Word Frequency Analyzer — Free Online Word & Phrase Frequency Counter
Paste any text and get a full frequency report: word and phrase counts (1–5 word n-grams), type-token ratio, Guiraud's R, hapax legomena and an overused-words detector — with stopword filtering and CSV export. 100% client-side: your text never leaves your browser.
The analyzer
Download the current n-gram table (respecting your n-gram length and stopword settings) as a spreadsheet-ready CSV: term, count, percent.
What is word frequency analysis?
A word frequency counter tallies how often each word appears in a text and ranks the results. Writers use it to catch unconscious repetition — the crutch words (just, really, very) that slip into drafts. Linguists use the same counts to measure lexical diversity: how varied a text's vocabulary is. SEOs use phrase frequency to check keyword-phrase density in content. This free online tool does all three: raw frequency, phrase frequency (n-grams), and diversity statistics, in one page.
What the metrics mean
Type-token ratio (TTR)
Unique words (types) ÷ total words (tokens). A 100-word paragraph with 65 unique words has a TTR of 0.65. TTR naturally falls as text gets longer, so only compare texts of similar length.
Guiraud's R
Unique words ÷ √total words. Proposed by Pierre Guiraud (1954), it measures the same lexical richness as TTR but stays stable across text lengths. Varied prose typically lands around 6–9; highly repetitive text scores lower.
Hapax legomena
Words used exactly once. A high hapax share signals rich vocabulary; in very short texts most words are hapax, which is normal.
Overused-words detector
After removing stopwords, the tool flags content words whose count sits at least 2 standard deviations above the mean (z-score ≥ 2.0, minimum 3 uses). The method and threshold are shown next to the results — it is a revision aid, not a verdict.
Use cases
- Editing a draft — find repeated words and phrases before line-editing (document word frequency counter).
- Academic writing — check lexical diversity of essays and papers; list hapax legomena.
- SEO content checks — measure keyword and phrase density with bigrams/trigrams.
- Stylometry & forensics — compare function-word distributions across texts (leave stopwords on).
- Language learning — see which words dominate a text you're studying.
- Website content audits — paste article text from a page to audit repetition (website word frequency counter).
Best word frequency counter: how this tool compares
If you're looking for the best word frequency counter, the honest answer depends on what you need. For a quick plain count, several free options exist. For statistical depth — phrase frequency, lexical diversity, hapax lists, overused-word detection and CSV export in one page — here's how this analyzer stacks up against the best-known incumbent:
Word Frequency Analyzer vs writewords.org.uk
| This tool | writewords.org.uk | |
|---|---|---|
| N-grams (phrase frequency) | 1–5 words, stopword-aware | words + phrases (basic) |
| Type-token ratio / Guiraud's R | Yes | No |
| Hapax legomena list | Yes | No |
| Overused-words detector | Yes (z-score) | No |
| CSV export | Yes | No |
| Ads | None in the tool | Ad-supported |
| Privacy | 100% client-side | Server-processed |
Comparison checked October 2026 from publicly visible features. WriteWords is a long-running free service; the table above reflects feature differences, not quality judgments.
What this tool is not
Privacy
All analysis happens in your browser with JavaScript. Your text is never uploaded, stored, or sent anywhere — the tool works offline once the page loads. There are no accounts, no cookies for tracking, and no ads inside the tool.
Frequently asked questions
What is a word frequency counter?
A word frequency counter analyzes a block of text and reports how many times each word appears, ranked from most to least frequent. This tool goes further: it counts phrases (2–5 word n-grams), measures vocabulary diversity with the type-token ratio and Guiraud's R, lists hapax legomena (words used exactly once), and flags statistically overused words — all locally in your browser.
What is type-token ratio (TTR)?
The type-token ratio is the number of unique words (types) divided by the total number of words (tokens). A text of 100 words with 60 unique words has a TTR of 0.60. Higher values mean more varied vocabulary. Note that TTR falls naturally as text gets longer, so it is most useful when comparing texts of similar length — or use Guiraud's R, which corrects for length.
What is Guiraud's R?
