How long does it take to write a blog post [From 2651 bloggers]
How long does it take to write a blog post? Based on our case study, writing a blog post takes 7 hours and 55 minutes for a 1500 word post [Full breakdown in this article].
We also gathered data from other sources to challenge our case study analysis [2651 bloggers]
Remember, the time it takes to write also depends on your process and the quality of your writing. Check out our guide to writing a blog post perfectly after reading this article.
How long does it take to write an article?
We gathered data from a Survey done on 2651 bloggers [The sum of the 4 data sources]:
- Orbit Media [1016 bloggers]
- Nectafy [10 writers]
- John Espirian [20 – 30 bloggers]
- Hubspot [1600 bloggers]
- A time distribution case study by EBIZLR
There is a major discrepancy in the results gathered from the 4 sources of data to our own case study.
How long does it take to write a blog post [2651 responses]
We scoured the net to gather data from bloggers on how long it takes to write a blog post, so you wouldn’t have to.
Four sources of data were found. [And we derive ONE CONCRETE amount of time after this breakdown]
It takes 4 hours [1016 responses]
Orbit Media [The 1st source of data] gathered answers from 1016 bloggers, on the time it takes to write a single blog post.
The average time they derived was 4 hours and 10 minutes. This was based on their average blog post length of 1376 words. Check out our blog post length case study where we uncover the average length.
It takes 3 hours [20 responses]
John Espirian [The 2nd source of data] surveyed his Linkedin network. and obtained responses from 20+ bloggers. The average time he derived was 3 hours and 4 minutes.
This was based on an average blog post length of 1113 words.
It takes 4.5 hours [10 responses]
Nectafy [The 3rd source of data] gathered answers from 546 blog posts written by 6 companies/ 10 writers in an 18-month period.
The average time they derived was 4 hours and 24 minutes. The average blog post length was not specified.
It takes up to 2 hours [1600 responses]
Hubspot [The 4rth source of data] surveyed 1600 marketers and built a report using it.
The average blog post length they derived was 1 – 2 hours for 500 word blog posts.
Here’s a more thorough accumulation of the data they gathered:
| The region where bloggers reside | Time Spent | |||
| Less than 1 hour | 1 – 2 hours | 2 – 3 hours | 4+ hours | |
| In Australia and New Zealand [ANZ] | 5% | 42% | 27% | 17% |
| In Asia Pacific [APAC] | 11% | 27% | 26% | 26% |
| Europe, the Middle East, and Africa [EMEA] | 10% | 35% | 25% | 17% |
| In Latin America [LATAM] | 12+% | 32% | 21% | 12% |
| In North America [NORTHAM] | 8% | 38% | 29% | 29% |
The above seems to be quite the amount of data to look at, so we took the averages of all the regions for each amount of time spent.
Here are the following averages:
| Time Spent | ||||
| Less than 1 hour | 1 – 2 hours | 2 – 3 hours | 4+ hours | |
| All regions [Combined] | 9.8% | 34.8% | 25.6% | 20.2% |
[All the percents don’t sum to 100, since the data was roughly estimated]
So, from the data gathered from Hubspot, on average:
- 10% of bloggers spent less than an hour
- 35% of bloggers spent 1 – 2 hours
- 26% of bloggers spent 2 – 3 hours
- 20% spend over 4 hours blogging
How long does it take to write a blog post [ONE Concrete Time]
To make sense of all the data that was gathered from 2651 bloggers, we derived an estimated average.
So, it takes a solid 4 hours to write 1000 words of a blog post.
Which is pretty average [even for myself] throughout the blogging nation.
While it’s great to get real data based from actual writers, let’s dive into analyzing how you end up spending time writing a blog post.
Blog post writing components [Time distribution case study]
Writing a blog post as a whole takes a certain amount of time. But what about each component of the writing process? Keep reading.
