How to Count Words in Google Docs, Word, Pages and Apple Notes

Every major word processor counts words for you; the count is just in a different place in each one. Google Docs keeps it in the Tools menu, Word shows it all the time in the status bar, Pages adds a counter to the page when you ask for it, and Apple Notes has none. If you only have the text, paste it into the word counter, which counts words, characters, sentences and paragraphs as you type.

Where to find the word count: quick reference

App	Where the count is	Shortcut	Live count while typing
Google Docs (computer)	Tools > Word count	Ctrl + Shift + C (Mac: ⌘ + Shift + C)	Yes, optional
Google Docs (Android, iPhone, iPad)	More (three dots) > Word count	–	No
Word (Windows, Mac)	Status bar at the bottom of the window	–	Yes
Word for the web	Review > Word Count > Show Word Count	–	Yes, in Editing view
Pages (Mac)	View toolbar button > Show Word Count	–	Yes
Pages (iPhone, iPad)	More > View Options > Show Word Count	–	Yes
Apple Notes	No built-in count	–	–

The menus and shortcuts come from each vendor’s own help pages, listed in the sources below, as of October 2026.

How to count words in Google Docs

On a computer:

1. Open the document.
2. Click Tools > Word count, or press Ctrl + Shift + C (⌘ + Shift + C on a Mac).
3. Read the numbers in the box: pages, words, characters and characters excluding spaces.
4. Click Done to close it.

To keep a running count, tick Display word count while typing in the same box and click OK. The count then sits in the bottom left corner of the page. Click it to switch between pages, words, characters and characters without spaces. Google suggests the live count for short documents such as news articles or school essays.

In the Google Docs app on Android, iPhone or iPad, open the document, tap More (the three dots), then tap Word count. The app shows words, characters and characters excluding spaces. There is no page count and no live counter on mobile.

What Google Docs leaves out. Unless you select part of the document, the count covers everything except headers, footers and footnotes. If your word limit includes footnotes, select them and count them separately, then add the two numbers.

Counting part of a document. Select the text first, then open the word count. The box then shows the count for the selection.

How to count words in Microsoft Word

Word counts as you type and shows the total in the status bar at the bottom of the window. To see more:

1. Click the word count in the status bar. The Word Count box opens with the number of characters, paragraphs and lines as well as words.
2. Select text to count part of the document. The status bar then shows the count for the selection and for the whole document. On a Mac you can also select the text and choose Tools > Word Count.
3. If the count is missing, go to Review > Word Count and make sure Show Word Count is ticked. In Word for the web, the count only appears in Editing view; choose Edit Document > Edit in Word for the web first.

How to count words in Pages and Apple Notes

Pages on a Mac. Click the View button in the toolbar and choose Show Word Count. A counter appears at the bottom of the page. Click the arrows on its right side to switch between characters with spaces, characters without spaces, words, paragraphs and pages. You can drag the counter elsewhere on the page, and choose View > Hide Word Count to remove it. Pages remembers your last choice, so the menu may say Show Character Count instead.

Pages on iPhone and iPad. Tap More at the top of the screen, tap View Options, then turn on Show Word Count. Tap the counter to see the other statistics.

In both versions, selecting text makes the counter show only the selection.

Apple Notes. The Notes User Guide has no word count feature as of October 2026. Two workarounds:

• Select the note text, copy it and paste it into a blank Pages document, then turn on the counter as above.
• Paste it into the word counter on this site. Nothing is uploaded; the counting happens on your device.

Why the same text gives different counts

Paste one essay into Google Docs, Word and Pages and the totals often differ by a few words. None of the three publishes its full counting rules, but the differences come from a small set of cases:

• What is included. Google Docs skips headers, footers and footnotes unless you select them. Check what your limit covers before you trim.
• Dashes and symbols. A dash typed with spaces around it (“yes — no”), a bullet character or an arrow may or may not count as a word.
• Joined text. Hyphenated words, slashes (“and/or”), email addresses and web links can count as one word or be split into several.

The word counter on this site uses one fixed rule: a word is any run of characters between spaces that contains at least one letter or digit. Results from the tool for typical edge cases:

Text	Words	Why
well-known	1	No space inside a hyphenated word
don't	1	Contractions are one word
3.5 kg	2	Numbers count as words
[email protected]	1	Emails and links count once
yes — no	2	A dash on its own is not a word
東京に行く	5	Chinese and Japanese characters count one each

For school or job applications, the program your teacher or the admissions office uses decides the official number. If you are close to the limit, check the count in that program and leave yourself a few words of margin.

Counting characters instead of words

Some limits are in characters, not words: social media posts, meta descriptions, SMS messages and many application forms. Google Docs and Pages show characters both with and without spaces, and Word’s Word Count box lists characters too. Make sure you read the figure the limit asks for.

The character counter shows both figures plus lines, UTF-8 bytes and SMS segments, and checks the text against common platform limits such as an Instagram caption or a Google Ads headline. Add Your own limit for a form that has its own number. Emoji and accented letters count as one character each, the way you see them. The character limits cheat sheet lists the limits for each platform.

Turning a word count into pages or minutes

Once you have the number, you may need to know what it means in practice:

• Pages. About 500 words fit on a single-spaced page and 250 on a double-spaced page in 12 pt Times New Roman. The guide how many pages is 1,000 words covers other fonts, and the words to pages converter does the sum for your settings.
• Reading and speaking time. The word counter shows both. For a talk, the words to minutes converter lets you choose a speaking pace.
• Essays and statements. How many words is a 5-page essay and the guide to personal statement word limits show common targets.

If you work to a limit often, set a Word goal in the word counter. It shows a progress bar and how many words you have left, or how many to cut.