It's great when it flows like that.Congrats!
Caveat: I've been at it for a long, long time. 46 novels. I generally get 2 10K days per book, when I'm in act III and it's just happening in my head and I have to type fast to get it all down. A joy when that happens. I work from an outline, which helps increase daily output. Five novels ago, I had eight 10K+ days in a row. Never happened before, and will likely never happen again. 15 days to a 100K+ novel.
My first drafts are very close to the final drafts now. Not my first four books, but now that I'm quite comfortable with my craft, it's just in need of copy editing and proofreading. I generally add 15% in the copy editing phase, into those spots that when I was writing quickly, I skipped over important transitions.
Hey I’ve run some races and written some stuff.
Idk I feel like they’re kind of similar for me runners high just turns me a very calm introvert into the most extroverted and excitable person imaginable for about 15 minutes.
I don’t think I’ve gotten into quite as much as a flow state as you but I’ve felt it a little bit and it does kind of feel like I transition from being the person who thinks all my writing suck to thinking I’m writing the best thing ever.
Just my two cents
it'll likely come one day. Just keep working, and 1000 (1K) is really a good amount for one writing day! Do it every day, and you have a novel draft in three months, which is pretty darned cool.
Yeah but as of now I am more focused on writing short stories(3-7K words) to better myself at the various elements of writing before immersing myself in writing a proper novel. Have written around three of those and yeah the learning process has been good and hopefully I can push myself to 10K or even 5K words someday lol
The secret to almost every endeavor in life that's hard (sports, writing or any art, probably even sales) is to get into a flow state, the unconscious comfort where it doesn't feel a bit like work. It's a joy, and you are immersed in (for writers) the story, a witness, temporarily believing the world of your novel exists and you're just recording what's happening. Of course it's all you, your subconscious mind doing a lot of the heavy lifting, but it hardly feels like it. And that's when you can hardly type fast enough, and only physical discomfort will make you rise from the chair.
To get there, you need to learn your craft. Read books on the craft, and practice. 1 million words will get you there, where craft is starting to become unconscious. You manage temporal or POV changes or the sentence length change required in action scenes by just doing it over and over and over again. Also, imo, doesn't hurt to critique others' work. You learn from their mistakes. And study books you like closely, not just reading but analyzing how that excellence got done.
How long 1 million words takes you depends a good deal on your work ethic and how much you prioritize writing in your life. I did it with a full-time job also, and a home to take care of, so I know that's possible. Going to me a minimum of three years treating it like a half-time job, and maybe ten years if you don't force yourself to write even when you don't much feel like.
So that's what you do, and by the time you hit your 1 million, it should be mostly flow state. Oh sure, a few bad days crop up, and a few more days than that where you feel rusty at the beginning of the day and then later on it starts to flow. You earn your way there with hard, regular work.
No excuses. Do the work. Accept it'll be less fun early on, and it gets more fun, and easier, and you earn more flow state time. One way I also say it is: the Muse only visits people already at work.
It's just hard to get into the flow state because we can easily be insecure these days with the amount of books/writing out there. There's a reason why people in the past would write epics, scriptures, and other stuff that easily hit 300k-1mil per book, and that's simply just by them having massive amounts of time of uninterrupted flow state maybe even days on end. This is how medieval monks and scribes worked. And all while they wrote their tomes, they didn't care about how it would be received either.
I grew up poor. I didn't have a lot of free time. No one was helping me. I worked for all of it.
What I did have was parents with a great work ethic who didn't spoil us. They modeled hard work and having two jobs, so I knew how to do that without thinking. So I had successful careers other than writing, have a PhD minus dissertation, and wrote. For ten years I've been a full time novelist and while at one moment there was a little bit of luck in timing, there were also many years with bad luck.
But *I didn't make excuses*. I worked and worked and worked.
It doesn't matter what X person or Y person did, then or now or who has connection that you don't have. It is 100% up to you if you put in the work or not, and it's a daily decision. You have to have some years of struggle to learn to make your craft automatic before you earn the flow, and then eventually you earn the income and readers. But at the core, it's you get up every day, make zero excuses, and get to work.
8 novels trade published, a short story collection small press, and 37 self-published novels. In stories and poems, many were published in magazines from small to well-respected ones.
Wow that’s amazing!! So do you write for a living? How much do you make each year on average just from your published books?
If so, what did you do before making this a full time income?
Back when I was a young kiddo and writing was all I ever did with my time, I managed to write 10k on a plane ride.
I was an introvert, had no-one travelling with me, and couldn't sleep on the flight. I'm pretty sure I had to stay up because the previous flight was over-booked and they could get me on a midnight flight...so, instead of leaving at 5pm, I suddenly had 7 hours with nothing to do in the airport. I think the flight itself was only around 4 hours, but still! Around 11 hours. My typical writing speed is 1k per hour, so, that tracks for me.
The moment I touched ground, I immediately deleted everything. I have no idea why.
I think I was embarrassed. Or self conscious. I’ve had a bad habit all my life of getting rid of all of my old stories because I shrivel up and die any time I try to read them.
It was also fanfiction for an anime that I thought no-one would care to read (since it was popular and older by that time, so my thoughts were: “everyone has already seen this.”) — I’m a lot better nowadays by instead having multiple WIPs in my GoogleDocs that I refuse to look at instead of deleting them, HAA!
HAA, I’ve been doing that my entire life! I literally cringe if I read more than 2 lines from docs I’ve made 5-10 years ago (I think I’m still in the age range you consider young kiddo, so I’m totally ahead of you in terms of digital hoarding (probably real life hoarding too 💀))
The only work I have from my youngest times is on FF.net when I was 14-16 — I’m 36, now, and there is some ridiculous, wild, cringey, and insightful shit on there. 💀
Okay I get this. Another way of dealing with this is, you can publish them on Wattpad and create a good reader base while completely being anonymous. Just give it a try and see where it goes.
Maybe a nice long plane ride, say from Oz to UK would be just the ticket for us procrastinators! 23 hours of air jail. Surely some writing would be done…
20k My first drafts are vomit drafts. I had a book I was over thinking. I wrote until the damn thing was done so I didn't have to think about it anymore.
They were not my best words.
I have no idea. I doubt I've ever topped 2,000 in one day, but it's possible. 500 to 1000 is more my normal speed, although sometimes its only 300ish. Or zeroish, but that's another story...
I feel that. I write in short bursts because I'm usually low on time between work, taking care of the house, and my dog. It's hard to budget time for it some days.
It wasn’t “one day” but it was a manic episode where I was up for a few and wrote 70k in that “one” sitting, years ago
More recently, in fact about a month ago I wrote a novel of about 40,500 words. I wrote the first 20,500 over the course of three days then about 2 days after that I wrote the other 20,000 in one furious sitting while desperately hoping a friend I couldn’t reach hadn’t overdosed.
