How many words should a digital sign have?
Quick answer: DigitalSignage.com's planning rule is 6 to 10 words for a screen people walk past and no more than 15 to 20 words for a screen where people wait, split into a headline of 3 to 6 words, a body of up to 12 words and a call to action of 2 to 4. The budget comes from time: a viewer reads about 2 words per second after a 3-second orientation, so words = (seconds on screen minus 3) x 2. Distance caps it further: from 50 feet a 1080p screen physically fits about 12 readable words.
Key facts
- The planning word budget for a slide is (seconds on screen minus 3) x 2, so an 8-second slide carries 10 words and a 13-second slide carries 20.
- A screen people walk past should carry 6 to 10 words; a queue or lobby screen 10 to 18; only a seated waiting room should go to 30.
- At 50 feet, body text must be about 132pt on a 1080p canvas, which leaves room for about 4 words per line and 3 lines, roughly 12 words.
- Keep glance-read lines to 25 to 40 characters and the body to 3 lines or fewer.
- A landscape menu board read from 10 feet physically fits about 30 item lines, but a common planning range for quick decisions is 5 to 7 items per category.
- Plan for German and Finnish text about 30 percent longer than English, and French and Spanish about 15 percent longer, the figures our localization guide uses.
Last updated October 25, 2026. Reading rates, dwell times and item counts on this page are planning estimates, not measured facts about your audience; type sizes come from our typography and viewing distance guide.
What is the word budget for a digital sign?
The word budget is the number of words a typical viewer can read in the time the slide is on screen, after subtracting about 3 seconds for noticing the slide and finding the headline. At a cautious planning rate of 2 words per second, that gives words = (seconds minus 3) x 2. A 10-second slide supports 14 words; a 6-second slide supports 6.
Two words per second is about 120 words per minute. It is deliberately slower than the 200 to 250 words per minute commonly cited for reading prose at a desk, because a sign viewer reads large type from a distance, often starts mid-slide, and is walking, queueing or talking. A budget built on the slow rate works for everyone; a budget built on the fast rate works only for the fastest reader standing still.
| Seconds on screen | Reading time after 3 s orientation | Word budget at 2 words per second | Typical use |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3 (a single glance) | 0 s | 3 to 5, headline only | Corridor, roadside, window |
| 6 | 3 s | 6 | Passing traffic |
| 8 | 5 s | 10 | Retail aisle, entrance |
| 10 | 7 s | 14 | Queue, lobby |
| 13 | 10 s | 20 | Break room, counter |
| 15 | 12 s | 24 | Longest slide for most venues |
| 20 | 17 s | 34 | Seated waiting room only |
Bottom line: take the seconds the slide is on screen, subtract 3 and double it; if your draft has more words than that, cut words or give the slide more time, never both shrink the text and keep the words.
The single glance is the special case. A viewer who looks for about 3 seconds, the attention span our content psychology guide plans around, has no reading time left after orientation, so the formula gives zero. In practice a short familiar phrase of 3 to 5 words, set large, is taken in as a unit. That is why window, corridor and roadside screens should carry a headline and an image and nothing else.
How many words fit on a screen at each viewing distance?
Distance sets a physical ceiling: the farther the viewer, the larger the text must be, and the fewer words fit on the screen. On a 1080p landscape canvas, about 190 words of body text fit at 10 feet, about 60 at 20 feet, 30 at 30 feet and 12 at 50 feet. Time limits the budget before space does at short distances; space wins beyond about 30 feet.
The table uses the body text size from our typography and viewing distance guide, 12 + 2.4 x feet in points on a 1080p canvas. It assumes a 90 percent safe area 1,728 pixels wide, a body area 600 pixels tall with the rest left for a headline, an average character width of half the type size, a line height of 1.3 and 6 characters per word including the space.
| Viewing distance | Body size on 1080p | Characters per full line | Words per line | Lines in body area | Physical word ceiling | Recommended budget |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 ft (1.8 m) | 26pt | 132 | 22 | 17 | 374 | 20 to 30 (time limited) |
| 10 ft (3 m) | 36pt | 96 | 16 | 12 | 192 | 14 to 20 |
| 15 ft (4.6 m) | 48pt | 72 | 12 | 9 | 108 | 10 to 14 |
| 20 ft (6.1 m) | 60pt | 57 | 9 | 7 | 63 | 10 to 14 |
| 30 ft (9.1 m) | 84pt | 41 | 6 | 5 | 30 | 8 to 10 |
| 50 ft (15.2 m) | 132pt | 26 | 4 | 3 | 12 | 6 to 8 |
Bottom line: within 20 feet, the seconds on screen limit the words; beyond 30 feet, the screen itself does, and a far-viewed sign should never carry more than about 10 words.
