What is your daily word count/quota?

What is your daily quota?

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DanielSTJ

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I'm trying to figure out when to put aside work. I vary in intensity and am trying to find out what is an ideal writing goal per day. For this reason, fellow AWers, I ask for your input. Do you have a set time? Number of pages? Chapters completed?

Please share your insight. :)
 

novicewriter

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Hmm. Well, nowadays, I don't have--or go by--a specific word count; I seem to be able to write more when there's an official deadline, (like for submitting poetry or a short story to a literary journal or an anthology), rather than a deadline I try to set myself. When I tried NanoWirmo, I wasn't able to reach the average, daily word count I'd need in order to reach 50,000 words by the end of the month.

Some days, I did manage to reach my own smaller word count goal of, say, 500 words, and even exceed that, but when I wouldn't reach the goal the next day or the one after that, I'd suddenly be so panicked about having to write a lot more in order to "catch up to the word count I should've reached by now," that it hindered me from writing and coming up with creative ideas.

I like the idea of having a goal of writing one chapter at a time; when I focused on writing and rewriting one chapter, I felt happy with what I'd accomplished, and not overwhelmed. It helped inspire me to want to continue on to writing the next chapter, whereas, having a specific word count deadline each day, just panicked and overwhelmed me so much that I wasn't able to get much done.

So, perhaps, if you're asking for help on choosing a certain method, it's possible that you might need to try out a couple or a few, to find one or two that suit you best.
 
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BethS

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I'm trying to figure out when to put aside work. I vary in intensity and am trying to find out what is an ideal writing goal per day. For this reason, fellow AWers, I ask for your input. Do you have a set time? Number of pages? Chapters completed?

Please share your insight. :)

My goal is to, most days, sit down and write. The output varies depending on time, flow, and my state of mind.
 

Ari Meermans

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I don't write to a daily quota. I only periodically check word counts to make sure the story is where it should be by that point. I stop writing for the day just before I'm about to write a scene or passage that I will find exciting or deeply satisfying to write. I like to be fresh when I tackle those.
 

Collie

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In summer I aim for 500 words/weekday.
During the school year 1,000.
If I’m on a roll I can hit 2,000 but after that my quality goes down considerably. After 3k I might as well be babbling.
 

Carrie in PA

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I have a daily word count, and I average it over a month. That way I don't beat myself up if I have a few days off, I just "make up" those words across another day or two.

Right now I'm editing, so I'm trying to work through 10 pages/day, but again, I'm averaging it per week.

The averaging thing has really helped me because I'm a bit of a perfectionist. If I decided I needed to do 500 words/day, full stop, I'd quit the first time I had a day off. So instead, I have to hit 15,500 for July (500 X 31 days). It's saved my sanity, because even though I try to "write every day", it's unrealistic. Some days I don't feel well, some days I want to spend with my family, some days I just want to sit on my ass with some tea and a good book. I had days off from my day job, this isn't any different.
 

lizmonster

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When I'm drafting, I have a word count goal - usually 2K/day, but when I have the energy, I'll double that. When I revise, I tend to pick an end date and divide the number of words by the number of days available.

I need momentum to work. If I slow down or take a break of more than a day or two, I struggle to get going again.
 

Lakey

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Any day in which I can manage any writing, revising, plotting, or researching is a good day. My day job demands the lion's share of my mental bandwidth.

(I do get some general reading in virtually every day, regardless of what else is going on. Audiobooks are a great boon to me, in that way.)

ETA: I have sometimes tried for daily word counts but there are some kinds of work I find hard to quantify. For example, yesterday I sketched a scene for which I had even-sketchier notes from two previous occasions. The sketch, incorporating those notes, was about 1000 words. Do I count that as writing a thousand words? What about when I go back and flesh out the sketch and turn it into actual prose, rather than a sketch. Suppose it's 3000 words after I do that. Do I count that as writing 2000 or 3000 words? Now I decide to revise and edit the scene because I want to post it to SYW. I spend a few hours on it, after which it is much stronger, and about 2700 words. What's my word count for that day?

So I'm moving more towards daily goals of "some quantum of progress" rather than any particular metric.
 