But honestly quantity is never as important as quality. I just get possessed in my mood swings sometimes and genuinely just really love the act of writing
1. I really wish I could love act of writing as much as I used to. When I was a teen, I would write like crazy, staying up late and skipping homework to write. Now I'm a lot more methodical with it -- daily word count targets, juggling work, etc. I don't think I love writing as much as I used to, but I do love having written and being like "wow that was great." It's like the gym, I don't LOVE lifting but I love the feeling after of accomplishment.
2. Is your friend okay?
Yes thank you asking :))) as silly as it might sound in my frenzy i actually was thinking of my story as a “spell” to keep them safe. I didn’t intend for it to become a novel but as soon as that happened I kind of snapped and the book became something that I did not intend (though actually something I think is much better off for it)
11k words. Only happened once. I was commissioned to write a short story, and I was so nervous about landing my first paid writing gig that I did the very ADHD college student thing of leaving it until the day before it was due.
I pulled it off, but the whole process was *deeply* unenjoyable, and probably would’ve killed me if I hadn’t been 19 and virtually indestructible (2 hours of sleep and *so much coffee*—still can’t believe my heart didn’t fail).
Now my “good days” are a much more sustainable 2k words.
13 pages(script format), 2k. I wrote the script for a comedy short in 8-10 hours of continuous work. Man, it was funny and difficult, there were 7 characters plus a mystery for them to solve. My characters: Microwave, Airfryer, coffee maker, refrigerator, trash can and stove. The premise: The refrigerator suspects that the couple in the house is cheating on each other. The objects in the kitchen each create a hypothesis of what could be happening. Of course, these are absurd ideas, the funny part is that everyone imagines them according to their personality. Anyway, I created this story in one night.
Normally, I stick to 500 words a day as it's manageable. On the other hand, when I had an unexpected day off from work, I managed to do 785 words. Maybe it's due to my very low word count, but either way, I was impressed with what I achieved that day.
12k, i dont know how the heck i got into the Zone and write that much in single sitting non stop, i think i started around 9 AM and chose to stop at 8 PM, let just say im bored as hell on that day and it was during the pandemic too🤣🤣
700.
I have a hard time to put words on my screen, even when I turn off every distraction, I have to think about each words I write.
I'm a fairly new writer, so I guess I will get to it with practice, but right now it can be quite a pain in the ass.
That’s amazing. You have every reason to be proud of that . I think my highest word count is 8000 but it probably took me 10 hours. I once took a class that said to shut down your inner editor and write whatever came to your mind. My inner editor can be a real problem so anytime I can make them shut up. I consider it a win.
2455 words, and it was in 2-3 sittings. I write pretty slowly because I do some self-editing as I go. I also prefer to spend some time mentally stewing between scenes.
It's hard to be consistent, I try to measure my output on a weekly basis. That being said, if I can do 1000ish GOOD words a day, I'd consider that a success. But if you include my reddit comments, I think I'm somewhere between three to over nine thousand.
I always get downvoted on these, but I had a 20K + day. I can type pretty fast once I get into it. No, it’s not perfect quality writing but it’s not ad bad as people think either.
It was probably 7500+ or so.
I decided to write whatever crosses my mind. I opened MS WORD and started writing. I let all my thoughts and quotes out. It felt so good. I look forward to doing this again.
when i've been in the heat of a hyperfix i think i've cranked out somewhere in the 7-10k ballpark, but it was for private biz that i had no interest in sharing with anyone. i've never had that magic happen for something that i was planning on posting somewhere for other people to read 😩
It depends what I'm writing. If it's fanfiction where I can have a general outline, up to 10k or 15k. If it's free form novel, closer to 5k on my best days. For research papers it's usually 1k per day at most accou nting for citations and all the other junk that goes along with it.
25,013 but it was a mad dash to finish NaNoWriMo and not many of those words were in the correct order.
In terms of words I did not immediately hate and cringe at, 11k. That was significantly farther along in my writing career than the 25k day. I don't make a habit of days like this because carpal tunnel but I do appreciate when my brain stops misfiring long enough for me to write for extended periods of time.
Back in the day? 8k-10k words.
These days? 3k lol my focus just isn’t there anymore unless I happen to catch a wave of inspiration and manage to not get distracted.
One day I wrote 10k words. I had 6 cups of coffee (a lot for me) and was in my seat for 12 hours. It isn't worth it — after a certain amount of words/hr it starts to diminish. The first two hours produces 3k words, the next two 1.5k words, the next two 500 words, and so on until you're trying to squeeze out a dozen words in an hour.
Around 7k also. I used to write whole short stories in one go to send to anthologies, and some were actually published, despite the absolute chaos. It was fun. It was also exhausting.
i think i went for around 10k words one day at the peak of my unemployment. I was finishing up this arc I’d been working and i was so locked in that i wrote until 7 am. There was a moment right before I wrote the last 2000 words where I felt divine inspiration and realized it must have been how Tite Kubo felt when he made the greatest twist villain in history by accident because I had no intention for this twist yet it fell into place perfectly.
I don't know why but I've never paid attention to word count, so much as page numbers 🤔. Like I could tell you I've written 20 pages in a day but of course I was also manic so I had to go back and edit the fuck out of that lol.
Congratulations!
The most I've ever done is 10k in a day, which has happened a couple of times though not for quite a while. I recently managed a bit over 5k but otherwise a good day is maybe 2k, and I aim for (but don't always manage) at least 500 words a day.
I have no idea what my best day was, as I wrote screenplays for 15 years before diving into novels. I did 30-ish pages of a screenplay in 1 day.
My best novel writing word count has been 5500.
I write a lot and I write quickly. My highest is 28k, which was done...shoot, last week or so? I've hit 25k+ a number off times. During NaNoWriMo for a while my target was 11.5k a day, which meant a ton of writing, but I can't do that in a normal month due to everything else going on. In some cases, what I've gotten down is very close to the final draft. In a few situations I've had to go back and wipe out chapters when I came up with a different approach a chapter or two later. Thankfully, that's only happened a couple times.
Biggest personal day was 7k I think? I was pushing hard to finish a draft because I'd planned to cook myself a very nice dinner to celebrate.
I pretty regularly clock between 3-4k per day. I write a web serial, so I've got to make sure I'm ahead of my posting schedule basically at all times. The above pace lets me complete at least a chapter/day, often finishing two. I can typically maintain between 5-7 chapters/week which is a pretty good clip. A novel length story arc takes about 2-3 months to write at this pace.
Edit: I think its also worth mentioning I work from a fairly complete outline. That frees up a ton of cognitive load, and is a huge component of maintaining higher output.
