Manuscript Word Counter
Paste your draft and watch the numbers update as you type — word count, estimated KDP pages, reading time, even how long the audiobook would run.
Estimates
Readability
Where these numbers come from
Every estimate here is a real, named formula — not a guess dressed up as precision.
Page count
KDP doesn't publish a single words-per-page figure — it depends on trim size, font and margins. 250 words/page is the common working number for a standard trade paperback; a taller 6×9 novel trim fits more, large print far less. Pick the trim that matches your plan above.
Reading & audiobook time
Silent reading time uses 238 words/minute, the commonly cited adult average. Audiobook length uses 9,300 words/hour — the same industry pace figure Born to Publish's own app uses to estimate narration length for a finished book.
Readability score
The Flesch Reading Ease score weighs average sentence length against average syllables per word — 206.835 − 1.015×(words/sentence) − 84.6×(syllables/word). Syllables are estimated by counting vowel groups, so treat the number as directional, not exact.
Questions authors actually ask
Does my manuscript get uploaded anywhere?
No. Every count happens in your browser with plain JavaScript — nothing you paste here is sent to a server, logged, or stored. Close the tab and it's gone.
Why does my page count differ from what KDP shows after upload?
This is a words-per-page estimate before formatting. KDP's actual page count depends on your final trim size, font, line spacing and front/back matter — it's normal for the two numbers to differ by 5–15%.
What's a "good" readability score for a novel?
Most commercial fiction sits in the 70–90 range (fairly easy to easy). Literary fiction and nonfiction with technical vocabulary often run lower — a low score isn't a defect, it just means denser sentences.
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