to them, which is what the plan options in the tool are for. A speech of 1,000 words takes 6 minutes 40 seconds at 150 words a minute, and 7 minutes 42 seconds at 130.

Minutes to words

How many words is a speech? Minutes to words table

How many words to write for a given time. The last column keeps a 10% safety margin free at the average pace, so you finish a little early rather than late.

Time	Slow 110 a minute	Safe plan 130 a minute	Average 150 a minute	Fast 160 a minute	Average with 10% margin
1 minute	110	130	150	160	135
2 minutes	220	260	300	320	270
3 minutes	330	390	450	480	405
5 minutes	550	650	750	800	675
7 minutes	770	910	1,050	1,120	945
10 minutes	1,100	1,300	1,500	1,600	1,350
15 minutes	1,650	1,950	2,250	2,400	2,025
20 minutes	2,200	2,600	3,000	3,200	2,700
30 minutes	3,300	3,900	4,500	4,800	4,050
45 minutes	4,950	5,850	6,750	7,200	6,075
60 minutes	6,600	7,800	9,000	9,600	8,100

A 5 minute speech is about 750 words at the average pace, and anywhere from 550 to 800 across the 110 to 160 range at which most people speak. The 10% margin is our suggestion, not a standard. Set it to 0 in the tool to see the plain figures.

Worked example

Plan a talk for a time slot

Say you have a 15 minute slot, want 3 minutes at the end for questions, expect 12 slide changes, and want to keep a 10% margin. Here is what the tool works out at 150 words a minute.

1. Take the questions time off the slot. 15:00 minus 3:00 leaves 12:00 for the talk.
2. Keep the margin free. 10% of 12:00 is 1:12, which leaves 10:48.
3. Allow for the slides. Twelve slide changes of 5 seconds each take 1:00. The 5 seconds is a starting value, so use your own.
4. Fill what is left with words. 9:48 at 150 words a minute is 1,470 words.

Without any of that planning, 15 minutes at 150 words a minute would suggest 2,250 words, which is 780 more than this plan allows. A 1,800 word draft in this case takes 13:00 with the slide changes, is over by 2:12, and the tool says to cut about 330 words.

Talk formats

How many words fit common talk formats?

Some formats set their own limit. These word counts are for a delivery at 150 words a minute, using only the time limit each organiser publishes.

Format	Limit	Words at 150 a minute	With 10% margin	Source
Three Minute Thesis (3MT)	3 minutes at most, with one static slide	450	405	3MT rules
Ignite talk	5 minutes: 20 slides, 15 seconds each	750	675	Ignite Talks
PechaKucha 20x20	400 seconds: 20 images, 20 seconds each	1,000	900	PechaKucha
TED talk	Recommended at 18 minutes or less	2,700	2,430	TED

Check the current rules for your event before you rely on this table. The 3MT rules disqualify a presenter who goes over 3 minutes, so the margin matters there. Ignite and PechaKucha fix the time per slide, so slide-change time is already inside their limit and you should not add it again in the tool.

Guide

How to use the speech time calculator

1. Under Your speech, paste your text, choose Upload (TXT, DOCX, PDF and more) or load a Web page. If you only know the length, choose Word count and enter the number.
2. Under Pace and time slot, pick a pace, or type your own words a minute. Enter your time slot in minutes and seconds, or choose one of the quick buttons.
3. Open Questions, safety margin, pauses and slides to set time for questions at the end, a margin, planned pauses and slide changes. Put [pause 3s] in your text to place a pause exactly where you want it.
4. Read Result. It shows your speaking time, whether the speech fits, how many words to cut if it does not, and the most words that fit your slot.
5. Open Timeline to see when each paragraph starts and which one crosses the limit. Open Your pace, press Start, read your speech aloud, press Stop, and use the measured pace.
6. Select Copy summary or Download .txt to keep the plan, or Copy settings link to share your pace and plan settings. The link never contains your text.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

How many words is a 5, 10 or 20 minute speech?

At 150 words a minute it is about 750 words for 5 minutes, 1,500 for 10 minutes and 3,000 for 20 minutes. At the cautious 130 words a minute it is 650, 1,300 and 2,600. Those are plain figures. If you also want questions, pauses or slides, enter them in the tool and it works out the real number.

How many words a minute should I speak in a speech?

There is no single correct rate. A university presenter guide (McGill) gives roughly 150 words a minute as the average for a short talk. A 1970 paper in the British Journal of Anaesthesia reports that most people speaking normally use 110 to 160 words a minute, and suggests 100 to 140 for addressing an audience. The 130 words a minute Safe plan preset is our planning value inside that range, not a measured average. The timer shows what your own delivery works out to.

Does speaking faster mean the audience understands less?