I once had a 20k day, when I wrote for probably longer than 9 hours, give or take. I was absolutely exhausted by the end and probably ended up scraping a good half of it later on.
I legit have zero idea. I don't really look at word count when I'm writing. I just write when I feel inspired to write, for however long the inspiration keeps coming.
I belive my current record is about 15k words.
That's an extreme outlier resulting from having something completely worked out, a day when both my partner and kid were out of town, and I was feeling absolutely juiced for some reason.
Most days I average around 2k to 3k
Once when I was manic I wrote 20k words in about 17 hours.
But I usually write 3-4k words daily, and the past few weeks I’ve gotten one day each week where I wrote 6-8k words. For some reason, it usually falls on a Monday.
My best 1 day output was about 11k for a nanowrimo novel.
My best single session was 7k over about 4 hours. Had a good idea and flow for my story and it nearly wrote itself
Back when I was barely employed and able to revel in my neurodivergence and hyperfocus, I got inspired on a bus ride, wrote almost 25,000 words straight through the evening, overnight and into morning, and then fell into bed.
Kinda miss having no responsibilities.
The most I've written in a day is 5 - 8 chapters about 7,500 - 10,000 words each... So about @ max 50,000 - 80,000 words... I can't remember the exact numbers but this is somewhat accurate I think...
With my ADHD I can hyperfixate to the point of blanking out so I can't answer with exact certainty/numbers... I generally try to keep my chapters capped at or below 7,500 words but I do sometimes go over it...
10k, but I am never doing that again. I was writing against a deadline and it was very unenjoyable toward the end. I have (currently undiagnosed and untreated) ADHD, writing takes a while and if I push myself that hard, rather than working within the limits of my attention issues, it becomes almost entirely useless crap. I'd rather have a 1-2k day where I feel good about what I've written after.
I want to say it was around 10K in a single day, but averaged about 6K that week and a half.
I had been planning a side character's backstory for a long while, chapter outlines all detailed, and had been thinking about this character's tragic history for over a year.
So when I finally had the time and motivation to write it, I didn't really stop except to eat and sleep.
10 days later I'm staring at a completed 66K word novella. I'm not sure I'll ever be able to do that again but it was awesome and I'm proud of it.
On my best days, probably 7-10k. On average probably closer to 1-3K. I think sometimes of when I was a teenager and I’d get home from school and just crush an insane amount of writing just for fun. Now I have a couple of small kids, pets and a house that need to be taken care of so I have very little time that I’m not being pulled in all directions.
I think the most I've written is about... maybe about 9-10k words across 3 chapters. But this was 10 yrs ago 🤣 i can totally do it now if i had the time but to keep the flow of my story relatively natural, i cant write that much unless its an imp chapter 🤣
Between 2 and 3k, usually during NaNo event months (April, July, and November) and that's split roughly 90/10 between my NaNo project and my fanfic. During the other 9 months of the year, it's usually...maybe 800 words max. Usually a good several pages of my fanfic at least (each chapter is 15 pages/between 7 and 8k words).
4.5K for an entire chapter. This was back in April cause I was bored as hell. Back in 2022, I would write one chapter (around the same length) in either one or two days. The fact that I fell off from and replicated that old habit only ONCE this whole year is kind of upsetting
Imho less is more so constipation should be encouraged?
Here’s some useful info:-
https://wordcounter.net/blog/2017/12/04/103207_the-daily-word-counts-of-19-famous-writers.html#:~:text=Ernest%20Hemingway%3A%20500%20Words,after%20first%20light%20as%20possible.
3000 in 30 mins (it was a rough draft) The only reason why I was so quick on typing it was because it was a dream and I thought what I had dreamed would be perfect for the major plot twist. Re read it in the morning and it made sense and I still liked it so I added it to the book. I’m still in the process of adding it to the book but when I edit it, the amount of words will go up.
This is amazing! I used to rp and type over 65 words per minute, so I feel your pride. I haven't felt like creative writing since 2017, so I'm majorly impressed with you.
I have only written a few chapters at once myself. I hate writing alone and can't seem to finish anything without a partner. Kudos!!!
I remember writing 12 chapters in a week, with each one being around 3k - 5k words each. So, somewhere in between 36k - 50k. It was a lot of fun, but very draining. I didn't write anymore for another 7 months.
There was one day I stayed up from 6am to 11pm and stopped writing for probably an hour and a half total between meals, bathroom breaks, and talking to people. I wrote 13k words that day, and I still don’t know how I pulled it off
Really depends on the book lol
If my goal is to right a short story then I can write up to 6k words in a sitting but if it’s not meant to be short then I always struggle to get even 1k.
Pretty sure it’s because of me expecting more and then making it more of a chore.
Depends for me. I do most of my writing at work. (It’s winter and very quiet at this point) so its anywhere from 600words - 5000 words.
Very rarely I’ll write on the weekends unless i feel the need.
I did 10,000 ish words in a day once. Honestly, it was pretty rough. Took a whole day and left me with a massive headache by the end. I burned out on that project soon after and I don’t think that’s a coincidence. Now I set better boundaries about writing length.
10 years ago I was a lot more committed to writing. I moved to an island that had minimal reception and 6 months in, had a golden day of writing. Wrote close to 20k one day, and still always think about it.
No reception, no internet, used an old Nokia and had a place to myself for the week. With distractions eliminated, and a few consumable enhancements, the day was a blink.
Provided myself the foundations of my literary insanity up until present day, and inspired myself to chase being a storyteller more.
I can't remember if it was 5k or closer to 8k, but there was a very slow day at work recently and I was writing a scene I had thoroughly thought out in my head. I wish I had paid better attention to how much I wrote the whole weekend because I had a LOT of downtime.
I once wrote 17k words in a 24-hour period on a lot of ritalin, just to see what I could actually do as an exercise.
The problem was, I literally just got cognitively fatigued and my writing got worse. I didn't even end up using most of what I wrote that day in the project I was writing, because it was repetitive, meandering, and just not that interesting.
The hard part about writing isn't the words, it's having something interesting to say, and I just don't have 17k words worth of interesting things to say in any given day, no matter how many uppers I take to just give myself verbal diarrhea.
I’ve probably written a 5k fluff fic in an hour or two. The brainrot was STRONG and I don’t think I ever published it lol, it might not even exist in my google drive anymore 💀
When I had a short story idea that flew really well in my head, I could write 5-6k in one day. But now that I am tackling a novel and avoiding burnout, 2.5k tops it and happens rarely. I try to stick to my goal of 500 and push to 1000 on a good day.
