The word count your word limit means.
“8,000 words, including notes but excluding references.” Wordrange counts a manuscript part by part, so you can add up exactly what the journal asks for. It works on PDFs, which the Mac can’t count at all, as well as Word files.
Coming soon to the Mac App Store as well, for $1.99, with automatic updates.
Main text and notes. 2,519 characters with spaces.
- Title and front matter28
- Abstract74
- ✓Main text412
- ✓Footnotes and endnotes40
- Tables and figure captions10
- References40
- Appendices50
From the sample manuscript that comes with the app
Counted by part
Word limits differ in what they include. Wordrange counts each part separately, and you keep the ones your limit includes.
Main text
The text itself, with its headings and block quotations.
Notes
Footnotes and endnotes, wherever they sit: at the foot of each page of a PDF, or in a Notes section at the end.
Abstract and title page
The abstract, labelled or not, and the title, authors, affiliations and keywords before the text begins.
References
The reference list or bibliography, in any common style and many languages.
Appendices and statements
Appendices and supplementary material; acknowledgments, funding, declarations of interest and author biographies.
Tables and captions
Figure and table captions, and in a Word file the text of its tables.
How it works
Drop a file and read the number.
Drop your manuscript
A PDF or Word file, or Markdown, LaTeX, RTF, OpenDocument, HTML or EPUB. Or a whole folder of them.
Untick what your limit leaves out
Everything is counted to start with. Untick the references, the abstract or the appendices if your journal leaves them out. Wordrange remembers your choice.
Copy the count
One click copies the number with what it includes, “7,948 words (main text and notes)”, ready for the cover letter or the submission form.
Made for PDFs
Preview can’t count the words in a PDF. Copying the text into a word processor counts the wrong things. Wordrange reads the page the way a person does.
Page furniture left out
Running heads, page numbers, line numbers and the journal’s copyright and licence lines aren’t counted as text.
Broken words joined
A word hyphenated at the end of a line counts once, not twice.
Footnotes found
The smaller type at the foot of each page is counted as notes, not as text.
Columns in order
Two-column journal pages are read column by column.
Scanned pages
Pages without text are read with the Mac’s built-in text recognition, on your Mac.
Words as Word counts them
“Well-known” is one word, “pp. 343–44” three; a dash standing alone isn’t a word. The same count journals expect.
A count you can check
Below the number, Wordrange shows the whole text, passage by passage, each marked with the part it was counted in. If a passage landed in the wrong part, Control-click or right-click it and count it as another. Nothing is hidden: you can always see what made the number.
Many documents at once
Drop a folder of essays or chapters and each gets its own count in the list. File › Export Counts as Spreadsheet saves every count and part in one file.
Nothing uploaded
No more pasting your manuscript into a word-count website. Wordrange counts on your Mac, by plain rules, and the app has no network access at all.
- No uploads, no network connections
- No AI and no guessing
- No account, no sign-in
- No analytics, tracking or ads
- Reads only the files you choose
- Sandboxed, native Mac app
Free to download
Wordrange is free to download from this page, signed and notarized by Apple. It will also be on the Mac App Store for $1.99, for automatic updates and to support the app. Both are the same app, with no subscription and no in-app purchases. It comes with a short sample manuscript (Help › Count the Sample Manuscript), so you can see how it divides a paper into parts.
Getting a manuscript ready to submit? Ibid checks every citation against the bibliography, and Verbatim checks every quotation against its source.
Requirements
- A Mac with macOS 14 Sonoma or later.
- A PDF, Word (.docx or .doc), Markdown, LaTeX (.tex), RTF, OpenDocument, HTML, EPUB or plain-text file.
Questions? See Support & FAQ.
