Word Frequency Counter - Find Most Common Words in Text

Analyze Text

Word Frequency Counter counts how many times each word appears in your text, calculates keyword density and vocabulary richness, and exports results to CSV. Paste any text below to analyze it instantly — no sign-up required.

About Word Frequency Counter

Word Frequency Counter is a text analysis tool that counts how many times each word appears in any text. It calculates keyword density, vocabulary richness (lexical diversity), and average word length — then displays results as a ranked table with visual frequency chart.

All processing happens in your browser. No text is sent to a server.

How to Use It

1. Paste or type your text into the input field.
2. Adjust filters: toggle case sensitivity, stop word removal, number exclusion, or minimum word length.
3. View the frequency table, bar chart, and summary stats instantly.
4. Copy results or export to CSV.

Example

Input: "The cat sat on the mat and the cat slept on the mat."

With stop words filtered and case ignored:

• cat — 2 occurrences (28.6%)
• sat — 1 occurrence (14.3%)
• mat — 2 occurrences (28.6%)
• slept — 1 occurrence (14.3%)

Without stop word filtering, "the" dominates at 4 occurrences — which is grammatically expected but tells you nothing about the content topic.

Features

• Ignore case: Treats "The" and "the" as the same word
• Ignore common words: Filters out stop words like "the", "and", "is" so content words surface
• Ignore numbers: Excludes numeric values from the analysis
• Min length: Only count words with at least N characters — useful for filtering short particles
• CSV export: Download the full frequency table as a spreadsheet-ready file

Vocabulary Richness (Lexical Diversity)

The vocabulary richness percentage shows how varied your word choices are. Formula: (unique words ÷ total words) × 100. A 1,000-word article with 450 unique words has a richness of 45%.

Higher scores indicate more diverse vocabulary. Technical writing tends to score lower (specialized terms repeat often), while creative writing scores higher.

Keyword Density

To check keyword density, paste your content and look for your target phrase in the frequency table. Divide its count by the total word count and multiply by 100. Most well-written content falls between 0.5% and 2% for primary keywords.

Use Cases

• SEO content auditing — verify your target keywords appear among the top content words
• Writing improvement — spot overused words, filler words, and repetitive patterns
• Academic analysis — compare vocabulary profiles across documents
• Content repetition detection — find words you lean on too heavily
• Language learning — track which words you use most vs. least in writing exercises

Limitations

• Counts single words (unigrams) only — does not detect multi-word phrases
• Stop word list covers English; other languages may need a different filter
• Vocabulary richness comparisons are most meaningful between texts of similar length

For a deeper explanation of word frequency analysis, keyword density formulas, and how to interpret results, see our guide: How to Analyze Word Frequency in Text.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is word frequency analysis?

Word frequency analysis counts how many times each word appears in a text and ranks them by occurrence. It reveals the most common words, keyword density, and vocabulary diversity of any document.

How do you calculate keyword density?

Keyword density = (number of keyword occurrences ÷ total word count) × 100. For example, if "analysis" appears 8 times in an 800-word article, its density is 1.0%.

What are stop words?

Stop words are common function words like "the", "and", "is", "of" that appear frequently in all English text but carry little topical meaning. Filtering them out lets you focus on the content-carrying words that actually define the topic.

What is a good keyword density for SEO?

There is no fixed ideal number. Most well-written content naturally falls between 0.5% and 2%. Above 3% often reads as unnatural. Modern search engines prioritize relevance and topical completeness over exact keyword counts.

What is vocabulary richness?

Vocabulary richness (also called lexical diversity or Type-Token Ratio) measures how many different words you use relative to the total word count. Formula: (unique words ÷ total words) × 100. Higher percentages mean more varied vocabulary.

Is this tool useful for SEO?

Yes. Running your content through a word frequency counter before publishing lets you verify that your target keywords appear among the top content words. If your primary topic phrase barely shows up, search engines may not associate the page with that query.

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Word Frequency Counter FAQ