Average Reading Speed
2 min read
Short answer
Check your own numbers
4m 12s
Reading time at 238 wpm
238 words per minute · average is 238
At other speeds
1,000 wordsCommon lengths
The figures
From Brysbaert’s 2019 meta-analysis of 190 studies covering almost 18,000 participants — the largest synthesis available:
| Activity | Words per minute |
|---|---|
| Silent reading, non-fiction | 238 |
| Silent reading, fiction | 260 |
| Reading aloud | 183 |
| Proofreading | 200 |
| Skimming for a fact | 400–700 |
Fiction is read faster than non-fiction, which surprises people. Narrative prose is more predictable — familiar sentence shapes, common vocabulary, no need to hold definitions in mind.
By age and stage
Rough averages, useful for judging an audience rather than an individual:
| Stage | Words per minute |
|---|---|
| Age 6–7 | 50–80 |
| Age 8–9 | 100–130 |
| Age 10–11 | 130–160 |
| Age 12–14 | 160–200 |
| Age 15–18 | 200–250 |
| Adult | 220–260 |
| Adult, skilled, familiar material | 280–350 |
What changes an individual’s rate
Vocabulary and background knowledge. The strongest factor by far. A cardiologist reads a cardiology paper at twice the speed of an equally intelligent physicist, because the terms are already understood rather than decoded.
Text difficulty. Long sentences and unfamiliar words slow reading measurably — which is exactly what the Flesch formulas quantify. The readability checker will tell you where your writing is making a reader work.
Purpose. Skimming, reading for gist, and reading to memorise can differ threefold in the same reader with the same text.
Format. Line length matters: very wide columns slow reading because the eye loses its place on the return sweep. 50 to 75 characters per line is the usual recommendation, and it is why this page is not full width.
Speed reading
Claims of 1,000 words per minute with full comprehension do not survive testing. The physical limits are clear: the eye can only take in a few words per fixation, and roughly four fixations per second is the ceiling. That puts an upper bound near 500 words per minute for genuine reading.
Above that, what is happening is skimming — which is a genuinely useful skill, but it is sampling a text rather than reading it. Research on speed-reading programmes consistently finds comprehension falling in proportion to the speed gained.
The reliable way to get through more material is to know more about the subject.
Why this matters when you write
Reading speed is why length is a cost. A 2,000-word article asks for nine minutes; a 600-word one asks for two and a half. Both may be worth it, but only one of them can afford a slow opening.
It is also why reading-time estimates should be generous. Quote 200 words per minute rather than 238 and your badge will be right more often than wrong. The reading time calculator lets you set whichever rate you want to plan with.
Frequently asked questions
Is 300 words per minute good? Yes — that is comfortably above average for non-fiction with full comprehension.
What reading speed do audiobooks use? 150–160 words per minute, close to the natural speaking rate. Many listeners play them at 1.25× or 1.5×, which puts them at 190–240 — roughly silent reading speed.
Why do publishers use 200 words per minute? It is a round number and it produces a slightly generous estimate, which is the safer direction to be wrong in.