How many words per minute do people normally speak?

In ordinary conversation, the average is about 196 words per minute, counting every pause ¹. Counting only the time when words are actually being spoken, the rate is about 236 words per minute ². Both figures come from the same set of recorded phone calls, so the gap between them measures how much silence and non-speech noise a normal conversation contains. If you are writing a script or planning a talk, the figure you need depends on whether it includes pauses.

Everyday conversation averages 196 words per minute with pauses counted

Researchers Jiahong Yuan, Mark Liberman and Christopher Cieri measured conversational telephone speech in English and Chinese. The average, counting all elapsed time, was 196 words per minute ¹. That is the number you would get by timing a real conversation with a stopwatch and counting its words, so it is the most useful single figure for everyday talk.

Individual calls differ a lot. Measured over elapsed time, the rate ranged from 111 to 291 words per minute across conversations ³. That spread is between calls, so it does not show how any one person compares with another.

Without the pauses, speech runs at about 236 words per minute

When silences and non-speech noise are removed, the same corpus gives an average of 236 words per minute ². The difference between the two figures is time with no speech in it. Put another way, about 17 percent of elapsed conversation time carries no speech ⁴.

This is why quoted "normal" speeds disagree. A rate taken over a whole talk, pauses for thought included, reads lower than one that counts only the time spent talking. Before you compare two numbers, check which one they measure. Our entry on articulation rate explains a related measure that also leaves out pauses.

A 2005 study gives normal speaking speed as 125 to 150 words per minute

Conversation is not the only kind of speech. A 2005 study of dictation productivity gives 125 to 150 words per minute as people's normal speaking speed ⁵. The study uses that figure as the baseline for its comparison with speech software.

Marc Brysbaert, in a 2019 review of reading rate, uses 150 words per minute as the speech rate in his own argument ⁶. That value sits inside the 125 to 150 range and below the conversational average, which makes it a reasonable starting point for scripts.

For a script, multiply the length by the rate. At 125 to 150 words per minute, a 10-minute spoken script is about 1,250 to 1,500 words ⁷. Pauses, slides and applause add time on top of that, so a script sized this way may run a little long.

The rate depends on how long each turn is

Speaking rate is not constant within a conversation. In the same corpus, the rate rises quickly as a speaker's turn grows from one word to seven words ⁸. A measure taken over short replies such as "yes" or "right" will read low, and one taken over longer turns will read higher. Compare like with like: a single short exchange tells you little about your normal pace.

What to do: time your own speech

The published averages describe groups. To learn your own rate, time a sample of speech and count it the way the research does.

1. Record yourself talking for at least two minutes on a topic you know well, such as describing your job.
2. Note the total length of the recording, pauses included. That gives the overall rate.
3. Turn the recording into text with audio to text in your browser, then count the words.
4. Divide the word count by the minutes. For example, 390 words in 2 minutes is 195 words per minute, close to the conversational average.

Repeat the test in a casual chat and in a short talk. The difference between the two results is often more useful than either number alone. For the full picture of speaking rates, read the guide to speaking speed, which sets these figures beside reading and typing. The overview of typing and writing speed covers the rest of the subject. If you need the pace for a formal talk, see how many words per minute to speak in a presentation. For the reading side, see how many words per minute reading aloud is, and for the fastest speech on record see the fastest speaking speed.