Research the blog post
The time to research depends on the:
- Blog post niche [Read our blog niche guide if you want to pick the perfect niche]
- Blog post topic [Want to learn 30+ methods to obtain blog post topics?]
- Your expertise on the topic [Check our guide on topical authority to improve your SEO rankings].
Learn the 7 main concepts of keyword research from our in depth guide.
Typically, researching for a blog post comprises the following:
Check out top ranking articles [Skim through 10 – 30 blog posts]
Sifting through 10 – 30 blog posts [As well as taking notes] can take between 30 – 150 minutes.
Analyze technical documentation; Research papers; Scholar articles
Depending on the technicality of your blog post topic, you’ll be analyzing technical documentation.
Finding technical documentation will take at least 1 – 2 hours. This is because finding such documentation isn’t easy.
You have to first find sites that have the authority and provide such documentation.
And, that takes 1 – 2 hours initially, until you gather enough resources [sites that have technical documentation], where you don’t have to find additional sites with technical documentation.
So, technically, the 1 – 2 hours it takes will be only temporary for your first few blog posts.
This applies to research papers, as well as scholarly articles.
Next, sift through the documentation. Unlike a blog post, these are usually large chunks of text.
And, it can take at least 30 minutes [per documentation], and for estimation purposes, we’ll assume you only look into 1 technical documentation.
So, you’re spending an extra 30 minutes gathering sufficient data to use in your blog post.
So, disregarding the 1 – 2 hours, you’re looking at 30 minutes for analyzing technical documentation.
Self study [Gathering your own data]
Another component, which most blog posts don’t actually implement, is gathering your own data.
This is a form of unique content. If you spend time gathering data, it can take anywhere from 1 hour to a month. Raw data is an important part of blog post quality: ONE of the 7 ranking factors discussed in our blog post SEO guide.
It depends on the type of data you gather and how you gather it.
Since this isn’t a component most blog posts have, we can ignore it in our time distribution study.
So, researching the blog post takes 1 – 2 hours [30 to 150 + 30 minutes].
Writing the blog post
The next component of a blog post is actually writing it. This can be broken down into the following components: The outline and draft.
The outline
The blog post outline is a process of compiling all the information you’ve gathered and creating a path for your blog post to follow. Learn how to make an amazing outline FAST from our blog post outline guide.
As a beginner, this can take longer. But, if you’re experienced, it can take less than 30 minutes.
The draft
The blog post draft is the part where you actually write the article.
How long this takes depends on the writing speed and length of the article.
The average writing speed is 13 words per minute [wpm].
But, we can assume [since a blogger writes a lot] the writing speed of a blogger will be higher.
So we can safely assume writing speed to be at 16 – 17 words per minute. The average blog post length is 1350 – 1500 words [Based on our case study].
So, it would take at most, 1 hour and 30 minutes.
However, unless you’re tightly focused for that time, you’ll take a break and/ or get distracted.
So, if we add in an extra 30 minutes, it takes 2 hours to actually write 1500 words.
SEO. Search engine optimizing the blog post
The next component of blog post writing is SEO. Search engine optimization [Learn more from out SEO guide]. This includes the following:
Including keywords throughout your blog post
A quick sprint through your article where you add keywords naturally. Adding keywords to your blog post should take less than 20 minutes.
Adding in headers, subheaders, the title, & meta description
This is a simple addition of words to your article to ensure Google can understand your content well.
Once you’re used to doing this, it should take less than 30 minutes to add in headers, subheaders, the title, & meta description.
Placing visuals + alt texts
Placing in visuals can take a long independent of the type of visual you’re using.
Because, finding one that brings the right value, ensuring it’s a good size and quality [as well as adding the alt text] will take time. Learn about these guidelines and everything important about utilizing visuals from our blog post visuals guide.
A single image would take at least 10 minutes. The average blog post length of 1500 words should have at least 4 – 5 images.
So, placing visuals into the blog post should take up to 50 minutes.
