How many words should a blog be?

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Yesterday I placed a reaction on a question, and I got a lot of responses on it. My comment became a featured comment. So I thought, it might be interesting for all of you to know how many words a blog should be. I also want to explain to you why a blog of less than 300 words is not acceptable and why a blog with 1000+ words is better.

This is an indication, not a law!


The wrong business

When your blog contains 300 words or less, you are definitely in the wrong business. Those blogs are not very interesting to Google. Google can't index your blog for the search enigines.

Google ranking system

It's important that Google can "read" your blog, and for that matter they need between the 300-500 words to be able to tell how relevant your text is and where it belongs in the search results.

Google and other search engines love blogs from 1000 to 3000 words. They simply assume that a longer blog contains more relevant information. That it is more complete and therefore more valuable. As a result, they rank the post higher, which in time, will ensure that your blog is shown higher in the search results.

Do you want to score well in Google with your article?

Then strive for a length of more than 1,000 words. Blogs between the 1000 and 3000 words blogs are highly highly rated by Google, so that should be your aim.

Of course, it is not the intention to keep on whining indefinitely to make your blog a certain length. You will chase away your visitors.

Your readers experience

A blog of 1000 words can be read in about 6 minutes by your visitors. A 3000 words blog takes about 15-20 minutes, and must be very interesting to keep your readers attention.

When you have too much text, your visitors are going to scan your post. They fly over your blog and only read the H-lines. Be sure that your H-lines are attractive and indicate exactly what your paragraph is about.

I regularly encounter blogs, with infinite text, and where I can not find the information I want to know quickly, then I leave again to find my answer elsewhere. When your blog has more than 3500 words, look closely if you stayed on topic. Try to split it into 2 blogs. You can also make an e-book of it. People do not spend 30+ minutes to read blog articles.

Exception on the rules

There are, of course, exceptions. E.g with instructional blogs, "how to do" blogs and that kind of stuff. Of course, it doesn't make sense to limit the number of words. After all, instructions must be clear, your reader needs to be helped as well as possible and if 6000 words are needed to give instructions and explainations, then you write that 6000 words blog.

Shortly said: How many words should a blog have?

  • Use as many words as you need to make your point (not a word more).
  • Stay on topic.
  • Put yourself in the shoes of your reader.
  • Keep in mind that Google needs 300-500 to "read" your blog.
  • Blogs of 1000 words or more are ranking better.


This blog contains 544 words.

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Recent Comments

153

Thanks Loes, I find it hard to keep mine under 1000 lol, so I must be doing something right. I watched someone from France on my site for 13 minutes the other night. xxxx

That's are nice times:)

Would i be right in saying that authority sites who dominate a niche can write a small 200 -300 word article will rank on google easily?

Exceptional, yes they have more chance

I've started aiming for 1500-2000 or more words and I have noticed some increase in traffic. Not huge but some. Also there is a jump whenever I publish a new blog of course - Wish I could do one every day.

The jump is caused by your sharing on social media, start sharing old posts on the days you are not sharing a new one

Great idea. Thanks loes

Neil Patel says that the average length of a blog that ranks at the top of the 1st page on Google is 1892 words.

Right in the middle of 1000-3000

Good evening Loes,

Yes, I read it from beginning to end. Sometimes, here on WA, blogs can get very, very long and I must confess I then do not always read the total. In older times I wrote shorter posts but now I always do 1000 plus.

Greetings from the south of Spain, Taetske

Hi Taetske, in the old days I had major problems to write 1000+ posts, not anymore:)
Greetings back from up North

According to the Wordpress plugin Yoast SEO, 300 is suitable for starters. But seriously, Google loves you for writing 1,000-word posts.

I've learned writing in-depth "how to" posts, and listicles are great ways for creating long-form content. Readers love it too!

Thank you for this post!

From 300 up Google is able to index

Great tips and explanation, Loes.

Thank you.

Hugh

You're welcome Hugh

Good info, Loes. I try to make my posts 2,000 words. The post I finished today was 1100 words. The previous one was 1930 words.

1100 counts too:) thanks

1100 words covered everything I wanted to say. :)

Up to the next post:)

This is Awesome Loes, i never knew.. i was writing blogs just to get more rankings.

I hope you wrote 1000+ blogs then

Hi Loes, so funny you should post this right when I'm working on an article on the subject, and it's right on point!

Thank you:)! Success, and perhaps you can use some of my info

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