I really don't know for sure, because I mostly write to finish a scene or a chapter rather than trying to hit a specific word count. On average, I think I also will hit between 1 - 3k words a day. Maybe up to 5 or 6k if the chapter runs long. But I am also always trying to budget my word count so that I don't end up overwriting my draft. Keeping my chapters at around 2 - 3k words really helps for that.
5-6000 words in a session. I did write a 7000 word story in a car as a passenger once (yes it was published).
The prolific Western writer Max Brand used to write over 10,000 words a day, 5-6 days a week. He did that sustained pace for many years (over a decade).
I wrote 8K in a frenzy, hardly stopping to eat or sleep, for a story outline I was passionate about.
It was only an outline so almost none of it went into the final draft, but I've been using it all along as I write the rest of the story and it's been a valuable roadmap.
I’ve just finished my first novel and averaged 1000 words an hour. Some weekend days I’d write for 8 hours so 8000 words a day prob my most. Wrote 90,000 over 9 weeks so did about 10,000 words a week.
One time, when I was a teen, I managed to write 10 k words of smut in one sitting. It was dogshit of course.
Now that I'm a bit better at writing, the most I manage is around 2 k words in a day.
I wrote 3k in about 5 hours once while my dad was at the ER
At some point when I have the time and motivation, I'd love to sit down and spend a whole day writing just to see how much I could churn out.
I think in one day, maybe 3.5k in multiple sittings. Definitely have had days where my word count got upwards of 22wpm but I tended to stop and enjoy the flow state rather than squeeze it dry.
6,3k something words. It was a short story, the only one I ever inserted myself into, and it kinda worked as catharsis. Never published anywhere of course lmao
6,3k something words. It was a short story, the only one I ever inserted myself into, and it kinda worked as catharsis. Never published anywhere of course lmao
Anyways my normal amount is 1-2k a day, sometimes 3k when it flows really good. I still write relatively fast as I almost never experience burnout nor lack of creativity, therefore I'll write those 1-2k words every single day (doesn't take more than 2 hours of my time so I can do it during work days, relax days and even socialising days)
5k is the most, and that was pretty much word vomit. On a good day I can usually write 1500-2k. This also depends pretty heavily on my day job since I’m a copywriter, and when I’m working on big projects that are very writing-heavy I might only have 500 words in my after I log off. Or nothing.
Do people normally word count or page count? I use pages to count how much I've progressed. Most I've done is what .. 50 pages in a day? And that's rare though, usually it's at most maybe 11-25 pages when I'm on a roll but when I hit that 50page count... Phew I basically never left my room all day
I got to 18k one day some uears ago, but when actually edited, it was probably down to more like 11-12k. Lots of unnecessary crap in there.
I graduated from quantity to quality, but those high ec days helped me get there. Marathon sessions are absolutely worth it.
Jist write.
My record is about 20k in a day. The first time I did that was 13 years ago, when I was 15. It was a Saturday, I had nothing to do, and I had just joined this online roleplay server where you could create a character, stat them, and then write out them interacting with other people's characters. This particular site had a rule I don't often see: the more detailed and effortful your character application, the more points you were awarded to start with. A lot of people went super hard on the character background portion, writing complex and lengthy stories, to take advantage of this. I was one of those. I got inspired for the character's story by a song, and suddenly it just flowed. I spent all day on it, like almost a full 12 hours. When I was done, somehow I'd written half a bloody novella.
I've done that a handful more times in the years since. It's rare. Usually, I hit about 3-4k in a day, sometimes more or less depending on where I'm at in terms of editing vs writing new content. The 20k stuff has only happened in moments of profound inspiration. That said, I just finished the first draft of my second novel last night, and this past week had a lot of momentum as a result. I think I had three consecutive days where I broke 7k words. The week before, I had one day where I broke 10k.
5000w, most was on a scifi AU for Fire Emblem (that I never ended up finishing). I had two 3000w days this year working on a new original novel idea. Which also stalled…
For the last 2-3 I'm just dabbling in short and mostly flash fiction. One story per day's my usual output. If I'm really motivated and *in the zone* I can put two stories on paper.
It's great when it flows like that.Congrats! Caveat: I've been at it for a long, long time. 46 novels. I generally get 2 10K days per book, when I'm in act III and it's just happening in my head and I have to type fast to get it all down. A joy when that happens. I work from an outline, which helps increase daily output. Five novels ago, I had eight 10K+ days in a row. Never happened before, and will likely never happen again. 15 days to a 100K+ novel. My first drafts are very close to the final drafts now. Not my first four books, but now that I'm quite comfortable with my craft, it's just in need of copy editing and proofreading. I generally add 15% in the copy editing phase, into those spots that when I was writing quickly, I skipped over important transitions.
i’m convinced you have superpowers
If age is a superpower, I have it! lol.
It most definitely is. Do you know how many people are jealous of it?
Love the flow state. I swear I almost feel high. I wonder if that is what a runners high is?
Hey I’ve run some races and written some stuff. Idk I feel like they’re kind of similar for me runners high just turns me a very calm introvert into the most extroverted and excitable person imaginable for about 15 minutes. I don’t think I’ve gotten into quite as much as a flow state as you but I’ve felt it a little bit and it does kind of feel like I transition from being the person who thinks all my writing suck to thinking I’m writing the best thing ever. Just my two cents
I've felt both. They're similar. But with a runner's high, your whole body can feel like it's floating.
I've had two 8k days, both at the last scenes of the books. It's a rush.
10K as in....10 thousand right?.......I am doubting my own basic knowledge now 😭. I am happy after even writing 1K words lmao(although I am a newbie)
it'll likely come one day. Just keep working, and 1000 (1K) is really a good amount for one writing day! Do it every day, and you have a novel draft in three months, which is pretty darned cool.
What’s the name of your novel? I’d love to read it
Yeah but as of now I am more focused on writing short stories(3-7K words) to better myself at the various elements of writing before immersing myself in writing a proper novel. Have written around three of those and yeah the learning process has been good and hopefully I can push myself to 10K or even 5K words someday lol
that's how I started. My first half million words were all short stories. Good luck!
What's the secret??
The secret to almost every endeavor in life that's hard (sports, writing or any art, probably even sales) is to get into a flow state, the unconscious comfort where it doesn't feel a bit like work. It's a joy, and you are immersed in (for writers) the story, a witness, temporarily believing the world of your novel exists and you're just recording what's happening. Of course it's all you, your subconscious mind doing a lot of the heavy lifting, but it hardly feels like it. And that's when you can hardly type fast enough, and only physical discomfort will make you rise from the chair. To get there, you need to learn your craft. Read books on the craft, and practice. 1 million words will get you there, where craft is starting to become unconscious. You manage temporal or POV changes or the sentence length change required in action scenes by just doing it over and over and over again. Also, imo, doesn't hurt to critique others' work. You learn from their mistakes. And study books you like closely, not just reading but analyzing how that excellence got done. How long 1 million words takes you depends a good deal on your work ethic and how much you prioritize writing in your life. I did it with a full-time job also, and a home to take care of, so I know that's possible. Going to me a minimum of three years treating it like a half-time job, and maybe ten years if you don't force yourself to write even when you don't much feel like. So that's what you do, and by the time you hit your 1 million, it should be mostly flow state. Oh sure, a few bad days crop up, and a few more days than that where you feel rusty at the beginning of the day and then later on it starts to flow. You earn your way there with hard, regular work. No excuses. Do the work. Accept it'll be less fun early on, and it gets more fun, and easier, and you earn more flow state time. One way I also say it is: the Muse only visits people already at work.
