Script Read Time Calculator
Paste a script and see how long it takes to say out loud — paced for the writing system it's actually written in, not one words-per-minute number for every language.
Writing system
English, Spanish, Portuguese, Indonesian — paced in words, 150 per minute by default.
Read-aloud time
0 sec
0 words at 150 words/min
Words
0
Pace
150/min
Default for Latin is 150
Against the usual slots
- 15s~38 words
- 30s~75 words
- 60s~150 words
- 90s~225 words
Budgets are for the words alone. Leave room for pauses.
Reading it at that pace is the hard part
These rates come from Orate, a teleprompter app we also build — it scrolls a script at the pace for its writing system while you record, in a band under the front camera so you're looking at the lens. Free, and it works offline.
Default speaking pace by writing system
The unit changes with the script, not just the rate — which is why a single words-per-minute figure can't be right for all of them. Chinese, Japanese and Thai aren't word-delimited, so they're counted in characters and their numbers aren't comparable with the rows above them.
| Script | Languages | Default pace | A 30-second take |
|---|---|---|---|
| Latin | English, Spanish, Portuguese, Indonesian | 150 words/min | ~75 words |
| Devanagari | Hindi, Marathi | 130 words/min | ~65 words |
| Bengali | Bengali | 130 words/min | ~65 words |
| Arabic | Arabic | 130 words/min | ~65 words |
| Tamil | Tamil | 115 words/min | ~58 words |
| Telugu | Telugu | 115 words/min | ~58 words |
| CJK | Chinese, Japanese | 250 chars/min | ~125 chars |
| Thai | Thai | 250 chars/min | ~125 chars |
These are the default rates Orate ships per writing system. They're comfortable starting points rather than measurements of any particular speaker, which is why the pace control above exists — your own pace is the one that matters, and it's worth timing yourself once and adjusting.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many words is a 30-second video?
About 75 words in English, at a comfortable 150 words per minute. That is words alone, with no allowance for pauses, so treat it as a ceiling rather than a target — 60 to 65 words usually sounds less rushed. The number is different in other languages: about 65 words in Hindi or Arabic, and about 58 in Tamil, because those scripts are spoken at a different rate.
How long does it take to read 500 words out loud?
About 3 minutes 20 seconds in English at 150 words per minute. The same 500 words take about 4 minutes 21 seconds in Tamil, which is paced at 115 words per minute — a Tamil word carries more syllables than an English one, so the same word count is a longer take.
Why is there no single words-per-minute number for every language?
Because for some languages the unit itself is wrong, not just the rate. Chinese, Japanese and Thai are not written with spaces between words, so counting words is meaningless and they are paced in characters per minute instead. Tamil and Telugu are agglutinative, so one word carries far more syllables than an English word and is spoken more slowly. A single words-per-minute constant applied to all of them is visibly wrong for most of the world.
Does the estimate include pauses?
No. It counts the words or characters in your script and divides by a speaking rate, so it measures continuous speech. Real delivery has breaths, beats after a punchline, and a pause before a call to action. Add roughly 10 to 15 percent for a conversational read, and time yourself once against the estimate to learn your own offset.
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