How Long Should Your Blog Articles Be?

by Rahimah Sultan

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You shouldn’t be overly concerned about word count when writing content. The quality is what really matters.

Due to recent algorithm updates, shorter articles are ranking better. But this is also related to changes in the way we consume content. The ideal length also changes significantly across industries.


Tech websites use fairly short articles that are commentaries on a product, technology development, or an event.


Fashion is another industry that uses short posts. These readers don’t care about the history of a trend or how garments are made. What you’re going to see are thousands of articles about which looks are hot and how to recreate them.


Job recruitment topics usually range from 900 – 1,000 words. Job hunters don’t have the time to read thousands of words. They want to find new employment quickly.


Food Bloggers can use around 1,200 words to cover an introduction and an in-depth recipe.


Finance, sales, and healthcare are some industries that still benefit from the comprehensiveness and depth of long-form content. As these industries cover fairly complex topics, it’s almost always necessary to go beyond 2,000 words in order to satisfy readers’ interest.


Retail, manufacturing, marketing, food, and travel use mid-length articles of 1,000 – 2,000 words to cover information. This remains the most common article length.



Keep your target audience in mind at all times, as you choose your blog topics and how much content to write for each. If you know their needs can be met with less than 1,000 words, don’t waste their time with fluff.


While doing research for this article, I came across this quote from Ryan Velez, freelance writer and editor:

Ideal blog length has always evolved over time. As a response to the wave of 750-word content, things expanded to be a lot more comprehensive, 2,500 words-plus. Now, with the wave of AI-generated content flooding the internet, word count doesn’t guarantee quality to the same degree. Combine that with the ‘TikTok Effect,’ and ideal content size is smaller now and quicker to get to the point. Think 1,500 to 2,000 words.



What is content marketing?

Content marketing is a long-term strategy used with the goal of building relationships with your target audience by methodically delivering high-quality, relevant content that educates and ultimately makes sales.



Long-Form Content vs. Short-Form

Web users are becoming smarter. Searches using long-tailed keywords increase daily. These users want specific answers to specific questions. So, your content strategy needs to match their increasing knowledge.

Creating content with a high word count allows the you to feel a sense of achievement you don’t get when writing 500-word articles. Marketers are feeling like they have to create long-form content to get a toehold in the SERPs.

But the times are changing. Users are falling in love with short-form content. It’s part of the reason U.S. adults spend up to an hour on TikTok.

Over 50 percent of business videos are less than two minutes long.

Combine these statistics with the fact that more and more adults believe attention spans are getting shorter, and it’s easy to see why consumers are placing greater emphasis and trust in concise articles that quickly answer their questions.



So, back to the question, how long should your blog articles be?


Two decades ago, the average article length was between 500-800 words. By the mid-2010s, articles were in excess of 2,000 words.

There are multiple reasons for this which include the way readers scan articles online and the psychology of equating length with quality.

Now, more concise articles are the trend. Although these aren’t quite as short as 800 words, they are short enough to quickly answer readers’ questions.


As you can see, longer is not necessarily better, neither is shorter. There is no one correct answer for blog article length. It’s dependent upon the industry. Your focus should be on quality not quantity or rankings.

Focus on top-quality content and promote it effectively rather than on how much to write.

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