How long does your content really take to read?

From Marc Brysbaert's 2019 meta-analysis of reading-rate studies, which puts the mean silent reading rate for adults reading English non-fiction at about 238 wpm. It is a measured average, not a marketing number, and the field stays editable because your audience may read faster or slower.

They are honest averages, not measurements of your actual readers. Real adult reading speeds range roughly from 175 to 300 wpm, and skimming (which is how most people read web pages) is faster still. Treat the estimate as a solid middle, and adjust the wpm for your audience.

Scripts: videos, podcasts, presentations, webinars. At a typical presentation pace of about 150 wpm, a 1,500-word script runs about ten minutes. Conversational speech is faster; slow, deliberate delivery is slower. The field is editable for exactly that reason.

It is a small, honest courtesy that sets expectations, and many readers like it. There is no solid evidence it changes rankings or AI citations either way. If you show one, compute it the way this tool does rather than inventing a flattering number.

Not directly. AI answer engines quote the passage that answers the question; they do not reward length itself. Reading time matters for the humans who click through from a citation: if the page wastes their time, they do not come back. Write as long as the question requires and no longer.

No. Counting and timing happen in your browser when you press Calculate; nothing is sent to a server, logged or stored.