Word Counter Widget
Add a live word counter to your writing or SEO pages. Readers type or paste text and see words, characters with and without spaces, sentences, paragraphs, reading and speaking time, and how the text fits common limits such as an X post or a meta description.
Live preview
Under the widget on your page: Powered by A2Z Tools
Embed code
<iframe src="https://a2z.tools/embed/w/word-counter" title="Word Counter by A2Z Tools" width="100%" height="850" style="border:0;width:100%" loading="lazy" allow="clipboard-write"></iframe>
A plain iframe. Works everywhere, including site builders that strip scripts. Adjust height if your content needs more room.
<div data-a2z-widget="word-counter" data-height="850"></div> <script async src="https://a2z.tools/embed.js"></script>
Adds a small script (what it does) that sizes the widget to fit its content, loads it lazily and keeps it isolated from your page's CSS.
Works with
How it works
Words are counted with A2Z's shared text engine, which understands Unicode: contractions (don't) and hyphenated words (well-known) count once, and Chinese, Japanese and Thai text is segmented with the browser's word segmenter. Sentences are split on . ! ? and their CJK and Arabic equivalents, without breaking on abbreviations like Dr. or e.g., on initials or on decimals. Characters are counted as Unicode code points, so an emoji is one character. Reading time uses 238 words per minute, the average silent reading rate for English non-fiction in Brysbaert's 2019 meta-analysis; speaking time uses 150 words per minute. The limit bars compare the character count with common caps and say how far over a limit the text is.
Method
- Words: Unicode letter/digit runs; apostrophes and hyphens inside a word join it
- Reading time = words / 238 wpm (Brysbaert 2019); speaking time = words / 150 wpm
- Characters = Unicode code points; without spaces = all whitespace removed
- Limits: X post 280, meta description ~160, title tag ~60, SMS 160, Instagram caption 2,200, LinkedIn post 3,000
Limitations
- The X bar counts plain code points; X's own weighting (links as 23, CJK and most emoji as 2) is not reproduced.
- An SMS limit of 160 applies only to GSM-7 text; a single emoji or non-Latin letter switches a real SMS to UCS-2 with 70 characters per part, which is not modelled.
- The 60-character title and 160-character description marks are common guidance, not published search-engine limits (those truncate by pixel width).
- Reading time assumes English prose; code, tables and dense technical text are read far more slowly.
Where publishers use it
- Blogging and copywriting guides with word-count targets
- School and university pages about essay length limits
- Social-media marketing tutorials on post length
- Freelance-writing sites that price by the word
Questions
Why does my word processor show a different count?
Tools disagree on hyphenated words, numbers with separators and URLs. This counter treats well-known and don't as one word each and counts numbers as words.
Does X (Twitter) count characters the same way?
Not exactly. X counts every link as 23 characters and CJK characters and most emoji as two, so treat the X bar as a guide.
How is reading time calculated?
Words divided by 238 words per minute, the average adult silent reading rate for non-fiction. Technical text is usually read more slowly.
Is my text stored?
No. Counting happens in the browser and the text is gone when the page closes.
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 - Elsevier . 238 wpm silent reading of English non-fiction
- Unicode Standard Annex #29: Unicode Text Segmentation - Unicode Consortium . Word boundaries behind Intl.Segmenter for CJK and Thai
Cite or recommend this tool
If you reference this tool in an article, course or documentation, these formats are ready to copy. They are optional - nothing is added to your site unless you paste it.
A2Z Tools Word Counter https://a2z.tools/character-count
<a href="https://a2z.tools/character-count">A2Z Tools Word Counter</a>
[A2Z Tools Word Counter](https://a2z.tools/character-count)
Word Counter by A2Z Tools - https://a2z.tools/character-count
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