Hi guys, so I'm writing my first high fantasy novel and at times it feels like my chapters are too short, but other times it feels like they are way too long. Am I overthinking this? Is there a general guideline? 
Some advice would be greatly appreciated. 

2000-3000 words is generally regarded as the golden "mean", going under it by a lot seems to be worse than going over it. 

Regardless of long or short chapters however story quality will be the prime indicator for whether readers stick around.

Thank you! that's a good guideline. 

It is also a function of your update schedule. If you update once or twice a week consider going over into longer chapters. If you are updating three or more times a week, then 2-4k is a good goal to shoot towards. More than individual chapters, there is also reader attention to consider. Someone who is updating daily can get away with shorter chapters because people might only read two or three days a week and will still get enough meat to satisfy their story needs. 

Consider your update schedule. That is what's most important. Slower update times? Longer chapters. Faster update times? Shorter chapters. Of course, there is such a thing as too long or too short while building a following. When you're established, too long stops being bad (as long as you're not simply padding), but too short will always earn you some kind of ire.

As to what constitutes short or long, the above posters have answered nicely.

Just adding my two cents by saying I've seen 1,500-2,500 to be an ideal chapter length for this site.

Best way to think about it is how much are you posting per week. It would then depend on you on where you want to cut it per release. 

I feel like 7 - 10k per week would be the sweet spot for steady readership growth per unit of effort (Which I don't have now). Add more words if you think you can handle it.  

Also, if you can chop it up without the chapters feeling empty, then you can get more readership and engagement since time spent in front page is skewed on releases and not word count per release.

Still a newbie here, but my general rule of thumb when writing a chapter is to have a purpose for each one and write however much is necessary to reach that goal.  For instance, "This chapter, I need to introduce this, this, and this," or, "Last chapter was heavily action focused, let's consider a calm period with more dialogue here."

This means my current writing rhythm is about 1 chapter every few weeks and each one totalling 5000+ words.  Seems to work for me and my story, but I am trying to improve on the turn around time to build up an audience.  So probably need to restructure in the future to be more efficient.

Been there. Used to think that the longer is better. Used to have 6-7k chapters on average after splitting my normal 10-15k chapters up when I realized 10-15k chapters is too long... 
Then I realized that 6-7k is too long too, so I split each into 2-3 chapters. Thought I'd end up with lots of 1.5k-2k chapters... instead I ended up adding stuff to each chapter and ended with 4-2.5k chapters on average. (I have a few that get close to the 5k and rare ones that are about 2k too) But 2-4k is a good sweet spot. At least for me. Sometimes I regret going down from the 6-7k I had, but it's done and I'm not going to redo everything again. 

There's no real answer for this one. You just have to figure out what works for you and how do you want to market them. Also, more is better only when it has quality in addition to the quantity. 

In short... what everyone here pretty much already said. 

D.T. Wrote: Still a newbie here, but my general rule of thumb when writing a chapter is to have a purpose for each one and write however much is necessary to reach that goal.  For instance, "This chapter, I need to introduce this, this, and this," or, "Last chapter was heavily action focused, let's consider a calm period with more dialogue here."

This means my current writing rhythm is about 1 chapter every few weeks and each one totalling 5000+ words.  Seems to work for me and my story, but I am trying to improve on the turn around time to build up an audience.  So probably need to restructure in the future to be more efficient.

You sound like a plotter ^;^ 99% pantser here, I don't do that at all. My chapters have very vague purposes and they're just... flowing, I sometime even throw dice on the outcome, I'm crazy.

Anyway, a single chapter every few weeks is rather slow. Even if it's 5k long chapters. (I do 1 4k-2.5k chapter a week and I believe it's slow, but I haven't started advertising or patreon yet. I'm planning to move back to 2 chapters per weeks once I do.) 

This is just a suggestion, it's meant to help. You do you of course. 
Try creating a bit of a backlog, write and keep the chapters to yourself instead of outright uploading them every few weeks or so. Once you have enough chapters and you feel comfortable with a schedule, you can release them more predictably. 
Just my two cents, I don't know why you're writing and what's your goal with your writing. If you're purely doing it for fun with no other possible goals, then just do what you want. 

