Words to minutes, worked out
| Words | Said aloud, calm (130 wpm) | Said aloud, conversation (150 wpm) | Typed (40 wpm) | Read silently (238 wpm) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 100 | 46 sec | 40 sec | 2 min 30 sec | 25 sec |
| 250 | 1 min 55 sec | 1 min 40 sec | 6 min 15 sec | 1 min 3 sec |
| 500 | 3 min 51 sec | 3 min 20 sec | 12 min 30 sec | 2 min 6 sec |
| 750 | 5 min 46 sec | 5 min | 18 min 45 sec | 3 min 9 sec |
| 1,000 | 7 min 42 sec | 6 min 40 sec | 25 min | 4 min 12 sec |
| 1,500 | 11 min 32 sec | 10 min | 37 min 30 sec | 6 min 18 sec |
| 2,000 | 15 min 23 sec | 13 min 20 sec | 50 min | 8 min 24 sec |
| 2,500 | 19 min 14 sec | 16 min 40 sec | 1 hr 3 min | 10 min 30 sec |
| 3,000 | 23 min 5 sec | 20 min | 1 hr 15 min | 12 min 36 sec |
| 5,000 | 38 min 28 sec | 33 min 20 sec | 2 hr 5 min | 21 min 1 sec |
Rounded to the second. People vary a lot; the calculator above uses your own speeds.
How long is a speech of N words?
Divide the words by your speaking speed. Most people talk at roughly 130 to 160 words per minute in English, often a little slower in a talk than in conversation. A 5-minute talk is about 650 to 750 words; a 10-minute talk about 1,300 to 1,500. Pauses for slides, laughter or questions come on top.
Typing, dictating, reading
- Typing at the common 40 words per minute takes about three to four times as long as saying the same words.
- Dictating is saying it, plus fixing what came out wrong. Even with a cautious 15% of the words fixed by keyboard, it is usually much faster than typing.
- Reading silently is the fastest of all: adults read English non-fiction at about 238 words per minute on average (Brysbaert, 2019).
Write by voice on your Mac
Volna types what you say into any app on your Mac: mail, chats, documents, code. It runs offline on your Mac, and it is free.
More
- Typing vs. speaking speed test: measure your own speeds in two minutes.
- Dictation for Mac that never leaves your Mac