How many words are in a novel?
A novel is 40,000 words or more
The Nebula Awards, run by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association, set the line most writers quote: a novel is 40,000 words or more. A novella is 17,500 to 39,999 words, a novelette is 7,500 to 17,499, and anything shorter is a short story.
That line tells you when a story is a novel, not how long yours should be. Publishers, agents and serial platforms each have their own expectations, so check the submission page or the top stories in your genre before you fix a target.
How many chapters a novel has
Divide the total by your usual chapter length. A 90,000-word book in 2,500-word chapters has 36 chapters. The same book in 1,800-word chapters has 50.
Web serial readers notice chapter length more than book length, because they read one release at a time. Pick a chapter length you can repeat on your update schedule, then let the chapter count follow.
How many pages your word count makes
Pages depend on trim size, font, margins and line spacing, so no single words-per-page figure is right for every book. The calculator starts at 250 words per page; change it to match your own layout.
To find your figure, count the words on three full pages of your print proof, or of a printed book with a similar layout, and take the average. Then a 300-page plan converts straight into a word target.
How long the book takes to read
A 2019 review of 190 reading studies by Marc Brysbaert put the average adult silent reading speed for English fiction at 260 words per minute, with most readers between 200 and 320. At 260 words per minute, a 90,000-word novel takes about 5 hours 46 minutes.
Use reading time to set release sizes. If you want a chapter to fill a 10-minute break, 2,600 words is about right at the average speed.
Plan chapter lengths for a whole serial
A calculator gives you the totals. Webnovels AI Writing Studio keeps the chapters, story facts and timeline for the book you are writing, so the target and the draft stay in one place.