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BethS

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I sketched a scene for which I had even-sketchier notes from two previous occasions. The sketch, incorporating those notes, was about 1000 words. Do I count that as writing a thousand words? What about when I go back and flesh out the sketch and turn it into actual prose, rather than a sketch. Suppose it's 3000 words after I do that. Do I count that as writing 2000 or 3000 words? Now I decide to revise and edit the scene because I want to post it to SYW. I spend a few hours on it, after which it is much stronger, and about 2700 words. What's my word count for that day?

Just fwiw--

When I tally up words written for the day, I count all new words, even if I don't end up keeping them. If I'm revising something and end up adding 100 new words to a scene but deleting 200 old words, my tally for that session is still 100 words.

I find this a more motivating approach than just counting up the net gain. Now, if someone is wanting to keep track of a growing word count for a novel or story, that would obviously have to be done differently to be accurate.
 

Lakey

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Just fwiw--

When I tally up words written for the day, I count all new words, even if I don't end up keeping them. If I'm revising something and end up adding 100 new words to a scene but deleting 200 old words, my tally for that session is still 100 words.

I find this a more motivating approach than just counting up the net gain.

I appreciate this idea in principle, but in practice I'm not sure how one would implement it. How do you know that you added 100 words and deleted 200? All I would be able to tell at the end of a revising session like that is that the total count for the scene went down by 100. (And that the scene was tighter, better, etc. - all the forward progress that is difficult to quantify.) That's not a challenge to your method, in any way - I really just can't envision how one would track that.
 

Enlightened

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I think this is a quantity/quality issue. Which side of the spectrum you focus on can vary word counts and quotas significantly. If you did significant outlining or are really good at pantsing is another issue. If you pre-scripted some dialogue to fit into scenes, of your outline, before writing, that can play into it.

I will keep goals not daily requirements. I'd like my first book to be finished in 10-12 weeks (80K max). That's 6667 - 8000 words per week. I'd like to work 6 days a week and keep one for chores and relaxation. That comes out to 1112 - 1334 words per day. At 250 words per page, that's 4½-5½ pages per day (my goal). I'd shoot for 5 pages a day, but wouldn't mind if I only did 3 one day and 7 another.
 

ValerieJane

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I try to write 1,000 words per session. My ideal writing time is at night, so I try to write 1,000 words before going to sleep. During the academic year, I have an hour break built into my schedule which I like to use to write sometimes. If I can write 1k during that break and another 1k at night, I'll feel productive. But there will be stretches when I don't write at all; I try not to get too worked up over it. Also, I tend to feel the same as Enlightened: if I write 3k one day and 500 words another, I'll still feel productive. That comes out in the wash.
 

Chase

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No specific count--the goal springs from the fact that the worst day writing is far better than the best day at work. :applause:
 
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A.P.M.

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I'm another one who tries to write 500 words a day. I don't always make it though...
 

Elle.

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My only goal is to write every day: can be a few words or sentences scribbled in my notebook or typing a few 1,000s on whatever I'm working on. Having a set count doesn't work for me, there is no point sitting down to write 500 words to hit a target if it's not coming, I'll end up either writing useless junk or block myself even more. That's what works for me.
 

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I don't have a daily word count or subscribe to the 'write-every-day' mantra, as neither, in my opinion, improve writing ability or skill. I just write when I can and concentrate on the words and not the number of them. The work still gets done and I very much enjoy the process.

Word accumulation still seems to be popular, though, so maybe I'm out of step :)
 

Aimless Lady

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I write 1,300 per day when I'm drafting. I do take Sundays off because I'm in town most of the day. This leaves me with the evening to write, and I'm a morning person. So no writing during the evening.
 

BethS

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I appreciate this idea in principle, but in practice I'm not sure how one would implement it. How do you know that you added 100 words and deleted 200? All I would be able to tell at the end of a revising session like that is that the total count for the scene went down by 100. (And that the scene was tighter, better, etc. - all the forward progress that is difficult to quantify.) That's not a challenge to your method, in any way - I really just can't envision how one would track that.

