Books by level / English books
Pride and Prejudice: reading level, length and free edition
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen is a novel in English. Our team rates it B2. It runs to 122,164 words with 6,407 different word forms, about 10–20 h of reading at 200 to 100 words per minute, and it is free from Standard Ebooks.
- Author
- Jane Austen
- Language
- English
- Level
- B2
- Form
- novel
- Words
- 122,164
- Different word forms
- 6,407
- Forms for 95% / 98%
- 2,425 / 3,964
- Reading time
- 10–20 h
- Free edition
- Standard Ebooks
Pride and Prejudice may today be one of Jane Austen’s most enduring novels, having been widely adapted to stage, screen, and other media since its publication in 1813. The novel tells the tale of five unmarried sisters and how their lives change when a wealthy eligible bachelor moves in to their neighborhood.
Is Pride and Prejudice right for your level?
To recognise 95% of the running words in Pride and Prejudice, you need its 2,425 most frequent word forms; for 98%, the share at which most readers manage a novel without a dictionary, 3,964. The median English B2 book in our table needs 3,747 forms for 95%, so by this measure the book is easier than most for its level: number 4 of 19, easiest first.
A word form is any spelling that appears in the text, so “walk” and “walked” count twice, and names count too. These numbers are a guide to how much vocabulary the book asks for, not a test. The level itself was set by hand by our team. Before you commit, read one page of the free edition and count the words you do not know: the one-page test takes two minutes.
Which words should you know before you start?
These are the words that Pride and Prejudice uses most often but that are not among the 2,000 most common word forms across all 309 English books in our library; the number is how many times each appears. Names of people and places are left out. Learning a handful of them first makes the opening chapters easier.
- sisters 76
- behaviour 55
- daughters 50
- agreeable 45
- civility 42
- assure 39
- amiable 36
- ball 35
- invitation 34
- dance 32
- astonishment 30
- ladyship 30
- neighbourhood 29
- attentions 28
- credit 27
How does it begin?
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.
From the Standard Ebooks edition, which is in the public domain. If this paragraph already feels slow, try a book one level lower.
How long does it take to read?
| Words | 100 wpm | 150 wpm | 200 wpm | 250 wpm |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 122,164 | 20 h | 14 h | 10 h | 8 h |
Learners reading a book at their level often manage 100 to 150 words per minute, and readers in their first language 200 to 250. Where these speeds come from, and a calculator for your own: How long does it take to read a book?
Where can you read it for free?
The free edition is from Standard Ebooks, a volunteer project that proofreads and typesets public-domain books. Standard Ebooks releases its editions into the public domain in the United States under CC0 1.0; you can download it as EPUB, Kindle (AZW3) or KEPUB without signing up.
To read it with a translation over every word you tap, open it in Readlang Mobile on iPhone or iPad.
What to read next at B2
English books at the same level that ask for a similar amount of vocabulary:
- Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoevsky: 204,644 words, 3,349 forms for 95%
- Dracula, Bram Stoker: 161,387 words, 3,383 forms for 95%
- The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald: 48,659 words, 3,508 forms for 95%
- Frankenstein, Mary Shelley: 78,010 words, 3,747 forms for 95%
- The Count of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas: 463,374 words, 4,828 forms for 95%
- Madame Bovary, Gustave Flaubert: 116,535 words, 5,089 forms for 95%
See also all English books by level and books at B2 in all five languages.