READING TIME · CHARLES DICKENS · 1838

How long does it take to read Oliver Twist?

At an average reading speed, about 10 hours 5 minutes. Oliver Twist is 157,727 words long, in 53 chapters.

WORDS: 157,727
CHAPTERS: 53
READING LEVEL: About grade 6 (Flesch–Kincaid)

Reading time at different speeds

Total reading time for Oliver Twist at three reading speeds
Reader	Speed	Whole book
Unhurried	200 words a minute	13 h 10 min
Average adult reader	260 words a minute	10 h 5 min
Quick reader	320 words a minute	8 h 15 min

To finish it at a steady pace:

20 minutes a day: about 31 days
30 minutes a day: about 21 days
60 minutes a day: about 11 days

How many chapters are in Oliver Twist?

Oliver Twist has 53 chapters. The longest is Chapter 39 (5,240 words, 20 min); the shortest is Chapter 36 (987 words, 4 min). The average chapter takes 11 min.

Reading times below are at 260 words a minute.

Words and reading time for each chapter of Oliver Twist
Chapter	Words	Reading time	Practice in Parlor
Chapter 1	1,115	4 min	Check it →
Chapter 2	3,936	15 min	Check it →
Chapter 3	3,086	12 min	Check it →
Chapter 4	2,570	10 min	Check it →
Chapter 5	4,028	15 min	Check it →
Chapter 6	1,721	7 min	Check it →
Chapter 7	2,323	9 min	Check it →
Chapter 8	3,228	12 min	Check it →
Chapter 9	2,326	9 min	Check it →
Chapter 10	1,796	7 min	Check it →
Chapter 11	2,610	10 min	Check it →
Chapter 12	3,412	13 min	Check it →
Chapter 13	2,807	11 min	Check it →
Chapter 14	3,963	15 min	Check it →
Chapter 15	2,344	9 min	Check it →
Chapter 16	3,521	14 min	Check it →
Chapter 17	3,198	12 min	Check it →
Chapter 18	2,983	11 min	Check it →
Chapter 19	3,396	13 min	Check it →
Chapter 20	2,983	11 min	Check it →
Chapter 21	2,164	8 min	Check it →
Chapter 22	2,467	9 min	Check it →
Chapter 23	2,713	10 min	Check it →
Chapter 24	1,991	8 min	Check it →
Chapter 25	2,234	9 min	Check it →
Chapter 26	4,494	17 min	Check it →
Chapter 27	2,485	10 min	Check it →
Chapter 28	3,423	13 min	Check it →
Chapter 29	1,377	5 min	Check it →
Chapter 30	2,341	9 min	Check it →
Chapter 31	3,956	15 min	Check it →
Chapter 32	3,353	13 min	Check it →
Chapter 33	3,281	13 min	Check it →
Chapter 34	3,703	14 min	Check it →
Chapter 35	2,814	11 min	Check it →
Chapter 36	987	4 min	Check it →
Chapter 37	3,585	14 min	Check it →
Chapter 38	3,575	14 min	Check it →
Chapter 39	5,240	20 min	Check it →
Chapter 40	2,575	10 min	Check it →
Chapter 41	3,583	14 min	Check it →
Chapter 42	3,687	14 min	Check it →
Chapter 43	3,755	14 min	Check it →
Chapter 44	2,372	9 min	Check it →
Chapter 45	1,216	5 min	Check it →
Chapter 46	3,564	14 min	Check it →
Chapter 47	2,521	10 min	Check it →
Chapter 48	3,427	13 min	Check it →
Chapter 49	3,566	14 min	Check it →
Chapter 50	4,234	16 min	Check it →
Chapter 51	4,835	19 min	Check it →
Chapter 52	3,310	13 min	Check it →
Chapter 53	1,553	6 min	Check it →

READING IT FOR CLASS?

Knowing how long it takes is one thing. Understanding it is another.

Parlor Study is a reading comprehension companion. Read Oliver Twist one chapter at a time, then make sure you understood it.

Read a chapter. The full Project Gutenberg text, with highlights, notes and read-aloud.
Explain it in your own words. Challenge me asks about the main idea, what the text suggests without saying, and the turn the chapter hinges on, then checks your answer against the text.
Talk it through, then come back. Discuss stays within the chapters you have reached, so it won’t give away what comes next, and Revisit brings your ideas back later.

Open Oliver Twist in Parlor →How Parlor practices reading comprehension

Parlor Study is a web preview for ages 13 and up, available by invitation. Request an invitation. AI feedback can make mistakes; check it against the text.

How these numbers were worked out

Words are counted in Oliver Twist, Project Gutenberg eBook #730, the edition Parlor opens, divided into chapters exactly as Parlor shows them. Project Gutenberg’s licence and notes are left out. Other editions may differ slightly.

Reading speeds follow Marc Brysbaert’s review of 190 studies, which found that adults read English silently at about 260 words a minute for fiction and 238 for non-fiction (Journal of Memory and Language, 2019). Older and more difficult books often take longer than their word count suggests.

The reading level is the Flesch–Kincaid grade, worked out from average sentence length (15.1 words) and word length. It measures how long the sentences and words are, not how hard the ideas are.

Similar length

Mansfield Park 10 h 15 min
Emma 10 h 15 min
Dracula 10 h 20 min
The Iliad 9 h 50 min

Also by Charles Dickens

All reading times →