How much is 50,000 words?
- and other similar questions...
How Important Is Word Count?
There are only three reasons word count is crucial:
- You submit a manuscript to a literary agent or publisher, and they specify exactly how much in chapters to send them,
- You submit an article to a newspaper, online news feed, magazine, etc. and they specify how long they want the article to be,
- You write a book. You realize you picked a font kinda tall /dark /big in font size, and it stretches the story for a much longer page count. In turn, this ends up using more pages, costing more out of pocket to print out. This has to become a calculated business choice, unless you have money to burn.
Word count to the creative writer
Word count is irrelevant. We are only interested in making the story rise to its full potential, even if it means longer pages with far more diverse chapters. Because we figure, some will get trimmed off by editors anyway. Many more rewrites lie in our futures.Word count to the literary agent
It means an awfully long manuscript they do not have the time to read through. Agents get piles of manuscripts dumped on their desks all year long. They need to cut through the flotsam somehow, and let the cream rise to the top. The process of elimination weeds out a few of these. If people submit more of a word count than what was asked of them, then this extensively long manuscript gets tossed into the slush pile, never to be seen again. Suddenly, that tower of manuscripts gets cut by half. Or more.Word count to the publishers
Hundreds of manuscripts fall into their laps. If manuscripts have far too many words, terrible grammar, ramble on & on, come off as disjointed, incomprehensible fantasies that represent neither plot nor logic, then into the slush pile it goes. A mish mash of word soup impresses nobody. Oh look, you have a full mastery of the Thesaurus, but can't tell a simple story to save your life. Bravo. *aggressive sounds of a paper shredder grate in the air and ear drums, maybe.Word count to the freelance writer
She/he was asked to submit a specific word count for whatever online publisher, or media company, that asked. Each article must meet a certain word count, and this is more crucial than if it were for a book. Here is the reason:Online magazines and websites are virtual real estate.
A few words on website ad placement
Every web page has optimizers and ads used to yield high traffic to their sites, that in turn pays for the costs of running that business. Think of a web page as valuable billboard space. Even in print, magazines do it too, only they have the unique luxury of having advertisers take out full-page glossy color ads, which bring in the most revenue.$$$$$$$$ Money, b!tches! $$$$$$$$$$$
On the internet...
Banner ads, skyscraper ads, and tiled ads- they all constitute to those pieces of profit, but the available ad space is divided up into smaller chunks. Each costs more or less, but the center of the screen is the only place to squeeze the stories into. Each ad varies in size, so the bigger they are, the more profitable, and the higher up on the web page.
Placement is key.
The eye wanders up and down the page, so that story better pull in the viewer. It's why editors must be choosy with content. Better content that is submitted, draws in readers, and hopefuly retains them for another month, as they look forward to this particular writer's content.
Ads therefore are, carefully placed over the web page where the focal points of the reader gaze the most. Viewership = Ad revenue = Running business.
(search for the Google Heat Map or check out http://www.vaughns-1-pagers.com/internet/google-heatmap-2.htm)
Here is a great example: http://www.stocktonteesside.co.uk/uploads/1/8/8/5/18856548/banner-sizes1.jpg
That said, word count is even more important in this arena. Most full articles are required to fit the 600-1000 word count (about 4 pages) broken up into 2-4 clickable pages, with loads of advertising and banner ads in between. Others typically ask for a 700 word count on a short article. These are usually stories you scroll up and down the web page to read.
A website cannot have a full page spread like a print magazine, obviously, (sometimes they will fit a nuisance of a large ad/video ad in between page clicks) but it does cleverly fit in advertisement all over the place. From contextual ads, to motion graphics, to text link ads, leaving only a small canvas left of story placement.
It is that size space that must be carefully measured for word count.
What Increases My Word Count?
Remember that word count is always an approximation, not set in stone.
Many, many things increase word count.
But not font type.
Typography in design affects page count
It's a misnomer to think that word count equals page count.The fonts you choose for your ebook formatting or printed books may extend the pages in number by some degree. Again, it does NOT increase word count, but merely page numbers. Fonts may also use more or less ink during the printing process, which some vanity publishers may pass the cost on to you. (for this reason, it's cheaper using san serif fonts; tall & skinny lettering) But because of the kind of fonts you use -and spacing, and formatting- your book may look like it extends for much longer than the requested word count, to the disdain of many editors and writers. Be aware of this!
Know that if you typed up a 50,000 word novel and the printed book ends up as thick as a dictionary, you're doing something wrong in the formatting process.
True Type fonts are generally used because they show up better on eReaders and devices. Times New Roman is a great example. Fancy custom fonts are unique, not well-known, thus are not pre-loaded onto devices, so the device may choose a True Type font to substitute in it's place. Fancy fonts are best left for cover artwork and not for the interior of the book.
