Words per minute calculator

Words divided by minutes. Time yourself over a known passage and you have your real rate rather than an average from a study of someone else.

What counts as a good rate depends entirely on the activity, and the numbers are not close to each other. Silent reading averages around 238 words a minute; speaking aloud is roughly half that; sustained writing is a different scale again, at perhaps 20 to 40 words a minute once thinking time is included. Typing speed is measured differently still — it uses a standardised five-character "word", so a typing WPM and a reading WPM are not comparable quantities even though they share a unit.