reading-time

reading-time

Medium's like reading time estimation.

reading-time helps you estimate how long an article will take to read. It works perfectly with plain text, but also with markdown or html.

Note that it's focused on performance and simplicity, so the number of words it will extract from other formats than plain text can vary a little. But this is an estimation right?

Installation

npm install reading-time --production

Usage

Classic

// In Node.js
const readingTime = require('reading-time');
// In the browser
const readingTime = require('reading-time/lib/reading-time');

const stats = readingTime(text);
// ->
// stats: {
//   minutes: 1,
//   time: 60000,
//   words: {total: 200}
// }
console.log(`The reading time is: ${stats.minutes} min`);

‍♂️ Why different imports for Node.js and the browser?

This library is primarily for Node.js. The entrypoint also exports a ReadingTimeStream class which is, without polyfills, not supported in browsers. A simple workaround is to import the underlying lib/reading-time module.

Note that in the upcoming 2.0.0 version, this won't be necessary anymore.

Stream

const {ReadingTimeStream, readingTimeWithCount} = require('reading-time');

const analyzer = new ReadingTimeStream();
fs.createReadStream('foo')
  .pipe(analyzer)
  .on('data', (count) => {
    console.log(`The reading time is: ${readingTimeWithCount(count).minutes} min`);
  });

‍♂️ Can I use this in the browser?

Yes. You need to provide the appropriate polyfills. Please refer to your bundler's documentation.

API

readingTime(text, options?)

Returns an object with minutes, time (in milliseconds), and words.

type ReadingTimeResults = {
  minutes: number;
  time: number;
  words: WordCountStats;
};

• text: the text to analyze
• options (optional)
  • options.wordsPerMinute: (optional) the words per minute an average reader can read (default: 200)
  • options.wordBound: (optional) a function that returns a boolean value depending on if a character is considered as a word bound (default: spaces, new lines and tabs)

countWords(text, options?)

Returns an object representing the word count stats:

type WordCountStats = {
  total: number;
};

• text: the text to analyze
• options (optional)
  • options.wordBound: (optional) a function that returns a boolean value depending on if a character is considered as a word bound (default: spaces, new lines and tabs)

readingTimeWithCount(words, options?)

Returns an object with minutes (rounded minute stats) and time (exact time in milliseconds).

• words: the word count stats
• options (optional)
  • options.wordsPerMinute: (optional) the words per minute an average reader can read (default: 200)

Note that readingTime(text, options) === readingTimeWithCount(countWords(text, options), options).

Help wanted!

This library has been optimized for alphabetical languages and CJK languages, but may not behave correctly for other languages that don't use spaces for word bounds. If you find the behavior of this library to deviate significantly from your expectation, issues or contributions are welcomed!

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