Words in a minute
How many words a person actually speaks in one minute, why the number you were given is probably wrong for you, and how to measure your own.
Reading aloud, the measured average is 183 words per minute; silent reading of non-fiction is 238. Ordinary conversation runs faster still. The 110 to 160 words per minute range used for planning speeches sits below all of these on purpose, because delivering a prepared talk is not the same act as reading to yourself. Source: Brysbaert, M, a meta-analysis of 190 studies and 18,573 participants.
Words per minute at a glance
| Activity | Words per minute | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| Reading aloud | 183 | Brysbaert (2019), 77 studies |
| Silent reading, non-fiction | 238 | Brysbaert (2019), 190 studies |
| Silent reading, fiction | 260 | Brysbaert (2019) |
| Prepared presentation delivery | 130 | Planning pace, not a measurement |
| Deliberate delivery | 110 | Planning pace, not a measurement |
| Video and voiceover script | 160 | Planning pace, not a measurement |
The distinction matters. Averaging every number above into one figure produces an answer that is wrong for all three use cases at once.
Measure your own rate instead of guessing
A population average tells you nothing about the pace you actually speak at, and the gap is routinely 30 words per minute in either direction. Thirty seconds of measurement settles it.
- Open the words to time calculator and press Test my pace.
- Read the sample passage at the pace you would use delivering a talk, not chatting.
- Stop after ten to fifteen seconds. The tool divides words spoken by elapsed time.
- Your number is applied to every estimate on the page and stored only in your browser.
Do it standing, and project your voice. Seated reading is meaningfully faster than speaking to a room, and that is exactly the gap rehearsal is supposed to close.
What actually changes your rate
- Prepared versus spontaneous. Reading a script aloud is slower than talking, and both are slower than conversation. The meta-analysis measured reading, not conversation.
- Material difficulty. Technical vocabulary, numbers and proper nouns all add articulation time that a word count cannot see.
- Audience. Delivering to non-native listeners pulls the rate down. Delivering to colleagues on camera pushes it up.
- Nerves. Most speakers speed up under pressure, which is why rehearsing at a slower pace than feels natural is standard advice.
- Punctuation. Commas, full stops and paragraph breaks create real silence. A script with heavy punctuation runs longer at the same nominal rate.
The Delivery Coach in the calculator reports the first three of these directly against your own script, which is why a single words-per-minute figure is not enough for planning.
Questions about speaking rate
It depends what you mean by speaking. Ordinary conversation runs considerably faster than a prepared talk. Brysbaert's 2019 meta-analysis of 190 studies measured reading aloud at 183 words per minute and silent reading of non-fiction at 238. The 110 to 160 words per minute range this site offers is a planning range for scripted delivery, not a measurement of everyday speech.
At the 130 words-per-minute planning pace, 130 words. At a deliberate 110 it is about 110 words, and at a brisk 160 it is about 160. Measured conversational speech runs faster than all of these. If you only need a rough figure, 130 words per minute is a safe planning default.
Because they are not research averages. The 110, 130 and 160 words-per-minute options are planning paces chosen to show how much delivery pace moves a total, and they are labelled as planning values. The measured figures used for reading modes come from Brysbaert's 2019 meta-analysis and are cited with their sample size in the pace reference on the home page.
It looks at the script you pasted for five things no timing calculator reports: runs of words with no punctuation long enough to run out of breath, filler words and what removing them would save you, words that are hard to say cleanly, numbers that are easy to rush or misread, and sentences heavy enough to slow delivery. Every finding links to the exact line in your script.