 

M.D.Syl Wrote: You sound like a plotter ^;^ 99% pantser here, I don't do that at all. My chapters have very vague purposes and they're just... flowing, I sometime even throw dice on the outcome, I'm crazy.

Anyway, a single chapter every few weeks is rather slow. Even if it's 5k long chapters. (I do 1 4k-2.5k chapter a week and I believe it's slow, but I haven't started advertising or patreon yet. I'm planning to move back to 2 chapters per weeks once I do.) 

This is just a suggestion, it's meant to help. You do you of course. 
Try creating a bit of a backlog, write and keep the chapters to yourself instead of outright uploading them every few weeks or so. Once you have enough chapters and you feel comfortable with a schedule, you can release them more predictably. 
Just my two cents, I don't know why you're writing and what's your goal with your writing. If you're purely doing it for fun with no other possible goals, then just do what you want. 

Yeah, definitely a plotter.  Usually leave a fair bit of wiggle room for the characters to do what they want, but I always knows where I want them to be by the end of a chapter and I always move the plot forward.

And fair advice!  Should clarify 5k is the definite minimum for the chapters right, but I still agree with your point.  My writing process has always been a slow one due to some inefficiencies in time management. 

Currently working towards writing as a career, so I'm trying to listen to all the advice I can!  As for the backlog, unfortunately, I already have a small readership on my own site.  It's nothing huge, but I'd rather not lose them. So I'm kinda stuck for the time being, outside of a weekly chapter update on sites like this until I catch up...

I'm working on getting a better work flow right now to speed up writing.  One of the biggest time sinks has been in the editing process, though.  (I have a few close IRL friends who have been going over each chapter with me, but they are busy so need like at least a week to review right now)

I've also been tempted to make updates weekly by posting a scene of each chapter each week, as I can quite comfortable write 2k words in a week.  But I'm worried about it affecting my plotting, as I do often still leave room for some spur of the moment plot changes on the more moment by moment level in my process.  To put it another way, I have the big strokes all figured out, but I may change a major piece in scene 1 of a chapter so I can make a big set piece moment in scene 5 of a chapter.

I think I may do that after I finish this current arc, as I'll be taking a step back to work on another project while also trying to get the first book published. I'll also be working on making it into an audio book since I have the sound equipment and folks have told me since I was young I have a good speaking voice.

D.T. Wrote: I think I may do that after I finish this current arc, as I'll be taking a step back to work on another project while also trying to get the first book published. I'll also be working on making it into an audio book since I have the sound equipment and folks have told me since I was young I have a good speaking voice.

Sounds like a good idea. Good luck! 
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How long chapters should be: 
If you're looking to market and make a career out of your fiction. I've seen a thread (that I can't currently find, was looking for it again but gave up) that tells you treat it like a business and also addressing the subject of chapter length. The thread says the right number is 1.5k-2.5k and stick to it, should make releases often (at least 5 times a week) and stick to that word count in order to be successful. (Not to increase the word count all of a sudden. and definitely not decrease it either.)

It sounds like a really good marketing advice. It's still somebody's opinion. but that author has a pretty large following, so gota be some truth to it. 

That being said, I don't follow that advice myself. Doing that would drive me mad personally. I'm not looking to hit some huge marketing success, I'd be comfortable sitting in the middle with a humble income through my work, if I ever have an income through my work at all. 

This is the thread @M.D.Syl is referring to: https://www.royalroad.com/forums/thread/116847

But it's specific to monetizing litRPGs through Patreon so if this isn't your specific goal, you'll still take away some good advice but shouldn't treat it as gospel.