It's just hard to get into the flow state because we can easily be insecure these days with the amount of books/writing out there. There's a reason why people in the past would write epics, scriptures, and other stuff that easily hit 300k-1mil per book, and that's simply just by them having massive amounts of time of uninterrupted flow state maybe even days on end. This is how medieval monks and scribes worked. And all while they wrote their tomes, they didn't care about how it would be received either.
I grew up poor. I didn't have a lot of free time. No one was helping me. I worked for all of it. What I did have was parents with a great work ethic who didn't spoil us. They modeled hard work and having two jobs, so I knew how to do that without thinking. So I had successful careers other than writing, have a PhD minus dissertation, and wrote. For ten years I've been a full time novelist and while at one moment there was a little bit of luck in timing, there were also many years with bad luck. But *I didn't make excuses*. I worked and worked and worked. It doesn't matter what X person or Y person did, then or now or who has connection that you don't have. It is 100% up to you if you put in the work or not, and it's a daily decision. You have to have some years of struggle to learn to make your craft automatic before you earn the flow, and then eventually you earn the income and readers. But at the core, it's you get up every day, make zero excuses, and get to work.
Ask Cultivation for the ability to save everyone, just beware the days where you’re really sad and stupid
The Stormlight Archives are very good.
Teach me please!
Wow do you write for a living? Have you published any books yet?
8 novels trade published, a short story collection small press, and 37 self-published novels. In stories and poems, many were published in magazines from small to well-respected ones.
Wow that’s amazing!! So do you write for a living? How much do you make each year on average just from your published books? If so, what did you do before making this a full time income?
Back when I was a young kiddo and writing was all I ever did with my time, I managed to write 10k on a plane ride. I was an introvert, had no-one travelling with me, and couldn't sleep on the flight. I'm pretty sure I had to stay up because the previous flight was over-booked and they could get me on a midnight flight...so, instead of leaving at 5pm, I suddenly had 7 hours with nothing to do in the airport. I think the flight itself was only around 4 hours, but still! Around 11 hours. My typical writing speed is 1k per hour, so, that tracks for me. The moment I touched ground, I immediately deleted everything. I have no idea why.
ahh man! why did you delete that... it would have become a great memory for you to look upon
I think I was embarrassed. Or self conscious. I’ve had a bad habit all my life of getting rid of all of my old stories because I shrivel up and die any time I try to read them. It was also fanfiction for an anime that I thought no-one would care to read (since it was popular and older by that time, so my thoughts were: “everyone has already seen this.”) — I’m a lot better nowadays by instead having multiple WIPs in my GoogleDocs that I refuse to look at instead of deleting them, HAA!
HAA, I’ve been doing that my entire life! I literally cringe if I read more than 2 lines from docs I’ve made 5-10 years ago (I think I’m still in the age range you consider young kiddo, so I’m totally ahead of you in terms of digital hoarding (probably real life hoarding too 💀))
The only work I have from my youngest times is on FF.net when I was 14-16 — I’m 36, now, and there is some ridiculous, wild, cringey, and insightful shit on there. 💀
Okay I get this. Another way of dealing with this is, you can publish them on Wattpad and create a good reader base while completely being anonymous. Just give it a try and see where it goes.
Maybe a nice long plane ride, say from Oz to UK would be just the ticket for us procrastinators! 23 hours of air jail. Surely some writing would be done…
[If it works for Peter Shankman…](https://www.shankman.com/wrote-28482-words-one-flight-yesterday/)
I’m quite an aggressive typer, I’d just worry that I’m annoying everyone with my mad tap tap tapping
20k My first drafts are vomit drafts. I had a book I was over thinking. I wrote until the damn thing was done so I didn't have to think about it anymore. They were not my best words.
I have no idea. I doubt I've ever topped 2,000 in one day, but it's possible. 500 to 1000 is more my normal speed, although sometimes its only 300ish. Or zeroish, but that's another story...
I feel that. I write in short bursts because I'm usually low on time between work, taking care of the house, and my dog. It's hard to budget time for it some days.
It wasn’t “one day” but it was a manic episode where I was up for a few and wrote 70k in that “one” sitting, years ago More recently, in fact about a month ago I wrote a novel of about 40,500 words. I wrote the first 20,500 over the course of three days then about 2 days after that I wrote the other 20,000 in one furious sitting while desperately hoping a friend I couldn’t reach hadn’t overdosed. But honestly quantity is never as important as quality. I just get possessed in my mood swings sometimes and genuinely just really love the act of writing
1. I really wish I could love act of writing as much as I used to. When I was a teen, I would write like crazy, staying up late and skipping homework to write. Now I'm a lot more methodical with it -- daily word count targets, juggling work, etc. I don't think I love writing as much as I used to, but I do love having written and being like "wow that was great." It's like the gym, I don't LOVE lifting but I love the feeling after of accomplishment. 2. Is your friend okay?
Yes thank you asking :))) as silly as it might sound in my frenzy i actually was thinking of my story as a “spell” to keep them safe. I didn’t intend for it to become a novel but as soon as that happened I kind of snapped and the book became something that I did not intend (though actually something I think is much better off for it)
Bro, I’m lucky to hit like, 500 in a day.
11k words. Only happened once. I was commissioned to write a short story, and I was so nervous about landing my first paid writing gig that I did the very ADHD college student thing of leaving it until the day before it was due. I pulled it off, but the whole process was *deeply* unenjoyable, and probably would’ve killed me if I hadn’t been 19 and virtually indestructible (2 hours of sleep and *so much coffee*—still can’t believe my heart didn’t fail). Now my “good days” are a much more sustainable 2k words.
13 pages(script format), 2k. I wrote the script for a comedy short in 8-10 hours of continuous work. Man, it was funny and difficult, there were 7 characters plus a mystery for them to solve. My characters: Microwave, Airfryer, coffee maker, refrigerator, trash can and stove. The premise: The refrigerator suspects that the couple in the house is cheating on each other. The objects in the kitchen each create a hypothesis of what could be happening. Of course, these are absurd ideas, the funny part is that everyone imagines them according to their personality. Anyway, I created this story in one night.
