The short answer
With a 12-point font such as Times New Roman or Arial and 1-inch margins, a page holds about 500 words single-spaced and 250 double-spaced. So:
- 500 words: 1 page single-spaced, 2 double-spaced
- 1,000 words: 2 pages single-spaced, 4 double-spaced
- 2,000 words: 4 pages single-spaced, 8 double-spaced
- 5,000 words: 10 pages single-spaced, 20 double-spaced
Headings, short paragraphs, dialogue and lists all lower the words per page.
Reading and speaking time
Adults read about 200 to 250 words a minute and speak about 130 to 150. A 1,000-word article takes 4 to 5 minutes to read, and a 1,000-word speech takes about 7 minutes to give.
Word limits
When an essay or application says "no more than 500 words", count the way the reader will: most schools count every word in the body, including short words, and leave out the title and references unless told otherwise. Hyphenated words such as well-known usually count once.
Check your text
Paste it into the Word Counter for words, sentences, paragraphs and reading time. For limits set in characters, such as titles and meta descriptions, use the Character Counter, and the Readability Score shows how easy the text is to read.