How Many Pages Is 10,000 Words?
1 min read
Short answer
10,000 words in pages
Times New Roman 12pt with 1-inch margins, the usual academic setup.
| Spacing | US Letter | A4 |
|---|---|---|
| Single spaced | 20 pages | 19.2 pages |
| 1.5 spaced | 26.7 pages | 25.6 pages |
| Double spaced | 40 pages | 38.5 pages |
By font
US Letter, 1-inch margins. Google Docs starts in Arial 11pt; Word used Calibri 11pt for years before switching to Aptos.
| Font and size | Single spaced | Double spaced |
|---|---|---|
| Times New Roman 12pt | 20 | 40 |
| Arial 12pt | 23 | 46 |
| Arial 11pt | 19.3 | 38.7 |
| Calibri 12pt | 21 | 42 |
| Calibri 11pt | 17.6 | 35.3 |
- Paragraphs
- About 67 (50 to 100, at 100 to 200 words each)
- Characters
- About 58,000 including spaces
- Reading time
- 42 minutes 1 second at 238 words a minute
- Speaking time
- 1 hour 7 minutes at 150 words a minute
- Handwritten
- About 40 sides of lined paperin average handwriting, about 250 words a side
Check your own numbers
40
Pages · double spaced
Every spacing
10,000 wordsAlso worth knowing
Estimates assume 12pt Times New Roman or Arial with 1-inch margins on US Letter or A4.
The undergraduate dissertation
10,000 words is the most common length for a final-year undergraduate dissertation in the UK, with many departments setting 8,000 to 12,000. Bound, double spaced, with a title page, contents and bibliography, it typically runs to 50 or more pages.
It is also a common length for a substantial report, a long-form magazine piece or a novella’s first act.
A chapter plan for 10,000 words
| Chapter | Words | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Introduction | 1,000 | 10% |
| Literature review | 2,500 | 25% |
| Methodology | 1,500 | 15% |
| Results or analysis | 2,500 | 25% |
| Discussion | 1,500 | 15% |
| Conclusion | 1,000 | 10% |
Humanities dissertations often drop the separate methodology chapter and use three thematic chapters of about 2,500 words instead. Either way, decide the shares before you draft. It is the single most useful thing you can do for a long piece of writing.
Working at this length
Write in chapters, not in one go. Each chapter is effectively a 1,500 to 2,500-word essay with its own job. Finish and edit one before starting the next, and the whole thing becomes a series of manageable pieces.
Track the count from the start. It is common to discover at 14,000 words that the limit is 10,000. A running total per chapter, against your plan, stops that happening.
Keep the argument visible. Over 40 pages a reader needs reminders: a short introduction to each chapter, a summary at its end, and a conclusion that answers the question set out in the introduction.
Reading time
At 238 words a minute, 10,000 words takes about 42 minutes to read. Your marker will read it more slowly than that, with a rubric open, so clarity is worth more than elegance. If your dissertation is a PDF or Word file, the PDF word counter can check the final count without retyping anything.