Guiraud's R (1954) is the number of unique words divided by the square root of the total word count. It measures lexical diversity like the type-token ratio, but is far less sensitive to text length, making it better for comparing documents of different sizes. Roughly, values around 6–9 are typical for varied prose; formulaic or repetitive text scores lower.
What are hapax legomena?
Hapax legomena (Greek for "said once") are words that appear exactly once in a text. A high share of hapax words usually signals rich, varied vocabulary; in a short text it is normal for most words to be hapax. Writers sometimes check hapax lists to confirm their rare-word choices were intentional rather than typos.
How does the overused-words detector work?
After removing stopwords (the, and, of, etc.), the tool computes the mean and standard deviation of word counts. A content word is flagged as overused when its count is at least 2 standard deviations above the mean (z-score ≥ 2.0) and it appears at least 3 times. This is a statistical heuristic — the flagged words are candidates for revision, not errors.
What are stopwords, and should I remove them?
Stopwords are common grammatical words like "the", "and", "of", "to" that carry little content meaning. Keep them on for a faithful picture of your raw text (useful for stylometry or SEO checks), and turn the filter on when you want to see which content words dominate — for example, to spot a word you repeat unconsciously in a draft.
How is this different from writewords.org.uk's word frequency counter?
WriteWords offers a plain word-and-phrase count with a 2005-era interface. This analyzer adds statistical depth no basic counter has: 1–5 word n-grams with stopword-aware phrase filtering, type-token ratio, Guiraud's R, a hapax legomena list, a z-score overused-words detector, word-length distribution charts and one-click CSV export — with a modern interface and no ads.
What is phrase frequency (n-grams)?
Phrase frequency counts multi-word sequences instead of single words. A bigram is a 2-word phrase ("climate change"), a trigram is 3 words, and so on up to 5-grams here. Writers use n-grams to find repeated phrasing ("in order to", "due to the fact that") that single-word counts miss; SEOs use them to check keyword-phrase density.
Does the tool support languages other than English?
The tokenizer is Unicode-aware, so it correctly splits words in Spanish, French, German, Indonesian and other Latin-script languages, plus scripts like Chinese and Japanese at the character-group level. The stopword filter list is English-only, so for other languages simply leave the stopword toggle off — frequency, TTR, Guiraud's R and hapax statistics work the same regardless of language.
Is my text uploaded to a server?
No. Everything runs locally in your browser with JavaScript — tokenizing, counting and statistics happen on your own device. Nothing is sent anywhere, which is why the tool also works offline once loaded. Your drafts stay private.
What is a good type-token ratio?
There is no universal target: TTR depends heavily on text length. A 100-word paragraph might score 0.65–0.75 while a 2,000-word essay by the same author scores 0.45–0.55 — that is normal, not worse writing. Compare TTR only between texts of similar length, or rely on Guiraud's R for length-independent comparison. Very low TTR in a short text usually means noticeable repetition.
Why do writers care about word frequency?
Because repetition is invisible to the author but obvious to the reader. A frequency scan reveals the crutch words you lean on ("just", "really", "very"), phrases you echo unconsciously, and whether your vocabulary is as varied as you think. Editors commonly run a frequency check as a first editing pass before line-editing a draft.
Can I analyze a whole document or website text?
Yes. Paste the full text of an article, essay, chapter or webpage content into the box — the analyzer handles tens of thousands of words instantly in your browser. For webpages, copy the visible article text (not HTML code); for documents, paste from your word processor. Then use the N-grams tab for phrase frequency or export everything to CSV for deeper analysis in a spreadsheet.
How do I export the results?
Open the Export tab and click "Download CSV". You get a spreadsheet-ready file with each word or phrase, its raw count and its percentage of the total, sorted by frequency. The export reflects your current n-gram and stopword settings.
Is this a readability checker?
No — deliberately not. This tool measures text statistics (frequency, diversity, repetition). It does not compute readability scores such as Flesch Reading Ease, grade levels or Lexile measures. If you need those, use our dedicated readability checker; keeping the two separate means each tool does its own job properly.