Here is one row worked through. At 30 feet the body size is 12 + 2.4 x 30 = 84pt. Each character averages 42 pixels wide, so a 1,728-pixel line holds 1,728 / 42 = 41 characters, or 6 words. Each line takes 84 x 1.3 = 109 pixels of height, so 600 pixels hold 5 lines. Six words times five lines is 30 words, and that is a ceiling, not a target.
Portrait screens cut the line length nearly in half. A 1080 x 1920 canvas has a safe width of 972 pixels instead of 1,728, so each line holds about 56 percent of the characters of a landscape line, though more lines fit vertically. Long words wrap badly on portrait, so write shorter words for tall screens. Our portrait screens and rotation guide covers canvas sizes.
How should the words be split between headline, body and call to action?
Give the headline 3 to 6 words, the body no more than 12, and the call to action 2 to 4, so a typical slide totals 10 to 18 words. The headline carries the message on its own for the viewer who only glances; the body adds the one detail that makes it usable; the call to action says what to do next.
Write the headline first and test it alone. If someone who reads only the headline knows what the slide is about, the slide works for a passing viewer. "Flu shots Thursday" passes; "Important health update" fails, because it promises information and delivers none. The body then answers the one question the headline raises, usually when, where, how much or for whom.
| Slide type | Headline words | Body words | Call to action words | Total | Planned seconds |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Passing-traffic promotion | 3 to 5 | 0 to 3 | 2 | 5 to 10 | 6 to 8 |
| Queue or counter promotion | 4 to 6 | 4 to 8 | 2 to 3 | 10 to 16 | 8 to 11 |
| Lobby or office announcement | 4 to 6 | 6 to 12 | 0 to 3 | 10 to 20 | 8 to 13 |
| Waiting room information | 4 to 7 | 10 to 20 | 0 to 3 | 14 to 30 | 10 to 18 |
| Menu board item | 2 to 4 (name) | 0 to 8 (description) | 1 (price) | 3 to 13 | Static |
Bottom line: if a slide's total runs past 20 words, it is two slides, and the second one usually belongs in a different playlist or a different screen.
One message per screen is the rule behind the split. A slide that announces new hours, a staff party and a parking change makes a viewer choose, and most choose none. Put each message on its own slide with its own headline, and let the loop carry the variety. Our content best practices guide treats this as the first rule of glanceable content.
How long should a line of text be on a digital sign?
Keep each line to 25 to 40 characters, about 4 to 7 words, and the body to 3 lines or fewer. Short lines let the eye take in each line in one fixation and find the start of the next without hunting, which matters when the viewer is several metres away and looking for only a few seconds.
Long lines also invite small type. A designer who sets a 90-character line across a 1080p screen has to choose a size that fits it, and that size is almost always too small for the room. Starting from the required size for the viewing distance and then counting how many characters fit, as the distance table does, keeps the type honest.
Break lines where the meaning breaks. "Open 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. / Monday to Saturday" reads faster than a line that wraps between "10" and "p.m.". Avoid hyphenating words across lines, avoid justified text, which opens uneven gaps, and left-align body text, or center it only for one or two short lines.
How should prices, times and numbers be written on a screen?
Write numbers in the shortest form that cannot be misread: $4.50, not $4.50 USD; $5, not $5.00 on a menu where every price is whole; 7 a.m., not 7:00 AM; Nov 2, not Monday, November 2nd. Every character saved is a character that can be set larger, and numbers are often the only thing a viewer needs.
