How to Count Words in a Story: What Counts, What Doesn't, and Which Tool to Trust
Quick answer: How to count words in a short story for a contest or submission: what counts as a word, whether titles count, why tools disagree, and how to land on an exact number.
To count the words in a story, paste the body text, without title or author name, into a word processor and read the count it gives; then check the venue's rules for whether titles, headings or section breaks are included. A word is any run of characters between spaces, so hyphenated compounds count as one, contractions count as one, and numerals count as one each. Most contests and magazines count body text only and allow a small margin, but a hard minimum or maximum, such as exactly 100 words, is enforced to the word.
The reason this needs a page is that tools disagree, writers count by eye, and a story rejected for being at 98 words is a story nobody read.
What counts as a word
The standard rule, used by Microsoft Word, Google Docs and nearly every submission platform, is whitespace splitting: a word is whatever sits between spaces or line breaks. Under that rule, 'well-known' is one word, 'don't' is one word, '1985' is one word, and 'a.m.' is one word. A dash with spaces round it is not a word but a dash set tight between words, as in some house styles, joins them into one. Ellipses attached to a word count with the word.
Where writers go wrong is in assuming their own instinct matches the tool. Most people count 'twenty-two' as two and 'Mrs Fall' as one because it feels like a name. The tool does the opposite. If a contest says 100 words exactly, the tool's opinion is the one that matters, so write to the tool.
Titles, names and section breaks
Almost all venues exclude the title and the author's name from the count. Section breaks marked with asterisks or a hash are usually excluded too, though a tool will count a row of asterisks as a word if you leave it in when you paste. Chapter headings inside a long story are a grey area; if the story is close to a limit, take them out before counting and treat the result as your true figure.
Epigraphs and dedications are almost always counted if they are on the page, which surprises people. Writory's short story contest runs from 100 to 3,000 words and judges the body of the story; if you are near either edge, count the body alone and leave yourself a margin of a few words rather than landing on the line.
Why tools disagree, and which to trust
Word and Google Docs agree almost always. Scrivener and some web counters treat em dashes and slashes differently, and a few count hyphenated words as two. The command line tool wc counts whitespace-separated tokens and matches Word in nearly every case. If two tools differ, the difference will be in punctuation joining words, and the fix is to find the offending token, usually a dash or a slash, and put spaces round it or rewrite.
For exact-count forms, drabbles, dribbles, 100-word contests, count twice with two tools and trust the lower number. If it is short, add a concrete noun; if long, cut an adjective. Never pad or trim with function words, which show.
A quick method
Strip the title and author line. Paste the body into Google Docs. Note the count. Search for double spaces, stray asterisks and trailing spaces, remove them, and note the count again. If the story is within five words of a hard limit, paste it into a second tool and compare. Then read the venue's rules one more time, because the only count that matters is the one they will do.
What writers can take from this
- Write to the tool, not to your instinct.
- Take the title out before you count; put it back after.
- Search for double spaces; they hide phantom words in some counters.
- For exact-count forms, adjust with nouns and adjectives, never with 'the' or 'and'.
- Read the venue's counting rule the day you submit, not the day you draft.
Try it yourself
Take a story you have finished and count it three ways: by eye, in a word processor, and with a second tool. Write down all three numbers and find every token that caused the difference. Then revise the story to exactly 300 words using only nouns and adjectives.
Questions
Do hyphenated words count as one or two?
One, in almost every tool and every contest. 'Mother-in-law' is a single word for counting purposes. The exception is a hyphen used as a dash with no spaces, which some counters treat as joining two words into one; put spaces round it if you want them counted separately.
Does the title count toward the word limit?
Not usually. Nearly all magazines and contests count the body of the story only. If the guidelines do not say, assume the title is free, but do not rely on that for an exact-count form without checking.
How accurate is the word count in Microsoft Word?
Very, for prose. It uses whitespace splitting and matches Google Docs in almost all cases. The rare disagreements involve dashes, slashes and symbols, not ordinary words.
By the Writory editorial team, reviewed by working writers. Updated September 2026.
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