How long should an op-ed be? Well, that depends.
I’ve looked at close to ten how-to guides for op-eds, all written by respected PR pros over the past 25 years. The conventional wisdom varies a bit: Under 700 or 800 words, most say. Many zero in on a “sweet spot” of 600 to 750 words. However, my analysis of 200 opinion pieces by college presidents tells a somewhat different, and more nuanced, story.
In looking at the op-eds from the first half of 2014, I did a word count on those that I had put in the database and could access the full text for such a count. (I did exclude one extreme outlier – a 2,500-word New Yorker piece.) Here’s a graph of all 200:
Note the long, gentle curve from about 300 words to 1,800 words, showing a broad distribution of op-ed lengths. Conventional wisdom is, in fact, somewhat right: that 600-750 word “sweet spot” does lie near the middle of the graph, and accounts for over a quarter of the op-eds studied. However, almost as many are shorter than 600 words, and nearly twice as many are longer than 750 words.
Looking at the op-eds by medium reveals even more:
Here you can see some major differences in op-ed length, depending on the publication or website:
- The recommended 600-750 word length probably can be traced back to traditional print newspapers. For these media, it still seems to be a good rule of thumb, although many newspaper op-eds are even shorter – 400 to 600 words.
- At the very low end of the word counts are op-eds in USA Today and the New York Times “Room for Debate,” along with a smattering of Huffington Post pieces.
- Of the 25 longest opinion pieces, almost all appear in the Chronicle of Higher Education, Inside Higher Ed, or the Huffington Post.
- Speaking of the Huffington Post, this op-ed megastore has the widest diversity of lengths, with examples scattered across the entire Graph 1 spectrum.
- Inside Higher Ed lengths also vary widely, but tend toward the upper end of the 430-1,800 range shown in Graph 2 – a half dozen examples are more than 1,000 words.
- The Chronicle of Higher Education op-ed lengths start at 720, but most are grouped around 850 to 1,000 words.
- Forbes magazine op-eds fall in the narrowest range, with most – like the Chronicle – being 850-1,000 words.
The Take-aways
- For op-eds in traditional newspapers, keep it really short – just as folks have always said. The same holds true for the NYT “Room for Debate” and USA Today.
- If you’re addressing a particularly complex issue, think about approaching Forbes, Inside Higher Ed, or the Chronicle, where their more generous length will give you some additional breathing room to make your case.
- At HuffPo, with op-ed lengths among the shortest to the longest in Graph 1, it appears that pretty much anything goes.
Glad you found the info useful, Matt.
Roland
Thank you very useful.
Matt Boente
After researching the average op-ed length and finding conflicting stats, I found your post very useful. Thanks for this analysis!