I'm going against the grain a bit and I don't think chapter length should be correlated to update frequency. Update consistency is more important than the length of the chapters so do what is within your capability and not more. You don't want to overpromise and underdeliver to your readers. Although I would advise sticking around a max of 2.5k as that is the generally established sweet spot for chapters; if a chapter is too long readers may choose to skip it in favor of something they don't have to scroll too far to read. If your chapters are longer you can easily break them up into smaller chapters specifically for posting here. It's important to play to the market and go with what the readers like in order to maximize your potential viewership. While this site is for far more than just litRPGs, readers do come to expect certain conventions over time and following those makes you more likely to be read.

Cymas Wrote: This is the thread @M.D.Syl is referring to: https://www.royalroad.com/forums/thread/116847

But it's specific to monetizing litRPGs through Patreon so if this isn't your specific goal, you'll still take away some good advice but shouldn't treat it as gospel.

I'm going against the grain a bit and I don't think chapter length should be correlated to update frequency. Update consistency is more important than the length of the chapters so do what is within your capability and not more. You don't want to overpromise and underdeliver to your readers. Although I would advise sticking around a max of 2.5k as that is the generally established sweet spot for chapters; if a chapter is too long readers may choose to skip it in favor of something they don't have to scroll too far to read. If your chapters are longer you can easily break them up into smaller chapters specifically for posting here. It's important to play to the market and go with what the readers like in order to maximize your potential viewership. While this site is for far more than just litRPGs, readers do come to expect certain conventions over time and following those makes you more likely to be read.

Thank you for the link!  I'll give it a read when I have the chance.

Yeah, going through a few other stories posted here, I definitely see this consistent through line that smaller chapters(at least compared to my current word count) are better.  My chapters can be broken comfortably into 2.5k, so I'll try adjusting that to see what happens.  May increase the update schedule to twice a week instead of once.  I'd love to post the suggested five days, but I think that would definitely kill me right now at my current pace.

I've also only started writing on this consistent level semi-recently, so I'm hoping to speed up the writing process as I continue with my current and future writing projects.

All that said, thank you both for the advice!

Since you're writing a novel what I would suggest is keeping the chapters at their current length within your master draft/document and then break them into pieces for your RR posts. You can schedule chapter releases so you could do that; finish the whole chapter, schedule them to post and go ahead and start the next one.

I would caution against trying to do too much, too fast though. I'm in a similar position where this is the most regular writing I've done in a very long time. I found it was very easy to keep momentum for the first month and even build up my backlog a bit. This month, my second full month here, not so much. I've burned through my backlog and am now writing my chapters basically the morning of my scheduled release. I'm not behind and I haven't missed a post yet, but I kind of feel like I'm treading water too. I'm glad I didn't overcommit myself but it's definitely showing me I haven't been using my time very effectively. The last few chapters have definitely suffered for it, too.

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I try to keep all the chapters of my novel now between 1000 to 5000 words, no more than that. I uploaded an 8k word chapter a few months ago and it became the least read, even though it was one of the important ones. I learned my lesson after that.

If a chapter feels too short, it usually misses a proper end. Without a proper end, making a chapter longer usually only leads to reader exhaustion before the "too short" feeling stops. For a web serial a chapter end means many readers have to stop there. They can not just turn the page to the next chapter. (unless you publish multiple chapters at once). So the end of a chapter needs to give some emotional conclusion to the reader, or there is something missing, ending in a "too short" feeling. The end of some scene might sound like a good place to end a chapter at, but from the reading experience, it is usually even a more unnatural end than other places in the plot.

Everything that makes the reader think back can usually be a good end. Perhaps combined with something funny to send the reader away in good mood.

The easiest way to write a proper end is a cliff hanger. Some readers might complain, though they will complain and consider the story good. (As opposed to not complaining and just dropping the chapter because 'the chapters are too short'). A cliff hanger might create some tension and anticipation for the next chapter, but that is actually a very minor effect. A writer usually automatically writes a chapter so it progresses towards the cliff hanger, automatically adding some structure leading to an end. The reader will usually think about what will happen next and what the chances are, making them automatically consider the what lead there and in what situation everything is, giving some good conclusion.


