The word count update

After 300 posts, I thought it would be a good idea to look back on word counts once again. Still equipped with my handy spreadsheet, which I have been updating on a semi-regular basis, I've managed to come up with these statistics (which don't include this post, obviously):

• Total word count: 210,456

That is indeed quite a lot of words. If my blog was a book, it would be longer than Moby Dick, Jane Eyre, and various other titles. I'm still a long way off the Lord of the Rings and War and Peace, but there's no need to rush. 

• Average word count per post: 702

It's slightly less than that, at 701.52, but decimals don't really translate well to whole numbered texts. This makes my average post by word count...the rather apt "Blogs I've Found" (701 words), which also happens to be one of my more popular blogposts by view count. This might be because it's pinned to my sidebar on the homepage. Now, I will admit I am a bit jealous that the post where I recommend other blogs is that popular, since it would suggest many don't hang around that much, but I digress.

161 posts have a larger word count than the average! 

• Longest blogpost: The A Level Review

This post comes in at a massive 2102 words, and I remember when I put it through the word counter, I was shocked that I'd somehow managed to write so many after a month-long hiatus. What makes it all the bigger a surprise is that it comes in at over 500 words longer to the previous record-holder:

1. The A Level Review (2102)
2. Amines, Amino Acids, and AI (1567)
3. Distant Day Out - Guildford (1502) 
4. Deciding Who is Eliminated in Football/Orders of Ranking (1478)
5. Waterloo to Vauxhall (1447)

I will admit that I have another post lined up which will jump into the top 5, so you can look forward to more rambling.

• Shortest blogpost: Bird Photography Update

My finest piece of writing yet, this minipost comes out to be 22 words long. To this day, I have no clue why I published it.

1. Bird Photography Update (22)
2. Crashwaves (24)
3. University college name Venn diagram (36)
4. The Christmas Angle (44)
5. Split Ring Commutator (58)

Two of those posts are admittedly poems, and I'm sure if I hadn't decided to publish loads of poems on this blog, I'd both be further away from 300 posts at this time, and that my average word count would also be far, far higher. My longest poem comes out at 173 words, after all. 

Now, an interesting trend is that my posts are generally getting longer - back in July 2023, I had an average word count of 421 per post; so far in July 2025, that's increased up to 975. I'd also give a special mention to last month, which has an average word count of 1012 per post - the highest yet, and a good indicator that my posts are getting all the longer.

 

See you on the next vaguely interesting milestone!