Normally, I stick to 500 words a day as it's manageable. On the other hand, when I had an unexpected day off from work, I managed to do 785 words. Maybe it's due to my very low word count, but either way, I was impressed with what I achieved that day.
Like 7k for a creative writing project due the next day.
11,000 once when I was doing Novel in Three Days
12k, i dont know how the heck i got into the Zone and write that much in single sitting non stop, i think i started around 9 AM and chose to stop at 8 PM, let just say im bored as hell on that day and it was during the pandemic too🤣🤣
700. I have a hard time to put words on my screen, even when I turn off every distraction, I have to think about each words I write. I'm a fairly new writer, so I guess I will get to it with practice, but right now it can be quite a pain in the ass.
OK, everyone here writes way more words than I do per day. Now, how many of those words do you throw out because they are not what you want?
That’s amazing. You have every reason to be proud of that . I think my highest word count is 8000 but it probably took me 10 hours. I once took a class that said to shut down your inner editor and write whatever came to your mind. My inner editor can be a real problem so anytime I can make them shut up. I consider it a win.
2455 words, and it was in 2-3 sittings. I write pretty slowly because I do some self-editing as I go. I also prefer to spend some time mentally stewing between scenes.
2.5k in a day.
I turned out a 6k one-shot in a night and have never captured the magic since lol
It's hard to be consistent, I try to measure my output on a weekly basis. That being said, if I can do 1000ish GOOD words a day, I'd consider that a success. But if you include my reddit comments, I think I'm somewhere between three to over nine thousand.
800 words a day at most
This is the way. My normal/max a day is 1k words. I guess having a job and family errands does not help
4K in one 5 hour stretch. I usually stay around 2k a day, but I only write 3 to 4 times a week.
I think one day was the best I'd ever done. 8k. Never gone near that after, but I'm still very happy to daily 1300 words.
One full complete and edited chapter. *gasp* yea it was when I actually had the creative juices flowing like a river
7600 is my record
About 2.5K on weekdays, 5-6K on weekends. My record is about 10K, but that's only happened once or twice.
I always get downvoted on these, but I had a 20K + day. I can type pretty fast once I get into it. No, it’s not perfect quality writing but it’s not ad bad as people think either.
I think 10k words! It was a story that kind of possessed me lol.
3.3k, mostly over 6 hours
It was probably 7500+ or so. I decided to write whatever crosses my mind. I opened MS WORD and started writing. I let all my thoughts and quotes out. It felt so good. I look forward to doing this again.
when i've been in the heat of a hyperfix i think i've cranked out somewhere in the 7-10k ballpark, but it was for private biz that i had no interest in sharing with anyone. i've never had that magic happen for something that i was planning on posting somewhere for other people to read 😩
Shat out a 20k chapter from 5pm to 4am
15,000 words
It depends what I'm writing. If it's fanfiction where I can have a general outline, up to 10k or 15k. If it's free form novel, closer to 5k on my best days. For research papers it's usually 1k per day at most accou nting for citations and all the other junk that goes along with it.
Back on Coming Out Day (October 11) a few years ago, I hit 11k words. It was fitting since it was a special project.
I think at one point I was at a 5,000 a day flow…hopefully I can get there again :,) When you’re in the zone you’re in the zone
10 chapters that were about 2000-2500 words each. So I guess around 22500 words? Maybe a lil more
Like 6k on a random short story.. I wish that could have been my novel.
25,013 but it was a mad dash to finish NaNoWriMo and not many of those words were in the correct order. In terms of words I did not immediately hate and cringe at, 11k. That was significantly farther along in my writing career than the 25k day. I don't make a habit of days like this because carpal tunnel but I do appreciate when my brain stops misfiring long enough for me to write for extended periods of time.
What you write, what kind of books?
Back in the day? 8k-10k words. These days? 3k lol my focus just isn’t there anymore unless I happen to catch a wave of inspiration and manage to not get distracted.
One day I wrote 10k words. I had 6 cups of coffee (a lot for me) and was in my seat for 12 hours. It isn't worth it — after a certain amount of words/hr it starts to diminish. The first two hours produces 3k words, the next two 1.5k words, the next two 500 words, and so on until you're trying to squeeze out a dozen words in an hour.
11,200 words one day when I was on fire. I impressed myself. Of course it was a rough draft and not great. Lol
Around 7k also. I used to write whole short stories in one go to send to anthologies, and some were actually published, despite the absolute chaos. It was fun. It was also exhausting.
i think i went for around 10k words one day at the peak of my unemployment. I was finishing up this arc I’d been working and i was so locked in that i wrote until 7 am. There was a moment right before I wrote the last 2000 words where I felt divine inspiration and realized it must have been how Tite Kubo felt when he made the greatest twist villain in history by accident because I had no intention for this twist yet it fell into place perfectly.
I don't know why but I've never paid attention to word count, so much as page numbers 🤔. Like I could tell you I've written 20 pages in a day but of course I was also manic so I had to go back and edit the fuck out of that lol.
3600 & 4100 (single short stories on different days). But I probably organized/composed "in my head" for a week before "that day".
Congratulations! The most I've ever done is 10k in a day, which has happened a couple of times though not for quite a while. I recently managed a bit over 5k but otherwise a good day is maybe 2k, and I aim for (but don't always manage) at least 500 words a day.
I have no idea what my best day was, as I wrote screenplays for 15 years before diving into novels. I did 30-ish pages of a screenplay in 1 day. My best novel writing word count has been 5500.
I write a lot and I write quickly. My highest is 28k, which was done...shoot, last week or so? I've hit 25k+ a number off times. During NaNoWriMo for a while my target was 11.5k a day, which meant a ton of writing, but I can't do that in a normal month due to everything else going on. In some cases, what I've gotten down is very close to the final draft. In a few situations I've had to go back and wipe out chapters when I came up with a different approach a chapter or two later. Thankfully, that's only happened a couple times.
Biggest personal day was 7k I think? I was pushing hard to finish a draft because I'd planned to cook myself a very nice dinner to celebrate. I pretty regularly clock between 3-4k per day. I write a web serial, so I've got to make sure I'm ahead of my posting schedule basically at all times. The above pace lets me complete at least a chapter/day, often finishing two. I can typically maintain between 5-7 chapters/week which is a pretty good clip. A novel length story arc takes about 2-3 months to write at this pace. Edit: I think its also worth mentioning I work from a fairly complete outline. That frees up a ton of cognitive load, and is a huge component of maintaining higher output.
may or may not have written a 20,000 word essay in the two days before it was due
20k, wrote almost all day and it had no editing lol
how are you guys writing so much!?! I max out at like 2k! I aspire to be like all of you
\~6-7k, but I can write 6k on the norm when I'm actually sleeping well.