Adding in external and internal links
Adding in internal links shouldn’t take long as long as you have an excel list of your blog post links to quickly copy and paste from.
External links can take some time to find the right site and article that would further help the users.
As well as linking to articles & resources you used to show Google you did your research.
Adding external and internal links to the blog post should safely take 1 hour.
Proofreading
The editing process is time intensive, but most editing is done as a method of refreshing content after a while.
So, we’ll only consider the part where you read the article to ensure there are no grammar mistakes, and that it makes sense.
[Keep in mind, there’s a lot more to editing that we cover in our guide to editing a blog post]
If you have Grammarly, this shouldn’t take long. Proofreading the blog post can take up to 15 minutes.
Promoting the blog post
Finally, the last component is promoting the blog post.
This isn’t actually part of the writing process, but it’s still a task you spend time on for your blog post.
Promoting on different social media means you’ll be writing copy for each platform, adding in a visual, as well placing in the link.
For each social media, it should take around 15 minutes. The average blogger has at least 2 social media platforms they promote on. Social media is just ONE of the 13 methods to bring more traffic to your blog post that is covered in our blog post traffic guide.
So, promoting the blog post should take an extra 30 minutes.
Adding our estimated time for each of the blog writing components will provide us with the final result.
Final Results [Blog post time distribution case study]
Based on our case study, writing a blog post takes 7 hours and 55 minutes.
Whereas data from the 4 sources resulted in only 4 hours.
First off, our result of approximately 8 hours was to write a 1500 word blog post.
Whereas the 4 hours determined [from the 4 sources] was to write a 1000 word blog post.
Which is technically 6 hours for 1500 words. But why is there still a difference of 2 hours?
Well, these bloggers only reported the time they took to write the blog post.
They didn’t mention the time they took in doing keyword research and blog post promotion.
So, if you plan on writing a blog post, it is safe to assume you will take 8 hours to write a blog post.
FAQ
The following results were derived from our case study analysis. Where we determined that it takes 8 hours to write a 1500 word blog post.
For the different blog post lengths, technically, only the writing time should vary.
But, the amount of research, SEO, editing, as well as promotion varies in the same manner.
So, we can simply estimate the time it takes for varying blog post lengths by scaling our result of 8 hours for 1500 words.
It should take 2 hours and 40 minutes to write a 500 word blog post.
But, 500 word articles do not rank on Google nowadays. Because they don’t provide enough content depth independent of the topic.
But, just the task of writing 500 words takes 40 minutes.
It should take 5 hours and 10 minutes to write a 1000 word blog post.
If you’re focused, you can cut down on the writing time and put out a 1000 word article within 4 hours.
But, just the part of writing 1000 words takes 1 hour and 20 minutes.
It takes approximately 7 hours and 55 minutes to write a 1500 word blog post.
Check our case study for the full breakdown. But, just the portion of writing 1500 words takes 2 hours.
It takes approximately 10 hours and 20 minutes to write a 2000 word blog post.
2000 word blog posts are considered above average in terms of length.
As a result, they perform better in the SERPs. So, it’s well worth spending 10 hours [Which is a day of work] to push out an article of that length.
Keep in mind, writing more words means adding in more valuable content, not bluffing.
But, just the chunk of writing 2000 words takes 2 hours and 40 minutes.
It takes approximately 12 hours and 50 minutes to write a 2500 word blog post.
2500 word articles are quite long, and it may take longer than 12 hours to ensure they’re well organized and structured.
So, add in an extra hour making it about 14 hours to write the 2500 word post.
But, just the section of writing 2500 words takes 3 hours and 20 minutes.
It should take approximately 16 hours to write a 3000 word blog post.
If your article reaches 3000 words, it means you’ve done good research on technical documentation, competing blog posts, and data gathering. [Learn how you can make better use of your competition from our guide on blog competitor analysis].
For this length, a lot more SEO is required, as well as proofreading, and promotion.