It can, for some listeners. A 1990 study by R. Griffiths in the journal Language Learning tested passages of 350 to 400 words at 100, 150 and 200 words a minute on lower-intermediate adult non-native English listeners. The 200 words a minute passages significantly reduced comprehension, while the scores at 100 and 150 did not differ significantly. Its title calls it a preliminary study, it covered one group of learners, and it does not tell us how native listeners respond. If your audience is listening in a second language, a slower pace is a reasonable choice. The study is in Language Learning.

How much of a safety margin should I keep?

There is no standard. The tool starts at 10% as a sensible buffer, and it is our suggestion, not a rule. Set it to 0 to see the plain figures. Keep more margin where the limit is strict. The Three Minute Thesis rules, for instance, disqualify a presenter who goes over 3 minutes. The margin is a share of the time left after the questions time.

How do I allow for pauses and slide changes?

Enter how many pauses you plan and how long each lasts, and the same for slide changes. The tool adds them to the speaking time. The defaults of 3 seconds per pause and 5 seconds per slide change are starting values, not measured figures, so time your own talk and change them. You can also type a cue such as [pause 3s] or [pause 1 min] in the text. A cue adds its time and is not counted as a word. The units it accepts are s, sec, secs, second, seconds, m, min, mins, minute and minutes, and a cue must have a unit and be no longer than 10 minutes.

How does the tool decide how many words to cut?

When your speech is longer than the time available, the tool takes the amount over, divides by your pace, and rounds up. If you are 132 seconds over at 150 words a minute, that is 330 words. After a cut of that size, the speech fits. It cannot choose which words to cut, so use the timeline to find the paragraph that crosses the limit, and trim from there.

What is the difference between this and the words to time converter?

The words to time converter gives reading and speaking time for any text. This page is for a talk with a time slot. It adds the slot, questions, a safety margin, pauses, slide changes, a pause cue for the script, and a check against the limit. Both use the same speaking paces.

How accurate is the speaking time?

It is exact for the pace you set, and as good as that pace is for you. A general average will be off for any one speaker, so measure yourself with the timer. Keep a margin for the day itself, because a laugh, applause or a slide that fails to load takes time you cannot plan exactly.

Does it work for other languages?

The paces are for English. Other languages and writing systems are spoken at different speeds, so the times will not be accurate. Text in Chinese, Japanese and other scripts written without spaces is counted with a browser word-splitting feature and flagged as an estimate.

Is my text uploaded or stored?

The text you type or paste, and the files you upload, are counted in your browser and are not sent to this site or anyone else. Two things do use the network. Reading a PDF downloads the open-source PDF.js reader from the jsDelivr CDN, but your file stays on your device. Web page sends the address you enter to a small page-reading service this site runs on Cloudflare Workers, which fetches that public page and returns its text. The service is written to store and log neither the address nor the text, though Cloudflare handles the request as any host does. A copy of your text and settings stays in your browser's local storage so a refresh does not lose your work, and Clear removes the text. This page also loads the site's advertising and analytics scripts, so avoid pasting highly confidential material into any web page you do not control.

Can I upload a file or load a web page, and what are the limits?

Yes. Under Upload, choose a TXT, MD, CSV, HTML, SRT, VTT, RTF, DOCX, ODT or PDF file of up to 10 MB. It is read inside your browser. Text beyond 2 million characters is cut off, only the first 300 pages of a PDF are read, and a scanned PDF that holds only images has no text to read. Subtitle files such as SRT and VTT count their words but not their time stamps. Under Web page, the reader cannot open pages that need a login, sites that refuse automated visits, or pages that add their text with JavaScript after loading. It reads about the first 1.5 MB of a page, gives up after 8 seconds, and allows about 12 pages a minute per visitor.

Sources

Sources

• 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. Link
• Whitwam, J. G. (1970). Spoken communication. British Journal of Anaesthesia, 42(9), 768-778. Link
• McGill University, 3MT Presenter Guidebook (pacing: average roughly 150 words a minute). Link
• Griffiths, R. (1990). Speech rate and NNS comprehension: A preliminary study in time-benefit analysis. Language Learning, 40(3), 311-336. Link
• TED Help Center, Do I need to keep talks within 18 minutes? (talks recommended at 18 minutes or less). Link
• University of Kansas, 3MT Competition Rules and Judging Criteria, which set out the rules of the University of Queensland Three Minute Thesis (3 minutes maximum, one static slide). Link
• Ignite Talks Guidelines (5 minutes, 20 slides, 15 seconds per slide). Link
• PechaKucha, About (20 images, 20 seconds each, 400 seconds). Link

The 130 words a minute Safe plan preset, the 10% margin, and the 3 and 5 second defaults for pauses and slide changes are planning values with no single study behind them.

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Last updated: November 2026