Well (cough), I may be unique in this strange ability, but I keep track of new words as I write them. I write slowly anyway, most of the time, so while I'm jotting down, say, "11" in the notebook (I keep a small spiral notebook at my side while I write) to represent the 11-word sentence I just wrote, I'm also thinking ahead about what the next words will be. If I get on a roll and the words are coming fast, I pause every few paragraphs to take a quick word count and put down that number. If I delete a three-word phrase and replace it with something else, longer or shorter, the new number of words goes into the notebook. At the end of a writing session, I add up the strings of numbers to get the day's count of new words. It's a constant business of writing, recording the numbers, writing, recording, and so on. Like I said, this works for me simply because I can do it without distracting myself; it's automatic now. I'm one of those odd people who's more whole-brained, rather than left or right brained, which also allows me to write creatively and do editing and revision as part of the same process.

I started this about a year and a half ago as an experiment, and I'm still doing it now because it motivated me to produce more and it also left a tangible record of progress. The other component to it that I haven't mentioned yet is that I use the daily count to award myself (don't laugh) stickers. I have a separate notebook for the stickers, and there are different stickers depending on how many words for the day. The more words, the nicer the sticker. I also award stickers for scenes and chapters finished.

It's a bit crazy and I suppose rather juvenile, and it likely wouldn't work for everyone (though I'd think it would be easier for the writer who writes without stopping to revise), but it works for me. I have a friend who does this, too (not sure how she counts her words, though. I don't think she does what I do.), and she puts her stickers on a wall calendar. I needed something more portable (I travel back and forth between Europe and the States every few months), hence the small notebooks.

Whatever works, you know? :greenie
 
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Bufty

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I don't find that juvenile or crazy at all, Beth . Thanks for sharing. :Hug2:
 

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Lately, I have been trying to get at least 1k words in a day. I've had mix success with this goal recently, but I used to be able to write 2-3k a day with no problem. I think it just depends on the type of person you are. I don't think anyone should feel ashamed if their goal is more or less, or even if they don't make their goal at all.

A good frame of mind for me recently has been to see as any progress as progress itself. Even if it is only 100 words, at least it is 100 more than what you started with. Really it seems to be more important to feel comfortable and positive with yourself, that way you may find it easier to write.
 

BethS

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I don't find that juvenile or crazy at all, Beth . Thanks for sharing. :Hug2:

Aww, thanks, Bufty. I admire the Other Writers who can pen a thousand or so words in a morning, like clockwork, without breaking a sweat. "Why yes," I imagine them saying in tones of gentle puzzlement. "Doesn't everyone do that?" And then they happily waft themselves off to a nice lunch and a relaxing afternoon, poolside maybe, or perhaps spending time doing the five other things they're really good at.

Me, I have to play games with my mind... :e2hammer::)
 
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bearilou

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My minimum is 444 words. That's the minimum required to keep my streak going on 4thewords.com.

But usually, I do aim for a much higher word count. I can because I have no other familial obligations and writing is my full time job. :D

I have played with the chapter goal on occasion (three chapters a day), to switch things up for funsies. I always come back to word goals.

Lately, I have been trying to get at least 1k words in a day. I've had mix success with this goal recently, but I used to be able to write 2-3k a day with no problem. I think it just depends on the type of person you are. I don't think anyone should feel ashamed if their goal is more or less, or even if they don't make their goal at all.
A good frame of mind for me recently has been to see as any progress as progress itself. Even if it is only 100 words, at least it is 100 more than what you started with. Really it seems to be more important to feel comfortable and positive with yourself, that way you may find it easier to write.


This is so important. SO important.
 
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SKara

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Until recently, I used to have time limits: Spend x hours writing/revising every day. Then I realized it was only motivating me to put in hours without putting in the necessary deep focus, so I gave up time counts. These days I don't measure my progress in the simple sense of the word, because in one way or another, it doesn't work well for me (either makes me anxious or leads to efficiency problems).

So I usually try to do the best I can without any kind of target, but I do generally have a mini-goal in mind: e.g. fix this specific problem in these two chapters, or add this new plot development in this section, but they're not strict "goals" - just enough to point me in the right direction.

As for an ideal writing goal per day, I'd suggest trying to figure out what works for you. Do you feel satisfied with your current targets/quotas? Or do they leave you dissatisfied and depleted?
 
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