A books per year calculator: your minutes a day and reading speed, turned into books a month, a year and a decade.
5.0(1 rating)Pick your minutes a day and your speed, and see how many books you'll read in a month, a year and 10 years.
Minutes a day
Your reading speed
The averages are from a 2019 review of 190 studies. For your own speed, take my reading speed test.
How long your books are
A typical book is the median of 51 recent New York Times bestsellers, measured from their unabridged audiobooks.
Books you can read
Books from my favorites that fit
At 20 minutes a day, 19 books from my own favorites fit in a year:
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The 4-Hour Workweek
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Deep Work
by Cal Newport
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The Laws of Human Nature
by Robert Greene
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Atomic Habits
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The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
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Building a StoryBrand
by Donald Miller
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Can't Hurt Me
by David Goggins
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Influence
by Robert Cialdini
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The E-Myth Revisited
by Michael E. Gerber
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And 7 more. See all my book picks
Each time comes from the book's unabridged audiobook at ACX's 9,300 words an hour, read at your speed.
What you type stays in this browser. The speeds are from a 2019 review of 190 studies, the audiobook rate is ACX's, and page lengths are measured on real books.
This free calculator tells you how many books you can read in a month, a year and 10 years, from the minutes you read each day.
It uses reading speeds from 190 studies and the real length of recent bestsellers. Then it shows which of my favorite books fit in your year.
How many books can you read in a year?
At 20 minutes a day and an average speed, you can finish about 16 novels a year, or 18 nonfiction books. Here's how the minutes add up:
- Novels a year
- 8
- Nonfiction books a year
- 9
- Hours a year
- 61
- Novels a year
- 12
- Nonfiction books a year
- 13
- Hours a year
- 91
- Novels a year
- 16
- Nonfiction books a year
- 18
- Hours a year
- 122
- Novels a year
- 24
- Nonfiction books a year
- 27
- Hours a year
- 183
- Novels a year
- 37
- Nonfiction books a year
- 41
- Hours a year
- 274
- Novels a year
- 49
- Nonfiction books a year
- 55
- Hours a year
- 365
The table counts finished books only. It uses an average speed of 260 words a minute for fiction and 238 for nonfiction, and a typical book: 114,855 words for a novel and 93,698 for nonfiction.
How many minutes a day for 12, 24 or 52 books?
Here's the time a goal takes, at an average speed:
- Novels
- 15 min a day
- Nonfiction
- 13 min a day
- Novels
- 29 min a day
- Nonfiction
- 26 min a day
- Novels
- 63 min a day
- Nonfiction
- 57 min a day
So a book a month takes about a quarter of an hour a day, and a book a week about an hour.
How long is a typical book?
Most calculators guess a book's length. I measured it on 51 recent New York Times bestsellers: the runtime of each unabridged audiobook, at ACX's 9,300 words an hour.
- Novels – the median is 114,855 words, about 400 pages
- Nonfiction – the median is 93,698 words, about 340 pages
If your books run longer or shorter, give the calculator a page count, or pick one of 28 counted classics or my favorites.
What changes the number
Two things move it most:
- Your speed – most adults read fiction at 200 to 320 words a minute, so the same minutes give about a quarter fewer books, or a quarter more. My reading speed test measures yours.
- The books you pick – War and Peace is about 5 typical novels on its own.
Minutes a day matter more than speed: going from 20 to 30 minutes adds 8 novels a year.
My favorites that fit your year
The calculator ends with books from my own favorites that fit in your year, in the order I'd read them, each timed at your speed.
For a single book or article, the reading time calculator gives the hours and minutes.
Who is the books per year calculator for?
It's for anyone making time to read:
- Reading time calculator – anyone timing a book, a chapter or an article
- How many books can I read in a year – readers setting a yearly goal
- Reading speed test – anyone who wants their own speed
- Readability checker – writers checking how easy a text is to read
More tools like these are on my free tools page.
Books per Year Calculator FAQs
Questions about reading time and speed? Here's what to know.
At 20 minutes a day and an average speed, you can finish about 16 novels or 18 nonfiction books a year.
At an hour a day, it's about 49 novels.
About an hour a day: 63 minutes for novels and 57 for nonfiction, at an average speed and a typical bestseller's length.
About 15 minutes a day for novels, and 13 for nonfiction, at an average speed.
The median of 51 recent New York Times bestsellers is 114,855 words for a novel and 93,698 for nonfiction.
I measured it from their unabridged audiobooks, at ACX's 9,300 words an hour.
A little, but minutes matter more.
Going from 20 to 30 minutes a day adds about 8 novels a year, and reading faster than about 1,000 words a minute costs understanding.
Yes, it's free, with no sign-up.
The math runs in your browser.
I did. I'm Navid Moazzez, and I made the books per year calculator as one of my free tools on navid.me.
More about me.
The reading time calculator times a single book or text, and the reading speed test measures your speed.
See all my free tools.
Navid Moazzez
AI business strategist & AI OS builder
Navid Moazzez helps creators and founders master AI and build their own AI Operating System (AI OS) to automate their business and life.
Navid.me is reader-supported. When you buy through links on this site, I may earn an affiliate commission. Learn more.
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