What Is the Average Reading Speed?

The average adult reads about 238 words per minute when reading non-fiction silently, and about 260 words per minute for fiction. Reading aloud is slower, at about 183 words per minute.

Those figures come from the largest review of reading speed so far: a 2019 analysis by Marc Brysbaert in the Journal of Memory and Language, which combined 190 studies with 18,573 participants.

Average reading speeds

Type of reading	Average speed
Silent reading, non-fiction	238 words per minute
Silent reading, fiction	260 words per minute
Reading aloud	183 words per minute
Speaking in a speech	about 125 to 150 words per minute

The speech figure comes from a public speaking textbook citing the National Center for Voice and Speech. It is included for comparison because people often confuse reading speed with speaking speed.

What about the “300 words per minute” figure?

You will often see 250 to 300 words per minute quoted as the average. The 2019 review argues that this is too high for most adults. It traces the 300 figure to older research where it was treated as a minimum for skilled readers, not an average.

Using 300 makes reading time estimates too short. That is why our word counter uses 238 words per minute for its reading time.

How long does it take to read…?

These times use 238 words per minute, the average for non-fiction.

Length	Reading time
250 words	About 1 minute
500 words	About 2 minutes
1,000 words	About 4 minutes
2,000 words	About 8.5 minutes
5,000 words	About 21 minutes
10,000 words	About 42 minutes
80,000 words (a typical novel), at 260 words per minute	About 5 hours

If you want to know the page count for a length, see our guides to 500 words, 1,000 words and 2,000 words.

What makes people read faster or slower?

The text. Fiction with everyday words is faster than technical or academic writing. New words and long sentences slow everyone down.
The purpose. Reading to study and remember is slower than reading for fun. Skimming is faster, but you take in less.
The language. The figures above are for English. Reading speed in words per minute differs between languages, partly because word lengths differ.
The screen or page. Small text, poor contrast and long lines make reading harder.
Practice. People who read a lot tend to read faster, mainly because they know more words.

Does speed reading work?

Be careful with claims of 1,000 words per minute or more. A 2016 review of speed reading research by Keith Rayner and colleagues found a trade-off between speed and accuracy: when people push their speed far above normal, they understand and remember less. It concluded that the best way to read faster without losing understanding is to become a more skilled reader in general, mainly by reading more and building your vocabulary.

How to test your reading speed

Pick a page of text you have not read before, in the kind of material you normally read.
Paste it into our free word counter and note the word count.
Start a timer and read it normally, at a pace where you understand everything.
Divide the word count by the minutes it took. For example, 600 words in 2 minutes 30 seconds is 600 ÷ 2.5 = 240 words per minute.

Try it with two or three different texts. Your speed for a novel and for a work email may be quite different.

Reading speed vs speaking speed

People speak much more slowly than they read. A text that takes 4 minutes to read silently takes about 7 minutes to give as a speech. If you are writing something to be read aloud, plan by speaking speed instead. Our guides to 3 minute and 5 minute speeches explain how.

Quick answers

Average silent reading speed: 238 words per minute for non-fiction, 260 for fiction.
Reading aloud: 183 words per minute.
1,000 words takes: about 4 minutes to read.
Is 300 words per minute average? No, it is faster than most adults read.
Test yourself: count the words in a text, time your reading, then divide.

Paste any text into the word counter to see its reading time and speaking time straight away.