Use numerals, not words, for anything a viewer will act on: "3 days left", not "three days left". Keep one format per screen, so prices do not appear as $4.5 on one line and $4.50 on the next. Group long numbers, 1,250 points or 555 0142, and avoid phone numbers on passing-traffic screens entirely, because nobody can memorise them in 6 seconds; a short URL or a QR code works better.
Numerals also need the right font. Prices in a column line up only with tabular figures, and the digits 1, 7, 0 and 8 must be unmistakable at distance. Our guide to the best fonts for digital signage covers numeral shapes and weights.
How many items should a digital menu board show?
A common planning range is 5 to 7 items per category and about 20 to 30 items per landscape screen read from 6 to 10 feet, with the menu fixed and promotions rotating in a separate zone. The physical ceiling is higher, but every extra item lengthens the decision while the queue waits.
The arithmetic for the ceiling: at 10 feet, body text is 36pt and each line takes about 47 pixels of height. A 972-pixel safe area minus a 100-pixel category heading leaves about 870 pixels, or 18 lines per column, and a 1080p landscape screen fits two or three columns at that size. That gives 36 to 54 lines, of which category headings and spacing take a third, so about 24 to 36 items fit.
Menus are the one place where more words are acceptable, because a customer reading a menu is stationary, close and motivated. Even so, descriptions of 0 to 8 words beat full sentences, and categories should stay in the order people order in. Our digital menu board guide covers layouts across one, two and three screens.
Three before and after rewrites
Each rewrite below keeps every fact the viewer needs and removes everything else. Word counts include every token, and planned seconds use the formula 3 + words / 2, rounded up.
1. Store hours announcement. Before, 32 words: "We are delighted to announce that starting Monday, November 2, our store will be open extended hours from 7:00 AM until 10:00 PM, Monday through Saturday, to better serve our valued customers." After, 14 words: "New hours from Nov 2 / Open 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. / Monday to Saturday".
2. Factory floor safety reminder. Before, 33 words: "Please remember that it is extremely important for everyone's safety that all employees wear the appropriate personal protective equipment, including safety glasses and hearing protection, at all times while on the production floor." After, 8 words with two icons: "Glasses and ear protection / Required past this line".
3. Retail weekend promotion. Before, 32 words: "Take advantage of our amazing limited-time offer and save big on all winter jackets and coats in the store, with discounts of up to 40% off the regular price, this weekend only." After, 11 words: "Winter coats up to 40% off / This weekend only / Aisle 6".
| Rewrite | Words before | Seconds needed before | Words after | Seconds needed after | Fits a 10 s slide? |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Store hours | 32 | 19 | 14 | 10 | Before no, after yes |
| Safety reminder | 33 | 20 | 8 | 7 | Before no, after yes |
| Weekend promotion | 32 | 19 | 11 | 9 | Before no, after yes |
Bottom line: each original needed about 19 or 20 seconds, which no passing viewer gives a sign; each rewrite reads in 10 seconds or less and keeps every fact that matters.
The pattern is the same in all three. Delete the throat-clearing ("we are delighted to announce", "please remember that"), delete adjectives that assert rather than inform ("amazing", "valued"), turn sentences into labelled facts, and add the one fact the original forgot, such as the aisle number. A safety icon carries meaning without reading time, which is why the second rewrite is the shortest.
Worked example: a lobby announcement read from 20 feet
A lobby screen read from 20 feet, where each slide stays 10 seconds, has a time budget of (10 minus 3) x 2 = 14 words and a physical ceiling of 63, so time is the limit and the slide gets 14 words or fewer. Body text at 20 feet is 12 + 2.4 x 20 = 60pt, and the headline, at twice the body, is 120pt.
Check the headline fits on one line. At 120pt the average character is 60 pixels wide, so a 1,728-pixel line holds 1,728 / 60 = 28 characters. "Flu shots Thursday" is 18 characters, 1,080 pixels, so it fits with room to spare. "Important health update for all staff" is 37 characters and would wrap, which is one more reason to cut it.
Check the body. "Free for staff, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., room 204" is 10 words and 42 characters. At 60pt each character is 30 pixels, so the line is 1,260 pixels, inside the 1,728-pixel safe width and on one line. The slide totals 3 + 10 = 13 words, under the 14-word budget, and needs 3 + 13 / 2 = 9.5 seconds, rounded to 10, exactly the slot it has.
