Limit the number of words and sentences Usability Guideline

Description

To enhance readability, sentences should be 20 words or less, and paragraphs 6 sentences or less.

Help

To improve readability, minimize the number of words in sentences, and the number of sentences in paragraphs.

Applicable standards

• Readability Guidelines
• Usability.gov 15:7

Note: The guidelines.usability.gov website has been down since July 2020, although www.usability.gov is still operating and the PDF version of the guidelines is still available.

Change history

• 3.5 Dec 2009 Don’t fire for non-English pages - this readability metric specific to English.
• 1.0 Feb 2007 Added.

This page describes a web site issue detected in HTML documents by SortSite Desktop and OnDemand Suite.

Rule ID: UseGov15.7