Writing
Character & Word Counter
Type or paste your text and watch every count update live — characters, words, sentences, paragraphs — with a limit checker for the essays and platforms that cap your length.
Characters
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0 without spaces
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words
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sentences
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paragraphs
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reading time
Limit checker
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Frequently asked questions
Do spaces count as characters?
Usually yes — most limits (UCAS, X, SMS, meta descriptions) count every character including spaces and punctuation. This counter shows both figures, with and without spaces, so you can use whichever your limit specifies.
How many characters is 650 words?
Roughly 3,500–4,000 characters including spaces — English averages about 5–6 characters per word plus a space. The Common App essay limit of 650 words is counted in words, though, not characters.
What are the main essay length limits?
Common App personal essay: 650 words. UC Personal Insight Questions: 350 words each. UCAS personal statement: 4,000 characters (including spaces). Coalition essay: 500–650 words recommended. The limit checker above tracks all of these live.
How are words counted?
Any run of non-space characters counts as one word — the same rule word processors use. Hyphenated compounds like “well-known” count as one word; “word counter” counts as two.
How long is one SMS message?
160 characters with the basic (GSM-7) alphabet. Using emoji or non-Latin characters switches the encoding and drops the limit to 70 characters per message; longer texts are split and billed as multiple segments.
How do I count sentences?
The counter splits on sentence-ending punctuation (. ! ?). Abbreviations like “e.g.” can inflate the count slightly, so treat the sentence figure as an estimate — the character and word counts are exact.
Characters are counted including spaces (and separately without); words are runs of non-space characters — the same rule as word processors. Reading time uses the average adult silent pace of ~238 words per minute. All counting runs locally in your browser.