So, consider 16 hours the minimum time required. It’ll take around 20 hours to write a 3000 word article.
But, just writing 3000 words without considering the other blogging components takes 4 hours.
It should take approximately 21 hours and 20 minutes to write a 4000 word blog post.
Though the actual time it takes can vary based on the amount of research you do for the blog post.
But, without the other components of blogging, just writing 4000 words takes 5 hours and 20 minutes.
Unlike a blog post, creating a blog can take ONE day to create if you go with all the default methods.
But it can take up to 2 weeks to establish a good custom blog.
How long the blog takes to create depends on whether you did the entire process yourself or paid someone to do it.
But, it can still take just a day if you follow the process I provide.
As long as you keep your perfectionism at bay, just so you can make the blog go live, and actually start writing.
You can later improve it when you have 20+ blog posts on the blog.
A blog post should be 1350 to 1500 words, which is the average length of a blog post.
Check out our case study to see how we determined that blog post length.
Yes, you can write 1000 words in 3 hours. The average writing speed is 14 words per minute.
If you write at that speed, you can write 1000 words in 1 hour and 10 minutes.
But, you also set aside time for thinking while writing. So, you can give yourself an extra hour.
And, you will still be able to write 1000 words in 3 hours.
Yes, you can write 1000 or 1k words in a day. It actually takes less than 3 hours to write 1000 words.
But, for those who have a job as well as chores, writing 1000 word blog post is still achievable in a day.
Yes, you can write 4000 words in 12 hours. A 4000 word blog post or any thesis paper requires 21 hours and 20 minutes.
But that includes researching, editing, and SEO optimization. But, just the writing process takes less than 6 hours.
So, you can easily write 4000 words in 12 hours.
Yes, 5 hours is more than enough to write 1000 words.
Yes, 4 hours is more than double the time needed to write 1000 words.
You can write 7 pages in 3 hours. But, it depends on how many words a 7 page document contains.
The average page with Arial font and 12 font size contains at least 400 words [When including 2 – 3 headings and paragraph breaks].
So, 7 pages would mean 2800 words.
From our case study, writing 2500 – 3000 words would take between 3 t0 4 hours.
So, if you can push yourself, you can write 7 pages of content in 3 hours.
It is very much possible to write 2500 words in a day.
To our study, the entire blogging process to write a 2500 word blog post takes approximately 13 hours.
And, the day has 24 hours. So, you can easily write 2500 words in a day. You can even split up your work.
Where you do blog post research on one day, and actually write the article the next day.
Blogging once a week is not enough unless you are in a very low competitive niche.
But, it is not totally bad, either. The average blog puts out at least 2 pieces of content per week.
And the blogs who put publish more than 4 blog posts a week see the most increase in their organic traffic.
If you’re starting a new blog, you should focus on publishing at least 2 – 3 blog posts per week.
Blogging once a week is not enough to produce results through SEO.
But, if you’re primarily obtaining traffic from other platforms, then it’ll be enough depending on the requirements of that respective platform.
Blogging once a month is 100% NOT enough. Google is an algorithm based platform.
And, it needs to be constantly fed to see results.
If you barely publish blog posts [Like once a month], Google won’t have enough content to determine how good your site is.
But if you’re publishing once a month, where each of your blog posts is over 5000 words long, with the exception of content quality, content depth, unique data, and stunning visuals, then it’ll be ok to blog once a month.
But, blogs that publish more often see better results than those that publish less.
A blog post outline can be written in 5 minutes. First, you need to gather your research data.
And use that to determine the different things you want to discuss.
And create bullet points for them [These will become your headigs].
If you’re experienced at it, it can take you 5 minutes to write the blog post outline.
You can write a blog post fast if you know what to write beforehand.
This is where a blog post outline is helpful. The outline ensures you know what to write next without going off track.
As long as you know what to write next, you can write way faster.
But, if you’re constantly having to think while writing, you’ll write too slowly.
