How Many Words in Bible? A Look at Different Versions

It’s one of those questions that just pops into your head out of pure curiosity: exactly how big is the Bible? For centuries, this incredible collection of texts has shaped history, inspired countless works of art, and guided the lives of billions. Many of us have held one, feeling the surprising weight of its tissue-thin pages. The sheer size can be a little intimidating. So, when people ask, “How many words in Bible?” they’re usually hoping for a simple, clean number to wrap their heads around its immense scale.

But the answer is anything but simple.

The truth is, there isn’t one single, official word count for the Bible. The number changes depending on which version you happen to be reading. From the poetic, almost Shakespearean language of the King James Version to the straightforward prose of the New International Version, every translation tells a slightly different numerical story. This isn’t a mistake. Instead, it’s a fascinating window into the art of translation, the history of which books made the cut, and the very nature of language itself.

More in Bible Category

How Many Pages in the Bible

How Many Words Are in the KJV Bible

How Many Words Does the Bible Have

Key Takeaways

• The total word count of the Bible changes significantly depending on the translation you read. There is no single “correct” number.
• The original languages of Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek have vastly different grammatical structures than English, making a one-to-one word translation impossible.
• Different Christian traditions include different books in their Bibles. The Protestant canon contains 66 books, while the Catholic canon includes 73, which drastically increases the final word count.
• Word counts are always estimates. The final number can be influenced by whether or not chapter headings, footnotes, and publisher introductions are included in the tally.

So, Why Isn’t There One Simple Answer?

You’d think counting the words in a book would be easy. Start at page one and stop at the end. Simple. With most books, that works perfectly. The Bible, however, isn’t most books. Two huge factors completely complicate a simple count: translation and canon.

First up is translation. The Bible wasn’t originally written in English. The Old Testament was primarily penned in Hebrew, with a few bits in Aramaic. The New Testament, on the other hand, was written in the everyday Koine Greek of its time. These ancient languages are built differently from modern English. For instance, a single Greek word like logos can be translated as “word,” “reason,” “plan,” or “message,” all depending on the context. Translators have to make a judgment call. Because of this, a passage translated with word-for-word precision will almost always have a different word count than one translated to capture the thought-for-thought meaning.

Secondly, there’s the issue of the canon. “Canon” is just a formal word for the collection of books that a religious tradition accepts as official scripture. The Protestant Bible has 66 books—39 in the Old Testament and 27 in the New. The Catholic Bible, however, contains 73 books. It includes seven additional books in the Old Testament, plus some extra chapters in the books of Esther and Daniel. These are known as the Deuterocanonical books. As you can guess, adding entire books to the collection makes a massive difference to the final word count.

Let’s Talk Numbers: How Many Words Are in the King James Version (KJV)?

When people want a specific word count, they’re often thinking of the King James Version. First published way back in 1611, the KJV is arguably the most influential book in the English language. Its majestic prose has shaped everything from classic literature to our everyday conversations for over 400 years. Because of its historical weight, it has become the unofficial benchmark for biblical stats.

So, what’s the magic number?

The King James Version of the Bible contains approximately 783,137 words.

This figure has been confirmed by countless dedicated individuals and various software programs over the years. It’s a powerful testament to the sheer scope of the 66-book Protestant canon, all rendered in beautiful, if a little old-fashioned, Jacobean English. The KJV was translated using a method called formal equivalence, which tries to be as literal and word-for-word as possible. This approach often leads to a higher word count, as English sometimes needs a few extra words to fully capture the nuance of a single Hebrew or Greek term.

How Does the KJV Break Down?

Digging a little deeper shows how that huge number is spread out. The Bible isn’t just one book; it’s a whole library, and its two main sections are very different in length.

The Old Testament in the KJV is the heavyweight champion, clocking in at around 602,585 words. This is where you’ll find the stories of creation, the nation of Israel, the law of Moses, and the powerful writings of the prophets.

The New Testament is much shorter, containing about 180,552 words. This section focuses on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ, the dramatic birth of the early church, and the letters written by the apostles.