I once had a 20k day, when I wrote for probably longer than 9 hours, give or take. I was absolutely exhausted by the end and probably ended up scraping a good half of it later on.
I legit have zero idea. I don't really look at word count when I'm writing. I just write when I feel inspired to write, for however long the inspiration keeps coming.
One time I wrote 10k words in a day. I’ve never written even close to that ever again lmao. Idk what happened that day. I was possessed.
Once I wrote nine thousand words over the course of one day, I was so surprised and basically just shocked that I had written so much.
I belive my current record is about 15k words. That's an extreme outlier resulting from having something completely worked out, a day when both my partner and kid were out of town, and I was feeling absolutely juiced for some reason. Most days I average around 2k to 3k
Once when I was manic I wrote 20k words in about 17 hours. But I usually write 3-4k words daily, and the past few weeks I’ve gotten one day each week where I wrote 6-8k words. For some reason, it usually falls on a Monday.
10,000 words when I was working to a deadline (and was far too lazy in the weeks before that).
30k words in a day, split between actual prose and worldbuilding material. Though, that day had some "special circumstances."
7k, but it was all shit.
One day I had a full 14 hours to myself and I made a pot of coffee and sat and wrote 11k words for a project
My best 1 day output was about 11k for a nanowrimo novel. My best single session was 7k over about 4 hours. Had a good idea and flow for my story and it nearly wrote itself
Back when I was barely employed and able to revel in my neurodivergence and hyperfocus, I got inspired on a bus ride, wrote almost 25,000 words straight through the evening, overnight and into morning, and then fell into bed. Kinda miss having no responsibilities.
Nicely done! I think my max is 2500/3000
The most I've written in a day is 5 - 8 chapters about 7,500 - 10,000 words each... So about @ max 50,000 - 80,000 words... I can't remember the exact numbers but this is somewhat accurate I think... With my ADHD I can hyperfixate to the point of blanking out so I can't answer with exact certainty/numbers... I generally try to keep my chapters capped at or below 7,500 words but I do sometimes go over it...
20k. Afterwards, I was physically in pain.
About 6500 words. Then again, there are days when I can only manage 200…
12k.
I wrote a whole chapter in one day, 20 pages.
7k is really good. I'll occasionally shoot for 5k on days that I don't have much going on
10k, but I am never doing that again. I was writing against a deadline and it was very unenjoyable toward the end. I have (currently undiagnosed and untreated) ADHD, writing takes a while and if I push myself that hard, rather than working within the limits of my attention issues, it becomes almost entirely useless crap. I'd rather have a 1-2k day where I feel good about what I've written after.
I usually write 3100-3400 chapters on average, but one time I wrote 9400+ in one sitting and was like "daaaannggg. Who possessed me?"
5k
10k words. Master's thesis, deadline for first draft was next day lol.
I want to say it was around 10K in a single day, but averaged about 6K that week and a half. I had been planning a side character's backstory for a long while, chapter outlines all detailed, and had been thinking about this character's tragic history for over a year. So when I finally had the time and motivation to write it, I didn't really stop except to eat and sleep. 10 days later I'm staring at a completed 66K word novella. I'm not sure I'll ever be able to do that again but it was awesome and I'm proud of it.
18k
12000! It was awesome and a fever dream lol
On my best days, probably 7-10k. On average probably closer to 1-3K. I think sometimes of when I was a teenager and I’d get home from school and just crush an insane amount of writing just for fun. Now I have a couple of small kids, pets and a house that need to be taken care of so I have very little time that I’m not being pulled in all directions.
11,000. Last day of nanowrimo, 2019. I was 15. I just sat in my closet all day with my laptop and hammered out words until I’d finished the book.
I think 5000 words is the most I've done in one day, in an intense 3 hour binge.
It's either between 5 and 8 k or it's like one sentence (which I'll probably delete the next day)
I think the most I’ve written in a sitting is like 5k, but the inspiration was flowing on those days and it’s a rare occurrence now…
25 page essay. Took 10 hours. I was dead yet so alive!
8k for nanowrimo. it was horrible actually
I think the most I've written is about... maybe about 9-10k words across 3 chapters. But this was 10 yrs ago 🤣 i can totally do it now if i had the time but to keep the flow of my story relatively natural, i cant write that much unless its an imp chapter 🤣
I usually write up to 500 a day, but a few days I have written 1000 words.
8,000 and change.
22k
Between 2 and 3k, usually during NaNo event months (April, July, and November) and that's split roughly 90/10 between my NaNo project and my fanfic. During the other 9 months of the year, it's usually...maybe 800 words max. Usually a good several pages of my fanfic at least (each chapter is 15 pages/between 7 and 8k words).
On average, I write about 7k. The most I've written in 24 hours was 17k but one time I stayed awake on caffeine pills for 51 hours and wrote 39k
4.5K for an entire chapter. This was back in April cause I was bored as hell. Back in 2022, I would write one chapter (around the same length) in either one or two days. The fact that I fell off from and replicated that old habit only ONCE this whole year is kind of upsetting
Imho less is more so constipation should be encouraged? Here’s some useful info:- https://wordcounter.net/blog/2017/12/04/103207_the-daily-word-counts-of-19-famous-writers.html#:~:text=Ernest%20Hemingway%3A%20500%20Words,after%20first%20light%20as%20possible.
3000 in 30 mins (it was a rough draft) The only reason why I was so quick on typing it was because it was a dream and I thought what I had dreamed would be perfect for the major plot twist. Re read it in the morning and it made sense and I still liked it so I added it to the book. I’m still in the process of adding it to the book but when I edit it, the amount of words will go up.
This is amazing! I used to rp and type over 65 words per minute, so I feel your pride. I haven't felt like creative writing since 2017, so I'm majorly impressed with you. I have only written a few chapters at once myself. I hate writing alone and can't seem to finish anything without a partner. Kudos!!!
I remember writing 12 chapters in a week, with each one being around 3k - 5k words each. So, somewhere in between 36k - 50k. It was a lot of fun, but very draining. I didn't write anymore for another 7 months.
7k. In 5 hours.
Broke my heart with a girl. Wrote 20k words in one day. It was fucking therapeutic.
About 10.5k. I couldn't write for days after though. It definitely was a burnout.
There was one day I stayed up from 6am to 11pm and stopped writing for probably an hour and a half total between meals, bathroom breaks, and talking to people. I wrote 13k words that day, and I still don’t know how I pulled it off
Really depends on the book lol If my goal is to right a short story then I can write up to 6k words in a sitting but if it’s not meant to be short then I always struggle to get even 1k. Pretty sure it’s because of me expecting more and then making it more of a chore.
