How long does it take to write a novel? The math and the timeline

Divide the length you are aiming for by the words you write in a week. An 80,000-word novel, a common length for adult fiction, takes about seven and a half months at 500 words a day on weekdays and under four months at 1,000. That is the first draft. Plan on revision and feedback taking at least as long again, which makes a finished, revised manuscript in a year to 18 months a realistic goal for someone who writes most days. Traditional publication often adds two years or more.

The math: words a day to a draft

Three numbers decide how long a draft takes: the length you are aiming for, the words you write in a session, and the sessions you actually get in a week. Length depends on genre. The guide to novel word counts by genre has the ranges. For most adult fiction, 80,000 is a sensible target.

weeks to a draft = target words ÷ (words per session × sessions per week)

80,000 ÷ (500 × 5) = 32 weeks, about 7½ months
90,000 ÷ (800 × 3) = 37.5 weeks, about 8½ months

Two rows have a history. NaNoWriMo, the November challenge to write 50,000 words in a month, asked for 1,667 words a day. The nonprofit behind it announced in March 2025 that it was closing, though writers still run the challenge on their own. Stephen King's number is 2,000: in On Writing he describes aiming for ten pages, about 2,000 words, a day, and says a first draft, even of a long book, should take no more than three months.

The full timeline, from idea to shelf

The draft is the stage people mean when they ask how long it takes to write a book, but it is rarely the longest one. For a traditionally published novel, the waiting after the draft usually takes longer than the writing.

Revision is the long middle

A first draft is fast because it is allowed to be wrong. Revision is where you fix what is wrong: a midpoint that does not turn the story, a subplot that goes nowhere, a character who changes for no reason. Expect at least two passes, one for structure and one for sentences. Before the first, put the draft away. King recommends at least six weeks, long enough that glaring plot holes show up when you reread.

Beta readers need a deadline

A beta reader reads the revised draft as a reader would and tells you where they got bored, lost or unconvinced. An 80,000-word novel is several evenings of reading for someone with a job, so give each reader a date four to six weeks out and a short list of questions. Then budget time to compare notes. A problem three readers mention is real. One that a single reader raises may be a matter of taste. The guide to finding beta readers has the questions to ask.

Agents and publishers run on months

Agents expect fiction to be finished before you query. Many answer queries in four to eight weeks, some take three months or more, and many treat silence as a no. A request for the full manuscript often adds another two or three months. If an agent signs you, expect a round of their edits before the book goes to editors, where it can sit for weeks or most of a year. After a deal, edits, copyedits, proofs, the cover and the sales cycle mean publishers commonly schedule the book a year to two years out. The guide to getting a literary agent covers the querying side step by step.

Self-publishing removes the waiting but not the work. Editing, a cover, formatting and a launch take three or four months at the fastest, and closer to six months to a year for a first book with a hired editor and designer.

How long famous novels took

Famous novels have taken anything from weeks to a decade. The table sticks to timelines documented by the authors, their publishers or their biographers. Many that circulate online are not.

Routines vary as much as totals. Anthony Trollope describes in his Autobiography (1883) sitting down at 5:30 each morning and writing "with my watch before me," holding himself to 250 words every quarter of an hour: 1,000 words an hour. Neither pace is a target, and a fast draft is not a fast book. Kerouac typed his scroll in three weeks, but it drew on notebooks from years of travel and went through several more drafts before Viking published it in 1957.

Find your real pace

A deadline built on your best day fails in the first bad week. Two weeks of honest records give you a number you can plan around.

1. Log two ordinary weeks

   Write at your usual times. After each session, note the date, the minutes and the words added. Do not change your routine to make the log look better.

2. Take the typical session

   Use the median, the middle value, not the best day. Count how many sessions you actually got per week, not how many you meant to.

3. Run the formula and add a buffer

   Divide your target by typical words × sessions per week, then add 20 percent for lost weeks. The result is your draft deadline. Recheck it a month in.

Speed in the draft and time in revision tend to trade off: a fast, loose draft needs more rewriting. Outlining first or discovering the story as you go (the pantser and plotter split) mostly moves time between stages: plotters spend weeks before the draft that pantsers spend after it. To try outlining, start with one of the outlining methods.

Build a schedule you can keep

Once you know your pace, lay the whole book out in weeks, including the stages where you are not writing.

What slows a novel down

• No fixed time. "When I get a chance" rarely comes. A scheduled 30 minutes beats a free Saturday that fills up.
• Rewriting chapter one. The opening will change once you know the ending, so polishing it first is work you will do twice.
• Research as a hiding place. Mark the gap with [CHECK] and keep drafting. Look it up in revision.
• The middle. Drafts lose direction somewhere past the halfway mark. A one-line plan for the next three scenes is usually enough to keep moving.
• The shiny new idea. A fresh premise always looks better than a WIP stuck at 40,000 words. Write it in a notes file and go back.
• Feedback on every chapter. Weekly critique of early chapters can turn a draft into a series of revised openings. Show readers the whole thing.

Keeping a long draft in Strokes

A novel runs to a year or more of files and several drafts, and at some point you will want an old version back. In Strokes, keep the book as a project with one document per chapter, so the folder tree is your table of contents. Save a version when you finish each draft: version history lets you preview any earlier one with the changes marked and restore it in one click, so draft one stays intact while you tear into draft two. For a first read before beta readers, open the AI Assistant beside a chapter and ask where the pace drops or which scenes repeat what the reader already knows. When the draft is ready to share, export it to Word, PDF or EPUB.