Just for fun, the KJV also has 1,189 chapters and 31,102 verses. It’s a truly monumental work.

What About More Modern Translations?

While the KJV is a literary masterpiece, many modern readers find its “thees” and “thous” a bit tough to get through. This has led to a wonderful variety of newer translations that aim to bridge the 400-year language gap. These versions often use different translation philosophies, which, as we’ve seen, directly impacts the word count.

Modern translations exist on a spectrum. On one end is formal equivalence (word-for-word), like the KJV or the New American Standard Bible (NASB). On the other end is dynamic equivalence (thought-for-thought), which focuses on getting the original meaning across in natural, easy-to-read language. Let’s see how a few of the most popular versions compare.

How Does the New International Version (NIV) Compare?

First published in 1978, the New International Version is one of the most popular Bibles on the planet. Its goal was to strike a perfect balance between accuracy and readability. The translators leaned towards a dynamic equivalence approach, trying to capture the original thought behind the text.

The result? The NIV is noticeably leaner than the KJV. It contains approximately 727,969 words.

That’s over 55,000 words fewer than its famous predecessor. This difference isn’t because anything was left out. It’s simply due to a more concise and direct way of speaking. The translation committee often used a single, modern English word to convey an idea that the KJV might have expressed with a more elaborate phrase, making the text much more accessible.

And the English Standard Version (ESV)?

Sitting comfortably between the KJV and the NIV is the English Standard Version. Published in 2001, the ESV was created to be a “word-for-word” translation that still felt elegant and readable. It’s essentially a modern update to a long line of classic translations that started with the KJV.

Because it leans more towards the literal end of the spectrum, its word count is higher than the NIV’s. The ESV has roughly 760,000 words.

This makes it a popular choice for many. It provides a more literal translation than the NIV without forcing the reader to navigate the archaic language of the KJV, making it a favorite for both deep study and personal reading.

Is the New Living Translation (NLT) Much Different?

The New Living Translation goes even further down the thought-for-thought path than the NIV. The main goal of the NLT is to communicate the meaning of the original texts so clearly and naturally that you almost forget you’re reading a translation. It reads less like an ancient document and more like a contemporary book.

This intense focus on readability leads to a word count that is, perhaps surprisingly, a bit higher than the NIV’s. The NLT comes in at approximately 749,762 words.

Why would a thought-for-thought translation have more words? Sometimes, clearly explaining a complex ancient idea in modern terms requires more words, not fewer. The translators might use a whole sentence to unpack the meaning of a single, dense Hebrew or Greek term, choosing to prioritize clarity over being concise.

Does the Original Language Tell a Different Story?

To really get why the word counts are all over the place, it helps to peek behind the curtain at the original languages. Counting words in Hebrew and Greek isn’t as simple as in English, mainly because the definition of a “word” can get a little fuzzy.

Ancient Hebrew, for example, is built on three-letter roots. A single root can spawn dozens of related words by adding prefixes and suffixes. A single Hebrew “word” can actually contain the subject, verb, and object all rolled into one. A translator has to carefully unpackage that into a sensible English sentence, a process that almost always requires using more words.

Koine Greek, the language of the New Testament, has its own quirks. It’s a highly inflected language, meaning words change their endings to show their role in a sentence. A single Greek verb can communicate person, number, tense, and mood all at once. English has to use a string of helper words (like “will,” “have,” or “was”) and a stricter sentence structure to get the same information across.

Because of this, counting the words in the original manuscripts is a deeply complex academic exercise. It doesn’t tell you how long an English Bible will be, but it does show why translators have such a challenging and vital job.

What Happens When You Add More Books? The Catholic Bible Word Count

So far, we’ve only been talking about the 66 books found in Protestant Bibles. For a huge portion of Christian history, however, the Bible was a larger collection. Catholic Bibles, like the New American Bible, Revised Edition (NABRE), include the Deuterocanonical books. This includes seven full books (Tobit, Judith, 1 and 2 Maccabees, Wisdom of Solomon, Sirach, and Baruch) plus some extra sections in Esther and Daniel.

