As a practical starting point for a voice over script, plan on roughly:
- 15 seconds: about 30–35 words
- 30 seconds: about 60–75 words
- 60 seconds: about 120–150 words
Those numbers are guidelines, not rules. A 70-word script may fit comfortably into 30 seconds in one commercial and feel painfully rushed in another. The difference is usually not the word count itself. It’s the intent of the script, the audience, the delivery style, the subject matter, the visuals and what the person speaking is actually trying to communicate.
That’s why I don’t believe voiceover timing should begin with a stopwatch. It should begin with the script.
How Many Words Should Be in a 30-Second Commercial?
For most 30-second commercial voiceover scripts, 60 to 75 words is a useful planning range. If the read is warm, reflective or emotionally sensitive, the comfortable number may be lower. If it’s deliberately fast, energetic and promotional, the script may carry more.
The same principle applies to :15 and :60 spots. A fast-paced local dealership promotion, furniture sale, political spot or event commercial may be written to move. A healthcare commercial, luxury brand piece or thoughtful corporate message may need far more space between thoughts.
I recently received a 96-word script for a 30-second commercial for a high-end beachside substance treatment facility. The intended tone was caring, reassuring and encouraging. Ninety-six words in 30 seconds works out to 192 words per minute.
Could I physically say all 96 words in 30 seconds? Probably. But that’s not really the right question. At that pace, a script intended to feel warm and reassuring begins to sound more like a high-energy local dealership, retail promotion or political ad. The client may technically get every word into the spot, but the performance can lose the very qualities the message was supposed to convey.
In other words, the copy may technically fit, but the story no longer works the way the client intended.
Why Word Count Alone Can’t Tell You Whether a VO Script Fits
Before I record a script, I’m thinking about several things: Who am I? Who am I talking to? What am I saying? Why am I saying it? What happened that caused me to say it in the first place? Those questions affect pace.
Imagine sitting on a sofa talking to your mother or a close friend about a sensitive medical condition. That conversation needs room. Now imagine telling someone that this weekend is the final chance to get a special price at the local Toyota dealership. Those messages should not move at the same speed.
Audience matters too. A piece directed toward seniors may intentionally use a little more space and clarity than content created for a younger audience accustomed to faster conversational pacing. That isn’t about assuming one audience understands more slowly than another. It’s about recognizing that different audiences, formats and generations often have different communication rhythms.
The same distinction appears across commercial voice over and corporate narration. A commercial may need urgency and compression. Corporate narration, training, eLearning or a technical explanation may need enough time for the listener to absorb an idea before the next one arrives. The number of words matters, but the reason for saying them matters more.
This Is Where AI Voiceover Totally Misses the Mark
This question of intent is also where I believe AI voiceover misses the mark.
An AI voice may be able to read the words and make them fit the allotted time, but reading the words isn’t the same thing as understanding why they are being said. Human conversation is full of tiny decisions we make almost without realizing it. We pause slightly before an important thought. We move more quickly through one phrase and give another one room. We compare three items differently than we read a simple list. We bridge thoughts together. Sometimes the smallest hesitation or change of emphasis is what makes a sentence sound like an actual person thinking instead of someone reading copy.
Those choices come from intent.
Over the past year and a half, I’ve had five clients come to me after trying AI voiceover first. In some cases, the AI couldn’t even pronounce the client’s names correctly. But pronunciation is only part of the problem. The bigger issue is that a voiceover can technically be timed correctly and still feel wrong.
That human element includes the little imperfections of real speech, the pauses between thoughts and the subtle changes that happen because a person is actually thinking about what they’re saying. We don’t read our thoughts from a script when we have a real conversation. We think them, and then they come out.
That’s an important part of why hiring a professional voice actor matters. A human voice actor brings more than a voice to the recording. There is thought, interpretation, instinct and intention behind the words.
AI can make the words fit. A human has to make the story work.
The Voiceover Has to Serve the Pictures Too
In television, video and digital advertising, the voiceover is never the main event. The pictures are carrying almost all of the emotion and information, and the voiceover is only there to support the story.
A pharmaceutical commercial might have only 40 words of narration in 30 seconds because the film needs room to work. We may be watching a patient, a family interaction or a visual transition that needs a beat before the next thought. If I fill every available second with narration simply because more words could technically fit, I may be fighting the production instead of supporting it.
That’s one reason I think timing should be considered while the script and edit are developing, not after everything else is locked. My own approach to a voice over script begins with understanding the audience, message and intended outcome. Pace comes out of those decisions. It shouldn’t be imposed on the script afterward just because somebody counted the words.
What Happens When a 30-Second Script Runs 38 or 40 Seconds?
If a script intended for 30 seconds naturally reads at 38 seconds, it is already about 27 percent over the slot. At 44 seconds, it is nearly 47 percent over. Asking the voice actor to “just read it faster” sounds simple, but that is not a small adjustment, and speeding up a performance that much can completely change it.
My normal process is to read the script first at the pace I believe serves the material. Then I’ll tighten it. Sometimes I’ll take several seconds off and listen again. If necessary, I’ll keep working until I can force it into the required time.
There have been occasions when I’ve spent 20 minutes rereading a 30-second script, trying different pacing and phrasing just to get it under the mark. Sometimes I can make it fit, but just because I can fit it doesn’t mean that’s the right read for the client. There is a real difference between getting every word in and delivering the message the way it was intended.
