# Candide

Candide by Voltaire has 33,693 words.

## At a glance

1759 philosophical tale by Voltaire.

- **Author:** [Voltaire](https://musael.com/books/authors/voltaire.md) (1694–1778)
- **First published:** 1759
- **Original language:** French
- **Genre:** humorous fiction
- **Readers:** adult

## How long it takes to read

- **Words:** 33,693
- **Reading time:** 2 h 15 min (at 250 words a minute)
- **Listening time:** 3 h 37 min (audiobook pace, 155 words a minute)

| Reading speed | Whole book | At 30 minutes a day |
| --- | --- | --- |
| 200 wpm | 2 h 48 min | 6 days |
| 250 wpm | 2 h 15 min | 5 days |
| 300 wpm | 1 h 52 min | 4 days |

## Read or listen

Candide is in the public domain: these editions are free to download, read and share.

- Standard Ebooks: https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/voltaire/candide/the-modern-library
- Project Gutenberg: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/19942
- LibriVox audiobook (3 h 59 min): https://librivox.org/candide01/

## Counted from the text

Automated estimates from the selected Project Gutenberg text; it may include a preface or notes.

- Words in the text: 35,815
- Dialogue: 51% of the words are inside quotation marks
- Average sentence: 18.4 words

## Where the numbers come from

The word count comes from the sources below.

- https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/voltaire/candide/the-modern-library (word count)
- https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/19942 (word count)
- https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q215894
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candide
- https://openlibrary.org/works/OL100672W
- https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/19942

Checked on 2026-10-27. Page counts change from edition to edition.

Source: https://musael.com/books/candide