See how far you've come — and stay motivated to the finish line.
At an average pace of 200 words per minute, the King James Version's ~789,600 words take about 66 hours — roughly 10–12 minutes a day to finish in a year. Faster readers (250 wpm) finish in about 53 hours; reading aloud (150 wpm) takes about 88 hours. Use the pace controls above to get your own estimate.
This calculator counts 789,634 words in the public-domain King James Version (609,253 in the Old Testament and 180,381 in the New Testament), across 66 books and 1,189 chapters. Totals vary slightly by translation and how words are counted.
Progress is measured by word count, not chapter count, so a percentage reflects how much text you've actually read. The calculator assumes you're reading straight through from Genesis, so your progress by book, testament, and whole Bible all draw from the same word counts.
Yes, your tracker selections and reading pace are stored locally in your browser, so they're remembered next time. Nothing is sent anywhere, and no account is needed.
Reading the entire Bible can seem like a daunting task. Sixty-six books, more than 1,100 chapters, nearly 790,000 words — it's easy to look at the whole thing and forget that it's all within reach.
When I set out to read the Bible cover to cover, what carried me through was tracking my progress as I went. That's why I built this tool, to pass that encouragement along to you. Whether it's your first time through or you're starting over, I hope seeing how far you've come keeps you motivated to make it all the way through, one chapter at a time.
This calculator was inspired by Deane Barker's Bible reading breakdown, which got me thinking about Bible reading in terms of word counts and pace.
Before this tool, I was tracking my own progress by hand using his data — adding up where I'd read and working out the percentages myself. I built this tool to make that easier. I use this tool myself, too!