How can you measure your spoken words per minute?
To quickly know what your speaking rate is, write a 650-word essay and then get out a stopwatch. Time how long it takes you to speak all of the words in the essay.
Once you’ve finished, divide the word count (650 words) by the number of minutes in decimals (30 seconds = 0.5 minutes) and you’ll get an estimate of your words per minute speaking rate.
For example, if it takes you 4.5 minutes to speak 650 words, you would do 650 divided by 4.5 and get 144 words per minute.
Word Count per Speech Length
To quickly find out how many words a typical speaking length requires, see the table below. You can quickly map word counts to typical speaking rates:
| Speech Length | Slow (100 wpm) | Average (130 wpm) | Fast (160 wpm) |
| 1 minute | 100 words | 130 words | 160 words |
| 5 minutes | 500 words | 650 words | 800 words |
| 10 minutes | 1,000 words | 1,300 words | 1,600 words |
| 15 minutes | 1,500 words | 1,950 words | 2,400 words |
| 20 minutes | 2,000 words | 2,600 words | 3,200 words |
| 25 minutes | 2,500 words | 3,250 words | 4,000 words |
| 30 minutes | 3,000 words | 3,900 words | 4,800 words |
| 45 minutes | 4,500 words | 5,850 words | 7,200 words |
| 60 minutes | 6,000 words | 7,800 words | 9,600 words |
| 2 hours | 12,000 words | 15,600 words | 19,200 words |
