Word Counter
Live counts for words, characters (with and without spaces), sentences, paragraphs and estimated reading time.
Built for fast, private, no-nonsense work.
Word Counter is part of PixHaul — a small set of browser-based tools we built because most of the “free online” alternatives are slow, ad-laden, and upload your files before they’ll process them. PixHaul does none of that.
Word Counter in four steps.
- 1
Paste or type your text
Drop any text into the editor. Counts update live with every keystroke.
- 2
Check the stats
Words, characters with spaces, characters without spaces, sentences, paragraphs, lines, and estimated reading + speaking time.
- 3
Aim for a target
Common targets — 280 chars for tweets, 60 chars for SEO titles, 500-word college essay sections, 1500-word blog posts. Now you can hit them.
- 4
Move on
Nothing to save or download — the stats are yours. Copy your text back when ready.
Questions, asked & answered.
How is “reading time” calculated?
We assume 220 words per minute, the average adult silent reading speed. Some sites use 200 or 250 — they’re all rough estimates because reading speed varies hugely with content difficulty and reader.
How is “speaking time” calculated?
140 words per minute, the average pace for spoken English (slightly slower than reading). Useful for estimating talk or podcast lengths.
Are HTML or Markdown tags counted as words?
Yes — they’re text. If you want a clean word count, paste only the readable prose, not the tags.
Why does my count differ from Microsoft Word?
Word uses slightly different rules for hyphens and contractions. PixHaul splits on whitespace, which matches the convention used by most word counters online. Differences are typically under 1 %.
Is my text uploaded?
No. The counter runs in your browser and we don’t even have a server endpoint for it. Your text is private.
Is there a character limit?
Practically no. We have tested with novels (~80,000 words / 500,000 characters) without issue.