---
title: "How long to read War and Peace? about 40 hours"
description: "War and Peace takes about 40 hours — roughly 561,000 to 587,000 words in English translation. What that assumes, how it breaks down, and how long at a realistic pace"
url: https://atoneplace.net/how-long-to/war-and-peace/
site: "At One Place"
---

# How long does it take to read War and Peace?

**How long to read War and Peace: about 40 hours**

roughly 561,000 to 587,000 words in English translation

War and Peace is the standard byword for a long book, and at around 40 hours it earns it — but the number genuinely depends on which translation you read. English versions range from about 561,000 to 587,000 words, a spread of over 25,000 words, because translators make different choices about Tolstoy's French passages and his repetitions. It is roughly half the length of the Harry Potter series. Unabridged audiobooks range from 55 to 72 hours depending on edition and narrator, which is a wider spread than the text itself.

## The numbers

- **Total:** 40 hours 8 minutes
- **In hours:** 40.1 hours
- **Non-stop:** 1.7 days without sleeping
- **Covers:** roughly 561,000 to 587,000 words in English translation
- **At a realistic pace:** an hour a night
- **That works out as:** about 41 days

## What this assumes

About 573,000 words at 238 words per minute, the midpoint of the published English translations. The translation you pick changes this by up to two hours.

> Sources disagree materially and the disagreement is real rather than error: different English translations genuinely contain different numbers of words, from about 561,304 to 587,287.

## Other books

| What | How long |
| --- | --- |
| Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone | about 5 hours 23 minutes |
| Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix | about 18 hours |
| The Hobbit | about 6 hours 39 minutes |
| The Bible | about 55 hours |
| Infinite Jest | about 40 hours |
| Moby-Dick | about 15 hours |
| Ulysses | about 19 hours |
| Dune | about 13 hours |
| Pride and Prejudice | about 8 hours 33 minutes |
| Nineteen Eighty-Four | about 6 hours 14 minutes |
| The Great Gatsby | about 3 hours 18 minutes |
| Animal Farm | about 2 hours 6 minutes |
| It | about 31 hours |
| The complete works of Shakespeare | about 59 hours |
| The complete Sherlock Holmes | about 72 hours as an audiobook |
| All of English Wikipedia | about 41 years |

## Common questions

### How long does it take to read War and Peace?

about 40 hours — roughly 561,000 to 587,000 words in English translation.

### What does that assume?

About 573,000 words at 238 words per minute, the midpoint of the published English translations. The translation you pick changes this by up to two hours.

### How long at a realistic pace?

an hour a night — about 41 days.

## Related pages

- [How long to read Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone?](https://atoneplace.net/how-long-to/harry-potter-philosophers-stone/)
- [How long to read Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix?](https://atoneplace.net/how-long-to/harry-potter-order-of-the-phoenix/)
- [How long to read The Hobbit?](https://atoneplace.net/how-long-to/the-hobbit/)
- [How long to read the Bible?](https://atoneplace.net/how-long-to/the-bible/)
- [How long to read Infinite Jest?](https://atoneplace.net/how-long-to/infinite-jest/)
- [How long to read Moby-Dick?](https://atoneplace.net/how-long-to/moby-dick/)
- [How long to read Ulysses?](https://atoneplace.net/how-long-to/ulysses/)
- [How long to read Dune?](https://atoneplace.net/how-long-to/dune/)
- [How long to read the Harry Potter series?](https://atoneplace.net/how-long-to/harry-potter-series/)
- [How long to watch Friends?](https://atoneplace.net/how-long-to/friends/)
- [How long to watch One Piece?](https://atoneplace.net/how-long-to/one-piece/)
- [How long to watch The Simpsons?](https://atoneplace.net/how-long-to/the-simpsons/)
- [How long to watch The Office (US)?](https://atoneplace.net/how-long-to/the-office-us/)
- [How long to watch the Marvel Cinematic Universe?](https://atoneplace.net/how-long-to/marvel-cinematic-universe/)

## Sources

- Calculated on this page — At One Place (/about/)