Manual typewriter · paper bail · margin bell
Word & Character Counter
Type or paste onto the sheet. The wheels on the machine roll with every keystroke: characters, words, sentences, paragraphs, lines, and how long it takes to read or say aloud.
Characters
Without spaces
Words
Sentences
Paragraphs
Lines
Reading time
0 sSpeaking time
0 sAverage word
0 lettersLongest word
-What is counted, and how
Characters are counted as you see them, including spaces and line breaks; the second wheel leaves the spaces out. Words are runs of letters, digits and apostrophes separated by spaces or punctuation, so "don't" is one word and "state-of-the-art" is four. Sentences end at a full stop, question mark or exclamation mark followed by a space or the end of the text; paragraphs are separated by a blank line; lines are counted at every line break.
Time
Reading time assumes 200 words a minute, a comfortable silent reading pace; speaking time assumes 130, a clear presentation pace. Both are estimates: dense technical text reads slower, a list reads faster.
Why a typewriter
A manual typewriter counted for you whether you wanted it to or not: the paper scale along the carriage numbered every character position, the margin stop set the line length, and a bell rang a few characters before the margin so you knew to return the carriage. The wheels on this machine are the same idea: a mechanical tally that only ever moves when a key does.
Why is my word count different from Word or Google Docs?
Every counter draws the line between words slightly differently for hyphens, slashes, numbers with commas and stray punctuation. On ordinary prose the counts agree; on code, tables or lists they can differ by a few.
Does it count characters for Twitter, SMS or meta descriptions?
Yes. Characters with spaces is the number those limits use: 280 for a post, 160 for an SMS, about 155 for a search snippet. Emoji count as one character each here, as they do on screen, though some services count them as two.
What does the bell mean?
It lights when the line you are typing passes 72 characters, the classic margin on a letter-width sheet: a hint that the line is long, nothing more.
Is anything uploaded?
No. The sheet stays in your browser.