What happens to the word count in two languages?
Translated text is usually longer than English, so a slide that fits in English may not fit in German, French or Spanish at the same size. Our multi-language localization guide plans for German and Finnish about 30 percent longer and French and Spanish about 15 percent longer, and recommends 30 to 40 percent spare room in text containers.
Putting two languages on one slide doubles the reading load. A 14-word English slide with a Spanish translation of about 16 words carries 30 words, which needs 3 + 30 / 2 = 18 seconds, almost twice the slot. Alternating slides works better: one English slide and one Spanish slide, each 10 seconds, so each reader gets a slide sized for them. Where a language is much shorter, such as Chinese, keep the same type size and use the space for margin rather than more words.
How to apply word budgets in DigitalSignage.com
Write each slide to its budget in the scene editor, then set its duration in the playlist so the time matches the words. In SignStudio, playlists under Campaigns, Playlists carry a default duration in seconds and a per-item duration, according to our scheduling documentation, so a 14-word slide can get 10 seconds while a photo slide in the same loop gets 6.
For text that changes daily, such as menu prices or announcements, the Google Sheets component lets someone edit a spreadsheet row instead of the layout, which our notice board guide describes. Keep a word limit in the sheet itself, for example a column header that says "max 12 words", because the person typing the row is the one who decides how long it is. For anything our documentation does not cover, such as automatic text fitting, ask support (support@digitalsignage.com, live chat at https://chat.digitalsignage.com/).
Frequently asked questions
How many words should a digital sign have?
6 to 10 words for a screen people walk past and no more than 15 to 20 for a screen where people wait, split into a headline of 3 to 6 words, a body of up to 12 and a call to action of 2 to 4. The planning formula is words = (seconds on screen minus 3) x 2, based on a cautious reading rate of 2 words per second. Seated waiting rooms can go to about 30.
What is the 3-second rule for digital signage text?
A viewer often gives a sign about 3 seconds, which is enough to notice it and take in a short familiar phrase but not to read a sentence. Every slide should therefore make sense from its headline alone, in 3 to 5 large words, with any detail in a body that only readers who stay need. Window, corridor and roadside screens should carry the headline and an image only.
How many words fit on a TV screen read from far away?
On a 1080p landscape screen, with body text sized at 12 + 2.4 x feet in points, about 190 words physically fit at 10 feet, 63 at 20 feet, 30 at 30 feet and 12 at 50 feet. Those are ceilings. The real budget is set by time and is usually 10 to 14 words within 20 feet and 6 to 10 beyond 30 feet.
How many lines of text should a digital sign have?
A headline of one or two lines and a body of three lines or fewer, each line 25 to 40 characters long, about 4 to 7 words. Break lines where the meaning breaks, left-align body text, avoid hyphenation and justified text, and size the type for the viewing distance first, then count how many characters fit.
How many items should be on a digital menu board?
A common planning range is 5 to 7 items per category and 20 to 30 items per landscape screen read from 6 to 10 feet. At 36pt body text a 1080p screen physically fits 24 to 36 item lines in two or three columns, but fewer items speed up the decision. Keep the menu static and rotate promotions in a separate zone.
Should I put two languages on the same slide?
Usually not. Two languages on one slide double the reading load: a 14-word English slide plus a 16-word Spanish translation needs about 18 seconds. Alternate one slide per language instead, each sized and timed for its own word count, and plan for German about 30 percent longer and French or Spanish about 15 percent longer than English.
How do I shorten text for a digital sign?
Delete openers such as "we are pleased to announce", delete adjectives that assert rather than inform, turn sentences into labelled facts, write numbers in their shortest form ($5, 7 a.m., Nov 2), replace instructions with an icon where one exists, and add the single fact the viewer needs to act, such as a room or aisle number. Most announcements shrink from about 30 words to about 12.
Related guides
- Text size by viewing distance
- Digital signage content best practices
- The psychology of effective digital signage content
- Multi-language localization for digital signage
- Digital menu boards
- Portrait screens and rotation
- Accessible digital signage content
- How long should each slide show on digital signage?
- Best fonts for digital signage
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