For example, the following are all design aspects graphic designers learn in school, so many of you are not going to know this. But a quick visual guideline explains the design process of font layout.
Don't worry: As writers, you are not required to know any of this shit.
This is just an in-depth description of graphic elements designers take into consideration before choosing certain fonts for commercial art. There is a reason behind every decision in choosing a particular font, and not just because a font is aesthetically pleasing.
And because word count depends on certain factors such as design elements, these aspects can unintentionally stretch your words to lengthier page counts.
Design elements such as,
- font styles
- font size
- using true type fonts or not,
- kerning
- serif or san serif
- single or double line spacing
- margins size
I made some diagrams to help (not drawn to scale):
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| Kerning is the space between characters. |
 | |||||
| A Serif is the little lines or curlies attached to the ends of letters for fancy effect. San Serif means it has none; these fonts are usually block-ish in appearance. |
 |
| Bigger sized fonts take up more space on a page. Those letter T's are getting taller and taller, stretching out the screen. Every point adds up! |
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| The words are being squeezed to the middle, as margins, headers, and footers increase in width. Less room to fit words means they get pushed onto next page. |
Punctuation in design affects word count
Another consideration is characters. Word count is the number of actual words, not the characters. You can put a word into parentheses, but those parentheses do not count. Just the word, and it counts as one word. The parentheses will lengthen your page count though, which is a design element often overlooked. Parentheses, commas, exclamation marks, and other such punctuation lengthen pages. This is why page count is irrelevant, and word count always preferred.
Ok, now lets get to the good stuff...
How much is 50,000 words?
How much is 10,000 words?
How much is in any word count, really?Like I said, word counts are approximations, so take it with a grain of salt.
These are the generally accepted word counts for whatever writing you work on:
Avg. Word Length
5 characters
Character count includes punctuation. For example: "Calm, but excited." That's 18 characters in all. Spaces do not count.
Number of Words On A Page
250 words on average
With Double-Spacing (for books)
Up to 7 words per line
About 30-40 Lines per pg.
250 - 280 words: 1pg.
1000 -1500 words: 5 - 6 pgs.
Articles
600 -1,000 words
Up to 100 words is considered 'Micro Fiction'.
Short Story (singular)
1,000 - 7,500 words
Best fit: Genre magazines or full feature articles.
Up to 100 - 1,000 words is considered 'Flash Fiction'.
Novellette
7,500 - 20,000 words
Best fit: Too long for magazines, but enough issues put together = One novella
Novella (A.K.A., How Much Is 10,000 Words)
20,000 - 50,000 words
Best fit: Long enough for a flight, but short enough to finish in a weekend.
Novel
50,000 - 110,000 words
Best fit: Big enough to print into hardback, and have it stand upright comfortably on a shelf as a sturdy paperback. Long enough to keep readers hooked for days, and beg for a sequel. Standard book length. (profitable)
Epic and Sequels
110,000 - + words
Best fit: For highly acclaimed authors usually, because publishers will frown on newbies who turn in a giant book. (too risky an investment) Think George R.R. Martin.
If you want to see real world examples, here is an article on exact word count for some of the most famous novels of all time.
How Do I Do A Word Count For My Book?
Three ways that I know how to do this:- Pre-loaded into your text editor,
- Word counter software/plugins, or
- You can insert your entire writing into an online word counter
Word Count In Text Editors
- In Microsoft Word, go to Tools > Word Counter.
- In Scrivener, go to View > Outliner Columns > Total Word Count.
- In Apache Open Office, go to File > Properties > click the Statistics tab. Also, at the very bottom taskbar on the left, there is a word count number. Double click it. It used to be that OO didn't come with a pre-loaded word counter, HOWEVER, there is a word counter plugin you can get from them to install.
- Note: Microsoft Notepad And Microsoft Wordpad do not have these features.
Word Count Software and Plugins
These are online word counters, no software downloads necessary.- Words Per Page: convert words to pages calculator
- Calculate Words to Pages and Pages to Words
- Word Counter Tool - Get Word Count & Character Count of Text
- Free online word count / words counter
- Convert Words to Pages - Free Calculator (select font & size)
- Writertopia Word Count Script
Word Count Plugins
- Word Counter Widget
- Author Wordcount
- Calculate Stuff's Word Counter Widget
- Writertopia Writing Meters
- http://honorless.net/progressbar.htm
- NaNoWriMo Word Meter
There are many more out there, just search for it. Hope that answers the eternal question on word counts. Anyway, get cracking, ya cheeky writers!