A chapter feeling "too long" is something I'm less sure about. It can happen if stuff is happening unmotivated or without interest by the reader. If you feel like adding anything to your story because "it is needed to prepare ..." or "it is needed to understand ...", then it might be much better to just remove it. Making sense does not help if the story is boring. Preparing stuff is nice for text books, but does not belong in fiction. (It's of course good if you have another part of the story that prepares and explains, but it needs to be proper part of the story and not just there "because ..."). Other forms of missing motivation can also make it feel long.

(That's of course all from the reader perspective. If you work for a living, then efficiency is more important than being effective. The causes for feeling to short or too long are often the same, but you either have to learn to get that right without much effort or you'll just drown).

Cymas Wrote: Since you're writing a novel what I would suggest is keeping the chapters at their current length within your master draft/document and then break them into pieces for your RR posts. You can schedule chapter releases so you could do that; finish the whole chapter, schedule them to post and go ahead and start the next one.

Yup, that's just what I've done.  I'll be releasing twice a week instead of once as well, so that might help my numbers more as well since it seems a lot of traffic comes from the recently updated.  I'd do more, but honestly I lean toward consistency over quantity and I know I can keep up 2 parts of a chapter weekly, even if I catch up before I finish the book.  Thank you for your advice on this, I appreciate it!

I can see now there is a big difference between writing a novel and publishing finished chapters online versus writing a webnovel.  I struggle to break out of the conventional book/chapter mindset when writing, so it's probably for the best I intend to treat my work as a novel in progress rather than a webnovel. 

Quote:I would caution against trying to do too much, too fast though. I'm in a similar position where this is the most regular writing I've done in a very long time. I found it was very easy to keep momentum for the first month and even build up my backlog a bit. This month, my second full month here, not so much. I've burned through my backlog and am now writing my chapters basically the morning of my scheduled release. I'm not behind and I haven't missed a post yet, but I kind of feel like I'm treading water too. I'm glad I didn't overcommit myself but it's definitely showing me I haven't been using my time very effectively. The last few chapters have definitely suffered for it, too.

Yeah, won't lie this is one of the things I've feared as well.  I've tried a couple of times in the past to get more into writing as a hobby, but it was always bursts of creativity with long droughts of inspiration.  I've managed to find a balance right now, but I always fear of falling off if I push myself too hard.

One thing I like in the guide you linked and @M.D. Syl referenced was the importance of longevity.  Writing on any professional level is definitely a marathon, not a sprint.  I think working on consistency and quality now will lead to greater longevity once you nail it down enough to focus on speed.  Probably isn't the best short term business but I plan on sticking around and don't expect any get rich quick schemata to my writing.  For now, I'll be happy if people read consistently and enjoy it enough to consider buying paperback down the line.

Chapter length can be pretty situational though when your just starting out you can go for shorter chapters around the 1,500-2000 word range as they are quick to write and easier to edit then longer chapters.

A novel like Mistborn for example has the majority of its chapters in the 4-6k word range with one 2k and three 8k word chapters. 

For a high quality polished novel I would aim for around 3-4k words a chapter, and don't be afraid to change the chapter length to suit the scene, I would aim for roughly 100k words per book, 150-200k words for the really long books. 2.5k words a chapter is plenty for most webnovels, even less if you upload regularly. Mother of Learning is roughly 7k words per chapter but had monthly uploads if I remember. Brandon Sanderson has a series on his youtube (Look in playlists) where he writes a chapter. The chapter in the published novel was about 2.7k words and there is about 3 hours of footage.


Fun fact: Some series can have insane total lengths, Harry Potter 1.1m, Stormlight Archives 1.8m, Wheel of time 4.9m. 

"Too long" is so subjective because it depends on the purpose of the chapter. I have one chapter that's almost 5000 words but it describes one continuous and ever-worsening (for the character) day so it flows well and it doesn't feel too long while reading. Most of my chapters can get their message/scene across in about half that length, however. For my own work I prefer chapters of between 1500 and 3500 words. It is rare for them to go over or under that but it happens when necessary. I write what is needed and try not to waste too many words. I don't really fuss over word count too much.