READING TIME · JANE AUSTEN · 1811

How long does it take to read Sense and Sensibility?

At an average reading speed, about 7 hours 40 minutes. Sense and Sensibility is 119,514 words long, in 50 chapters.

WORDS: 119,514
CHAPTERS: 50
READING LEVEL: About grade 9 (Flesch–Kincaid)

Reading time at different speeds

Total reading time for Sense and Sensibility at three reading speeds
Reader	Speed	Whole book
Unhurried	200 words a minute	10 h
Average adult reader	260 words a minute	7 h 40 min
Quick reader	320 words a minute	6 h 15 min

To finish it at a steady pace:

20 minutes a day: about 23 days
30 minutes a day: about 16 days
60 minutes a day: about 8 days

How many chapters are in Sense and Sensibility?

Sense and Sensibility has 50 chapters. The longest is Chapter 44 (5,509 words, 21 min); the shortest is Chapter 5 (1,019 words, 4 min). The average chapter takes 9 min.

Reading times below are at 260 words a minute.

Words and reading time for each chapter of Sense and Sensibility
Chapter	Words	Reading time	Practice in Parlor
Chapter 1	1,552	6 min	Check it →
Chapter 2	1,960	8 min	Check it →
Chapter 3	1,532	6 min	Check it →
Chapter 4	1,943	7 min	Check it →
Chapter 5	1,019	4 min	Check it →
Chapter 6	1,344	5 min	Check it →
Chapter 7	1,282	5 min	Check it →
Chapter 8	1,248	5 min	Check it →
Chapter 9	1,861	7 min	Check it →
Chapter 10	2,047	8 min	Check it →
Chapter 11	1,433	6 min	Check it →
Chapter 12	1,672	6 min	Check it →
Chapter 13	2,102	8 min	Check it →
Chapter 14	1,506	6 min	Check it →
Chapter 15	2,520	10 min	Check it →
Chapter 16	1,981	8 min	Check it →
Chapter 17	1,626	6 min	Check it →
Chapter 18	1,513	6 min	Check it →
Chapter 19	2,933	11 min	Check it →
Chapter 20	2,444	9 min	Check it →
Chapter 21	2,938	11 min	Check it →
Chapter 22	2,823	11 min	Check it →
Chapter 23	2,379	9 min	Check it →
Chapter 24	2,113	8 min	Check it →
Chapter 25	1,938	7 min	Check it →
Chapter 26	2,530	10 min	Check it →
Chapter 27	2,481	10 min	Check it →
Chapter 28	1,447	6 min	Check it →
Chapter 29	3,831	15 min	Check it →
Chapter 30	3,074	12 min	Check it →
Chapter 31	3,800	15 min	Check it →
Chapter 32	2,588	10 min	Check it →
Chapter 33	3,043	12 min	Check it →
Chapter 34	2,630	10 min	Check it →
Chapter 35	2,340	9 min	Check it →
Chapter 36	3,093	12 min	Check it →
Chapter 37	4,502	17 min	Check it →
Chapter 38	3,163	12 min	Check it →
Chapter 39	1,992	8 min	Check it →
Chapter 40	2,629	10 min	Check it →
Chapter 41	2,628	10 min	Check it →
Chapter 42	1,800	7 min	Check it →
Chapter 43	3,396	13 min	Check it →
Chapter 44	5,509	21 min	Check it →
Chapter 45	2,113	8 min	Check it →
Chapter 46	2,874	11 min	Check it →
Chapter 47	2,339	9 min	Check it →
Chapter 48	1,300	5 min	Check it →
Chapter 49	4,230	16 min	Check it →
Chapter 50	2,473	10 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 Sense and Sensibility 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 Sense and Sensibility 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 Sense and Sensibility, Project Gutenberg eBook #161, 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 (20.9 words) and word length. It measures how long the sentences and words are, not how hard the ideas are.

Similar length

Robinson Crusoe 7 h 45 min
Wuthering Heights 7 h 30 min
Babbitt 7 h 55 min
Madame Bovary 7 h 25 min

Also by Jane Austen

Pride and Prejudice 7 h 50 min
Emma 10 h 15 min
Persuasion 5 h 20 min

All reading times →