How many words are in a novel?

The short answer

Publishing guides broadly agree that adult fiction typically falls between 70,000 and 100,000 words. Below roughly 50,000 words, commercial publishers tend not to treat a manuscript as a full-length novel. One analysis of Amazon's Top 100 found an average of about 89,000 words, with fantasy highest at about 109,000.

A caution on sources: these figures come from writing-advice and publishing blogs (for example The Self Publishing Site, Publishing Xpress and Authorlytica, read on October 15, 2026), not from industry statistics, and the cutoffs differ from one guide to the next. Treat them as ranges, not rules.

Novella, novel, epic: the usual categories

• Novella: about 17,500 to 40,000 words (the range used by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America for its awards). Some guides stretch it to 20,000 to 50,000.
• Novel: 40,000 words and above technically counts. Commercial publishing usually treats 50,000 as the threshold, and most published novels are at 70,000 or more.
• Epic or tome: 120,000 words and above.

As a self-published author you can choose any length. Readers' expectations by genre still shape reviews: a thriller that ends at 30,000 words feels unfinished, and an epic fantasy at 60,000 feels thin.

Typical word counts by genre

For a debut, one guide suggests fantasy authors aim for 95,000 to 110,000 words, even though established authors often publish longer books. Non-fiction varies too widely for a single range, so count your own manuscript rather than benchmarking it.

From words to pages

As a rule of thumb used in our own estimates, an 80,000-word novel makes about 250 to 300 printed pages. That is an approximation: the real count depends on the trim size, the font size, the line spacing, the margins and the number of front-matter pages.

Pages matter for three KDP numbers. The page count must fall within the limit for your trim size and paper: for a 6 x 9 inch paperback, 24 to 828 pages in black and white on white paper. The minimum inside margin grows with the page count, from 0.375 inch for 24 to 150 pages to 0.5 inch for 151 to 300 pages. And the spine is the page count times 0.002252 inch on white paper (0.0025 inch on cream), with spine text only possible from 79 pages.

Use a words-to-pages calculator with your own trim size and font to get a precise figure, and re-run it after translation.

What each length costs to translate with Librolingua

Translation is priced per 1,000 words of your actual manuscript, VAT included, with a minimum order of 40 euros. The totals below are simple multiplication of the four levels' prices: Essentiel 2.50 euros, Qualité 6 euros, Premium 10 euros and Excellence 16 euros per 1,000 words.

Translating into several languages earns multilingual discounts of 7 to 15 percent. AI translation does not equal a great literary translator; it makes translations possible that would otherwise not exist. Ask a native speaker to read the result before you publish.

What each length costs to lay out for KDP

Paperback layout is priced at 0.14 euro per page with a 29 euro minimum, and 30 percent off when it accompanies a translation. An EPUB alone is 19 euros. Using the page counts from the rule of thumb above:

For comparison, the automated tool Gutter charges 0.15 euro per page with a 15 euro minimum, and French freelance layout artists quote 250 to 700 euros for a novel (see our cost guide for the sources).

How to count the words of your manuscript

Do not estimate by pages. Use the word counter of your word processor, or paste your text into a counting tool, and count the whole manuscript: chapter titles are words, and so are the epigraphs. Different programs count hyphenated words and numbers slightly differently, so a 1 or 2 percent gap between two counters is normal.

Count the source text you will hand over, not an estimate of the translation. Quotes and billing for translation are based on the real words of the manuscript. If you cut the book before translating, you pay less and you have less to proofread afterward.

FAQ