As you can imagine, adding all that material gives the word count a serious boost. While the exact number still depends on the translation, a typical English Catholic Bible contains well over 900,000 words, with some estimates pushing the total closer to one million.

These extra books add hundreds of pages and thousands of verses, expanding the biblical story with more history, wisdom, and powerful accounts of faith.

Why Are These Books Included?

It’s a long story, but the short version is that these books were part of the Septuagint—a Greek translation of the Hebrew scriptures that was widely used in the time of Jesus. Many New Testament writers even seem to quote from it.

During the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century, reformers decided to base their Old Testament only on the books in the original Hebrew canon, which didn’t include these texts. The Catholic Church, in response, officially reaffirmed their status as scripture. This historical fork in the road is the main reason for the difference in size between Protestant and Catholic Bibles today.

How Can I Figure Out My Reading Speed for the Bible?

Knowing the word count of your Bible is more than just a fun fact. It can be super practical, especially if you want to set a reading goal, like tackling the whole thing in a year. Figuring out your personal reading speed can help you build a plan that actually works.

Here’s a simple way to do it:

• Pick a passage: Choose a chapter from a straightforward narrative book like Genesis or Luke. Poetry like the Psalms can slow you down, so maybe avoid that for this test.
• Set a timer: Time yourself reading at a comfortable, normal pace for five minutes. No speed-reading!
• Count the words: You can either count every single word or get a good estimate. Most Bible pages have 500-700 words. You can also count the words in five lines, find the average, and multiply by the number of lines you read.
• Do the math: If you read 1,000 words in five minutes, your reading speed is 200 words per minute (WPM), which is about average for an adult.

Once you know your WPM, you can figure out how long it will take to read any version of the Bible. To read the KJV (783,137 words) at 200 WPM, you’d just divide 783,137 by 200. That gives you 3,915 minutes. Divide that by 60, and you get about 65 hours.

What’s a Realistic Bible Reading Plan?

With that number, breaking it down into a daily goal is easy. To read the KJV in a year, you’d need to read for just under 11 minutes a day (3,915 minutes / 365 days). Suddenly, it sounds much more doable!

Here are a few ideas based on a 200 WPM speed and the KJV word count:

• One-Year Plan: Requires about 11 minutes of reading per day.
• Six-Month Plan: Requires about 22 minutes of reading per day.
• 90-Day Plan: An intense but rewarding goal, requiring about 44 minutes of reading per day.

There are tons of excellent reading plans online that can guide you. A great place to explore different options is the American Bible Society.

Does Word Count Even Matter in the Grand Scheme?

After all this talk about numbers, it’s fair to ask: does any of this really matter?

In one sense, not at all. The spiritual value and profound message of the Bible can’t be measured in words or chapters. The power of the text is in its stories of hope, its calls for justice, and its timeless wisdom—not its length. Knowing the word count won’t change its meaning one bit.

But in another sense, understanding the numbers is incredibly helpful. It demystifies this massive book, turning it from an intimidating mountain into a series of hills you can climb day by day. It gives you a practical way to engage with it. What’s more, appreciating the differences between translations can help you pick the right Bible for you.

Each translation style serves a different purpose:

• Formal Equivalence (KJV, ESV, NASB): These are fantastic for deep, scholarly study. Their word-for-word approach gets you as close as possible to the original language and phrasing.
• Dynamic Equivalence (NIV, NLT): These are perfect for daily reading and devotionals. They prioritize getting the message across clearly and powerfully.
• Paraphrase (The Message): A paraphrase isn’t a strict translation but a restatement of the message in today’s language. It can be a wonderful tool for seeing a familiar passage in a completely new light.

Ultimately, the “best” Bible is the one you’ll actually open and read. The numbers are just a map. The real adventure is in the journey.

So, how many words are in the Bible? The answer will always be, “It depends.” It depends on the translation, the tradition, and even the language it was written in. What we find isn’t a simple number, but a rich history of faith and scholarship—a beautiful testament to the enduring effort to make this ancient library speak to everyone. The real takeaway isn’t a number, but an invitation to open the book and start reading for yourself.

Frequently Asked Questions – How Many Words in Bible