Paste your text to see the average words per sentence, your longest sentences, and an estimated reading time.
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238 words/min
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What Average Sentence Length Tells You
Average sentence length is the number of words in your text divided by the number of sentences. This calculator splits your text into sentences, counts the words in each one, and shows the average along with a length breakdown, the longest sentences, and an estimated reading time. Style guides for public-facing writing note that long sentences are harder to understand, so the average is a quick way to see whether a draft is drifting long. It is a guide, not a score: a mix of short and long sentences usually reads better than sentences that are all the same length.
Where a Words-per-Sentence Check Helps
Plain-language and public documents
Check a notice, policy, or help page against the 15–20 word average that plain-language guidelines set.
Blog posts and web copy
Find the paragraphs where long sentences pile up before you publish, and tighten them first.
Essays, theses, and reports
Spot run-on sentences in a draft and see which ones to split before you hand it in.
Editing other people’s writing
Give a writer a number and a list of flagged sentences instead of a vague note to “shorten things”. Set the limit to match your style guide.
How to Check Your Writing
- Paste or type your text into the box, or click “Insert sample text” to try it.
- Read the average in the highlighted card. The length check below it tells you where that average falls.
- Look at “Longest sentences”, then split or trim the ones above your limit. Change the limit if your style guide uses a different number.
Note: The counts update as you type. Nothing needs to be submitted.
How the Count Works
- A sentence ends at a period, exclamation mark, or question mark followed by a space or the end of the text.
- Decimals and web addresses are not split, because no space follows the period. The abbreviations Mr., Mrs., Ms., Dr., Prof., Sr., Jr., vs., Inc., Ltd., Fig., e.g., and i.e. are also kept inside their sentence. Other abbreviations may be counted as sentence ends.
- Words are runs of text separated by spaces or line breaks that contain at least one letter or number. Hyphenated words and contractions count as one word.
- By default, every line break ends a sentence, so headings and list items count as sentences. Turn the option off if your text is hard-wrapped, as in text copied from some emails and PDFs.
- Blank lines always end a sentence and separate paragraphs.
Sentence Length Guidelines From Plain-Language Style Guides
These are published targets for public-facing writing, not rules for every kind of text.
| Source | Sentence length guidance |
|---|---|
| Plain English Campaign | Average of 15–20 words |
| US Social Security Administration (POMS) | Average of no more than 15–20 words per sentence |
| Australian Government Style Manual | Average of 15 words; no sentence longer than 25 |
| Texas Department of Insurance plain language checklist | Average of 20 words or less |
| Publications Office of the European Union | Ideally no more than 15–20 words per sentence |
Your own style guide, publisher, or instructor may set a different limit. Use the “Flag sentences longer than” box in the tool to match it.
Shortening Long Sentences
Ways to bring a high average down once the calculator shows where the long sentences are.
Split at conjunctions
In a flagged sentence, look for and, but, because, which. If the words on each side could stand alone, end the sentence there and start a new one.
Cut wordy phrases first
Replacing wordy phrases shortens a sentence without losing meaning: “in the event that” becomes “if”, and “in reference to” becomes “about”.
Vary the length on purpose
A run of sentences that are all about the same length can feel flat. After shortening, check the breakdown chart and keep a few short sentences next to longer ones.
Why Your Sentence Count Looks Off
An abbreviation splits one sentence into two
A period after an abbreviation such as “approx.” or “Gov.” looks like the end of a sentence, so the count goes up and the average goes down.
💡 See the solution▼
Headings and bullet points pull the average down
With the line-break option on, every heading and list item counts as its own short sentence, even without a period.
💡 See the solution▼
Hard-wrapped text counts every line as a sentence
Text copied from some emails and PDFs has a line break at the end of every line. With the line-break option on, each line becomes a sentence and the average drops sharply.
💡 See the solution▼
A good average hides one very long sentence
A single 60-word sentence among many short ones barely moves the average, but readers still have to get through it.
💡 See the solution▼
Sentence Length Questions
Q.What is a good average sentence length?
A. Plain-language guides such as those from the Plain English Campaign and the US Social Security Administration recommend an average of 15 to 20 words per sentence. The Australian Government Style Manual suggests an average of 15 words with no sentence longer than 25. The right number depends on your readers, so treat these as starting points.
Q.How does the calculator decide where a sentence ends?
A. A sentence ends at a period, exclamation mark, or question mark that is followed by a space or the end of the text. Closing quotation marks and brackets stay with the sentence. Decimals such as 3.5 and web addresses are not split, and neither are the abbreviations Mr., Mrs., Ms., Dr., Prof., Sr., Jr., vs., Inc., Ltd., Fig., e.g., and i.e. Blank lines always end a sentence, and single line breaks do too unless you turn that option off.
Q.What counts as a word?
A. Any run of text separated by spaces or line breaks that contains at least one letter or number. Hyphenated words and contractions such as “well-known” and “don’t” count as one word. Standalone symbols and dashes with spaces around them are skipped. A dash with no spaces, as in “word—word”, joins the two words into one.
Q.How is the reading time calculated?
A. The tool divides your word count by 238 words per minute, the average silent reading rate for English non-fiction among adults in a 2019 meta-analysis of 190 studies by Marc Brysbaert. Your readers may be faster or slower, and technical material takes longer, so use it as a rough guide.
Q.Is my text uploaded anywhere?
A. No. The counting runs in your browser and the text is not sent to ToolkitsLab or any other server. The text disappears when you close or reload the page.
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