Count Characters & Words
Character word count is a free, instant text analysis tool designed for writers, editors, SEO professionals, content marketers, and students. Paste or type any piece of writing into the editor below and watch as it analyses your content in real time - counting characters, words, sentences, paragraphs, and spaces, while estimating how long it would take an average reader to work through your text.
Beyond basic counts, this character word count tool lists your top 20 keywords - the words that carry the most weight in your writing - with frequency counts and percentage breakdowns. A fully customisable stopword list ensures common filler words like "the", "and", and "is" are excluded from keyword analysis, so you always see what truly matters. No sign-up, no data stored, no limits.
Character Word Count
About Character Word Count
Characters are counted as the total number of individual characters in your text, including punctuation, numbers, and spaces. This is the raw length of your input string.
Words are counted by splitting your text on whitespace and filtering out empty tokens. Hyphenated words (e.g. "well-known") are treated as a single word.
Sentences are detected by identifying groups of text that end with a full stop, exclamation mark, or question mark. While this covers the vast majority of sentence structures, highly unconventional punctuation may occasionally affect the count.
Paragraphs are counted as continuous blocks of non-empty text separated by one or more line breaks. Single-line breaks within a block are not treated as paragraph separators.
Keywords are extracted by tokenising your text, converting to lowercase, stripping punctuation, and removing any word found in the active stopword list. The remaining words are tallied by frequency and the top 20 are displayed with their count and percentage of total keyword occurrences. Percentages are relative to total non-stopword words only, not the full word count.
Frequently Asked Questions
What does this tool count?
This tool analyses your text in real time and provides six metrics: total characters (including spaces and punctuation), words, sentences, paragraphs, spaces, and an estimated reading time. It also identifies your top 20 most frequently used keywords, showing each word's count and its percentage share of all meaningful words in your text.
How are characters counted?
Characters are counted as the total number of individual characters in your text, including letters, numbers, punctuation marks, and spaces. This is the raw length of your input string. The tool displays both the total character count (with spaces) and the count excluding spaces, so you can use whichever figure is relevant to your platform or writing guidelines.
How are words counted?
Words are counted by splitting your text on whitespace and filtering out any empty tokens. Hyphenated words such as "well-known" are treated as a single word. The count updates instantly as you type or paste, with no button to press.
How are sentences counted?
Sentences are detected by identifying groups of text that end with a full stop, exclamation mark, or question mark. This covers the vast majority of sentence structures, though highly unconventional punctuation - such as ellipses used mid-sentence or abbreviations followed by a capital letter - may occasionally affect the count.
How are paragraphs counted?
Paragraphs are counted as continuous blocks of non-empty text separated by one or more blank lines. Single line breaks within a block are not treated as paragraph separators - only a blank line between two blocks of text creates a new paragraph in the count.
How is reading time calculated?
Reading time is estimated based on an average adult silent reading speed of 238 words per minute, a figure drawn from widely cited reading research. Results are shown in seconds for short texts and in minutes and seconds for longer pieces. The estimate is a useful guide rather than a precise measurement, as individual reading speeds vary considerably.
How does the keyword analysis work?
Keywords are extracted by tokenising your text, converting all words to lowercase, stripping punctuation, and removing any word found in the active stopword list. The remaining words are tallied by frequency and the top 20 are displayed with their raw count and their percentage share of all non-stopword words in your text - not the total word count. This gives you a clear picture of which content words carry the most weight in your writing.
What are stopwords and can I customise them?
Stopwords are common filler words - such as "the", "and", "is", and "of" - that are excluded from keyword analysis so the results focus on the words that actually carry meaning in your text. The tool comes pre-loaded with over 170 common English stopwords. You can expand the stopword panel at any time to remove words you want included in your keyword results, or add new stopwords specific to your industry or writing style. Your customisations apply immediately without needing to reload or recount.
Is my text stored or sent to a server?
No. All processing happens entirely in your browser using JavaScript. No text you enter is ever sent to a server, stored in a database, or shared with any third party. You can use this tool confidently with sensitive drafts, client copy, confidential reports, or any proprietary content - nothing leaves your device.
Do I need to create an account to use this tool?
No account, login, or sign-up is required. The tool is completely free to use with no usage limits and no paywalled features - every function is available to everyone immediately, without any friction.
What is this tool useful for?
This tool is useful for any situation where text length matters. Common use cases include checking that a social media post fits within a platform's character limit (such as X/Twitter's 280 characters or LinkedIn's post limits), ensuring an essay or assignment meets a required word count, auditing SEO content for keyword density, estimating reading time for blog posts or articles, and reviewing professional documents for length requirements. Writers, editors, students, content marketers, and SEO professionals all use character and word count tools as a regular part of their workflow.
What is the character limit for common platforms?
Character limits vary by platform. X (formerly Twitter) allows 280 characters per post for standard accounts. SMS messages are typically 160 characters per segment. Meta descriptions for SEO are recommended to stay between 150 and 160 characters. LinkedIn posts allow up to 3,000 characters. YouTube video descriptions allow up to 5,000 characters. Email subject lines are most effective at around 40 to 60 characters for mobile readability. Paste your text into this tool to instantly check whether it falls within any of these limits.
How many words should a blog post or article be?
Ideal word count depends on the purpose and audience. Short-form blog posts typically range from 500 to 800 words. Standard blog articles tend to perform well between 1,000 and 1,500 words. In-depth guides, pillar pages, and SEO-focused content often run from 2,000 to 3,000 words or more. Research consistently shows that longer, comprehensive content tends to rank better in search results, but quality and relevance matter more than hitting a specific word count. Use this tool to check your word count as you write or after pasting a finished draft.