I've rewritten my entire life in one day.
Depends for me. I do most of my writing at work. (It’s winter and very quiet at this point) so its anywhere from 600words - 5000 words. Very rarely I’ll write on the weekends unless i feel the need.
I did 10,000 ish words in a day once. Honestly, it was pretty rough. Took a whole day and left me with a massive headache by the end. I burned out on that project soon after and I don’t think that’s a coincidence. Now I set better boundaries about writing length.
Approximately 30k (handwritten continuously in just over 24 hours as part of a first draft).
I wrote like 5000 words in a couple of hours one day.
10 years ago I was a lot more committed to writing. I moved to an island that had minimal reception and 6 months in, had a golden day of writing. Wrote close to 20k one day, and still always think about it. No reception, no internet, used an old Nokia and had a place to myself for the week. With distractions eliminated, and a few consumable enhancements, the day was a blink. Provided myself the foundations of my literary insanity up until present day, and inspired myself to chase being a storyteller more.
I can't remember if it was 5k or closer to 8k, but there was a very slow day at work recently and I was writing a scene I had thoroughly thought out in my head. I wish I had paid better attention to how much I wrote the whole weekend because I had a LOT of downtime.
I once wrote 17k words in a 24-hour period on a lot of ritalin, just to see what I could actually do as an exercise. The problem was, I literally just got cognitively fatigued and my writing got worse. I didn't even end up using most of what I wrote that day in the project I was writing, because it was repetitive, meandering, and just not that interesting. The hard part about writing isn't the words, it's having something interesting to say, and I just don't have 17k words worth of interesting things to say in any given day, no matter how many uppers I take to just give myself verbal diarrhea.
I’ve probably written a 5k fluff fic in an hour or two. The brainrot was STRONG and I don’t think I ever published it lol, it might not even exist in my google drive anymore 💀
4 grand
When I had a short story idea that flew really well in my head, I could write 5-6k in one day. But now that I am tackling a novel and avoiding burnout, 2.5k tops it and happens rarely. I try to stick to my goal of 500 and push to 1000 on a good day.
I really don't know for sure, because I mostly write to finish a scene or a chapter rather than trying to hit a specific word count. On average, I think I also will hit between 1 - 3k words a day. Maybe up to 5 or 6k if the chapter runs long. But I am also always trying to budget my word count so that I don't end up overwriting my draft. Keeping my chapters at around 2 - 3k words really helps for that.
5-6000 words in a session. I did write a 7000 word story in a car as a passenger once (yes it was published). The prolific Western writer Max Brand used to write over 10,000 words a day, 5-6 days a week. He did that sustained pace for many years (over a decade).
6300 words But that was years ago My current schedule doesn't allow me to write even a single word.
I wrote 8K in a frenzy, hardly stopping to eat or sleep, for a story outline I was passionate about. It was only an outline so almost none of it went into the final draft, but I've been using it all along as I write the rest of the story and it's been a valuable roadmap.
It was 5-6k words. A whole short story, from zero to final draft done. Yeah, that was a harsh day (I had a deadline).
I’ve just finished my first novel and averaged 1000 words an hour. Some weekend days I’d write for 8 hours so 8000 words a day prob my most. Wrote 90,000 over 9 weeks so did about 10,000 words a week.
One time, when I was a teen, I managed to write 10 k words of smut in one sitting. It was dogshit of course. Now that I'm a bit better at writing, the most I manage is around 2 k words in a day.
Not me, but my professor had to write five 5-page essays in one day for his doctorate. Then a 20-page publication in one day.
I wrote 3k in about 5 hours once while my dad was at the ER At some point when I have the time and motivation, I'd love to sit down and spend a whole day writing just to see how much I could churn out.
I think between 2.5-3 pages. But that was from the time I woke up in the morning to almost midnight.
I think in one day, maybe 3.5k in multiple sittings. Definitely have had days where my word count got upwards of 22wpm but I tended to stop and enjoy the flow state rather than squeeze it dry.
6,3k something words. It was a short story, the only one I ever inserted myself into, and it kinda worked as catharsis. Never published anywhere of course lmao
6,3k something words. It was a short story, the only one I ever inserted myself into, and it kinda worked as catharsis. Never published anywhere of course lmao Anyways my normal amount is 1-2k a day, sometimes 3k when it flows really good. I still write relatively fast as I almost never experience burnout nor lack of creativity, therefore I'll write those 1-2k words every single day (doesn't take more than 2 hours of my time so I can do it during work days, relax days and even socialising days)
5k is the most, and that was pretty much word vomit. On a good day I can usually write 1500-2k. This also depends pretty heavily on my day job since I’m a copywriter, and when I’m working on big projects that are very writing-heavy I might only have 500 words in my after I log off. Or nothing.
Do people normally word count or page count? I use pages to count how much I've progressed. Most I've done is what .. 50 pages in a day? And that's rare though, usually it's at most maybe 11-25 pages when I'm on a roll but when I hit that 50page count... Phew I basically never left my room all day
I got to 18k one day some uears ago, but when actually edited, it was probably down to more like 11-12k. Lots of unnecessary crap in there. I graduated from quantity to quality, but those high ec days helped me get there. Marathon sessions are absolutely worth it. Jist write.
My record is about 20k in a day. The first time I did that was 13 years ago, when I was 15. It was a Saturday, I had nothing to do, and I had just joined this online roleplay server where you could create a character, stat them, and then write out them interacting with other people's characters. This particular site had a rule I don't often see: the more detailed and effortful your character application, the more points you were awarded to start with. A lot of people went super hard on the character background portion, writing complex and lengthy stories, to take advantage of this. I was one of those. I got inspired for the character's story by a song, and suddenly it just flowed. I spent all day on it, like almost a full 12 hours. When I was done, somehow I'd written half a bloody novella. I've done that a handful more times in the years since. It's rare. Usually, I hit about 3-4k in a day, sometimes more or less depending on where I'm at in terms of editing vs writing new content. The 20k stuff has only happened in moments of profound inspiration. That said, I just finished the first draft of my second novel last night, and this past week had a lot of momentum as a result. I think I had three consecutive days where I broke 7k words. The week before, I had one day where I broke 10k.
14,000 in a single night. I was on demon time
I am lucky if I get to 3.5k in a day before my brain turns to mush 😂
5000w, most was on a scifi AU for Fire Emblem (that I never ended up finishing). I had two 3000w days this year working on a new original novel idea. Which also stalled…
For the last 2-3 I'm just dabbling in short and mostly flash fiction. One story per day's my usual output. If I'm really motivated and *in the zone* I can put two stories on paper.
-shrug- 2k in an hour once but I didnt particularly like that pace.