When the Script Is Too Long, Something Has to Give
If a 96-word script needs to become a warm, comfortable 30-second commercial, there are really two fundamental choices: buy more airtime or reduce the copy. As the voice actor, it generally isn’t my responsibility to decide which words are expendable. Only the client, agency, writer or creative team knows which claims, details and ideas are essential.
I’ve also spent decades as a producer and director and have produced and directed nearly a thousand voiceover productions. I’m a professional writer as well, so if a client wants help rewriting a script, I can certainly do that. But a genuine rewrite is a separate job and should be treated as one.
If we’re talking about removing a few unnecessary words or dropping a sentence to make an otherwise solid script fit, I’m not looking for a reason to turn that into another charge. If the script truly needs to be rewritten, that takes time and requires decisions about the client’s message that go beyond voice performance.
I sometimes call an overstuffed spot a Cinderella slipper script. We’re trying to put a big foot into a very small slipper. My job is to do everything I reasonably can to give the client what they want, but the real objective is still to tell the story about their product, service or idea in a way that works.
Seven Extra Words Can Be a Big Deal in a :30
One of the most common situations in production happens after a script is already working. Someone says, “We just want to add one more line.”
Seven additional words may not sound significant. But if the original 30-second script contained 70 words, adding seven more increases the copy by 10 percent. In a 30-second spot, that can represent roughly three additional seconds of spoken material at the original pace.
For broadcast television, cable or radio, you usually don’t have those three seconds to spare. A :30 needs to be a :30. A :15 needs to be a :15.
Web video, social content and some corporate narration may give you more flexibility. Even there, however, you may be timing the narration to an existing edit, animation, graphics sequence or presentation. The media may change, but the basic problem doesn’t: extra words require extra time or a faster delivery.
Read the Script Out Loud Before You Send It
If there is one practical suggestion I would give anyone writing or approving voiceover copy, it’s this: read the script out loud and time it. Actually say every word.
A script you have been reading silently for two days can sound perfectly timed in your head. You already know where every sentence is going. You may mentally hear the pauses and inflection without physically taking the time required to make them. Speaking the words out loud is different.
When I prepare a script, one of my first passes is what I call a technical or data read. I’m not performing it yet. I’m simply reading the words aloud to understand the structure, timing, flow and how those words actually work together in my mouth. That simple step can reveal a great deal before the real performance begins.
I think it’s useful for the writer to read the script aloud, and it can be useful for someone else on the creative, brand or marketing team to read it too. Different people will naturally pace it differently. If everyone is running long, the problem probably isn’t the voice actor. For more on preparing your script for a VO session, this is one of the easiest ways to prevent timing problems before recording begins.
Pronunciations, Numbers and Technical Copy Affect Timing Too
Word count can also hide complexity. I once received a script with only about 40 words, but roughly half of them were Old Testament names and places I had never encountered before. I spent a considerable amount of time researching pronunciations. I got all but one of them right, and even that final word became a point of discussion within the creative team because people disagreed about the preferred pronunciation.
Scientific, pharmaceutical, engineering and technical terminology can create the same issue. So can company names, product names and people’s names. Whenever possible, give the voice talent a pronunciation guide or reference recording for anything that could reasonably be said more than one way.
Numbers and URLs deserve attention too. Does the client want “www.starlingproductions.com” or simply “starlingproductions.com”? How should a year, price, abbreviation or model number be spoken? Those choices affect both clarity and timing.
On highly regulated pharmaceutical, legal or technical projects, the wording may already have passed through multiple rounds of creative, brand, marketing, communications, regulatory or legal review. In those situations, changing even a small piece of approved language may not be an option. That makes accurate timing and pronunciation information even more important before the recording session. My Voice Over Session FAQs covers some of the other information that can help a session move smoothly, including direction, revisions, audio delivery and pronunciation questions.
So, How Many Words Should Your 30-Second VO Script Have?
For a :30 spot, the practical range can change considerably depending on the intent and delivery:
- Slow, heartfelt, personal or conversational reads: approximately 30–50 words
- Normal conversational reads: approximately 60–70 words
- Fast-paced, high-energy promotional or political reads: approximately 70–85 words
Those ranges are still not rules. They’re a way to understand how dramatically performance style affects the amount of copy that can comfortably fit into 30 seconds.
If it’s supposed to feel intimate, caring or reflective, give it room. If it’s intentionally urgent and high-energy, it can probably carry more words. If the voiceover has to work around important pictures, music, graphics or dramatic pauses, account for those too.
Most importantly, read it aloud. Have someone else read it aloud. Time both reads. A word-count guideline can tell you whether you’re in the ballpark. Your ears will tell you whether the message is working.
About the Author
Robert Starling is a professional American male voice actor and commercial producer/director with decades of production experience at Starling Productions, a ProductionHub.com Top PRO100 ranked production company. Based in Lighthouse Point, Florida, between Miami and Palm Beach, he provides broadcast-quality voiceover services for clients throughout South Florida in Fort Lauderdale, Pompano Beach, Deerfield Beach, Boca Raton, Delray Beach, West Palm Beach, Jupiter, the Florida Keys and Naples. He also works regularly with clients and production professionals across Florida, including Orlando and Tampa. Robert records from his professional studio for clients nationwide and worldwide, with live-directed sessions available via Source-Connect and Zoom.