Slide text checker

How it works

Splitting. In “Automatic” mode, slides separated by a blank line are one slide each, and without a blank line every line is one slide. You can force either mode. In the one-slide-per-line mode, a blank line counts as an empty slide, so you can mark an image-only slide that way.

Counting. A word is anything between spaces, so “e-mail” and “don’t” are one word each, while a lone dash or an emoji is zero. Chinese, Japanese and Thai are split into words with the browser’s own word segmenter, which gives a good estimate rather than a dictionary-exact count. Characters are counted the way people see them, spaces included, so an emoji with a skin tone is one character.

Reading time. It is the word count divided by 250 words a minute for the short end of the range and by 200 for the long end. That speed is an assumption about silent reading, not a measurement of your viewers. It does not suit Chinese or Japanese, and people skim slides, so use it to compare slides with each other rather than as a promise.

Flags. A slide is flagged when it has more words than your target (25 unless you change it), when it has no words at all, or when one word is longer than 20 characters and may break badly in large type. The 25 and the 20 are rules of thumb, not platform rules.

Slide limits. TikTok’s Creator Academy says a photo post takes up to 35 images. Instagram’s Help Center says a carousel takes up to 20 photos or videos. Both figures are as of November 2026.

How to use the result

Treat each flag as a question, not a verdict. A slide over your target may hold two ideas that want two slides. A recipe step can reasonably need 40 words, while a hook slide rarely does. Change the target to match the kind of slide you are writing.

Look at the spread before the totals. If one slide is five times longer than the rest, it takes about five times as long to read, so the swipe rhythm may feel uneven. In our view, cutting or splitting that slide usually does more than trimming every slide a little.

The reading time is a gut check. If the whole slideshow adds up to a couple of minutes of reading, it is closer to an article than a slideshow, and in our view that is a sign to cut. If one slide takes longer to read than the others, move its detail into the caption.

Words are only half of legibility. The tool cannot see how the text sits on your pictures, so check colors with the slide contrast checker and the placement with the safe zone checker. When the counts look right, plan the order of slides with the slideshow planner.