Writing Pace Planner

What this generator does

Turns a target, a deadline and a pattern of days off into a day-by-day plan whose figures sum to exactly the words remaining, then shows what happens to the rate when days are missed. The closest tool already here is the event countdown planner, and it solves a different problem: that one schedules a sequence of distinct tasks backwards from a date with individual lead times. This one distributes a single divisible quantity forwards across the days that are actually available.

How to use this tool

1. Enter what you have written so far and what you are aiming at.
2. Enter the start date and the deadline, as yyyy-mm-dd.
3. Choose your days off and whether you want a flat pace or a tilted one.
4. Press Work out the pace, then use the missed-days box to see the catch-up rate.

Understanding the controls

Words written so far

Subtracted from the target, so the plan covers what is left rather than the whole book. Setting it correctly is what makes the catch-up figure meaningful.

Start date and deadline

Both are counted, so the deadline day is a writing day. Dates are handled in UTC throughout, which is why a plan spanning a clock change does not gain or lose a day.

Days off

Removes those weekdays from the count entirely rather than assigning them zero words. That raises the daily figure on the days you do write, which is the honest version — a plan that quietly assumes you write on Sundays is a plan you will miss.

Shape of the plan

Even gives the same figure daily. Front-loaded starts higher and eases off, buying slack for the end where illness and losing the thread actually happen. Ramp up does the opposite for a start from cold. The tilt is gentle by design — the last day is half the first — because steeper shapes produce opening figures nobody hits.

Worked examples

50,000 in 30 days

1,667 a day. Twenty of the thirty days carry 1,667 and ten carry 1,666 — that is what an even split of 50,000 actually looks like.

The same, weekdays only

About 2,273 a day across 22 days. Fewer days, higher figure, stated rather than assumed.

After missing 10 days

2,500 a day over the remaining 20 — still within reach, and the figure most people never work out.

After missing 20

5,000 a day, which the tool marks as not sustainable rather than presenting as a plan.

Common use cases

• Setting a daily target for a drafting month with weekends off
• Working out whether a deadline is still reachable after losing a fortnight
• Planning a thesis chapter or a report against a fixed submission date
• Deciding between a flat pace and one that eases off before the deadline
• Checking whether a target is honest before committing to it publicly

How this generator works

The available days are counted between the two dates, skipping the rest days, and the words remaining are distributed across them by weight: equal weights for a flat plan, a gentle linear tilt for the other two. The distribution uses whole-word integer apportionment, so the daily figures sum to exactly the words remaining rather than to a number close to it — a plan totalling 49,993 of a 50,000-word target is the same defect as a bill that will not add up, and much easier to miss because nobody totals a calendar. The catch-up figure is the words remaining divided by the days left after the ones you missed, rounded up so it genuinely reaches the target.

Randomness and fairness

Nothing here is random. The plan is arithmetic on your target, your dates and your days off, and the same inputs always produce the same schedule — a writing plan that changed each time you opened it would be worse than no plan.

For how randomness is produced across the whole site, see how Generate Random works.

Assumptions this tool makes

• The deadline is fixed and the target is not negotiable. Where either is flexible, moving one is usually a better answer than a rate you cannot hit.
• Dates are handled in UTC, so the plan is the same length regardless of where you are or whether the clocks change.

Limitations and good to know

• It assumes words are interchangeable. Revising is not drafting, and a day spent cutting 2,000 words is progress that this plan records as failure.
• The feasibility threshold is a stated rule of thumb — about 2,000 words a day sustained — not a measurement of you.
• Days off are a weekly pattern. Individual holidays, or a week away in the middle, have to be handled by shortening the window yourself.
• It cannot know that the last 10,000 words are the hardest, which for most drafts they are.

Common mistakes

Working out the rate once and never again

The opening figure stops being true the first day you miss. Come back and enter the days missed — the new rate is usually far lower than it feels, and that is the whole reason this tool has a second box.

Counting days off as zero-word days

That silently lowers the daily figure and makes the plan look easier than it is. Set the days-off pattern instead, which removes them from the count and raises the figure on the days you actually write.

Treating a front-loaded plan as a way to finish early

It is not — the total is identical. It moves effort earlier so that the inevitable lost days at the end cost less, which is a different benefit and the only one it offers.

Practical tips

• Set the target slightly above what you need. Drafts almost always want cutting, and finishing 5% long is a much better position than finishing 5% short.
• If the catch-up figure comes back above 2,000 a day, move the deadline or the target rather than the plan. A rate you will not hit is not a plan, it is a way of quitting slowly.
• Enter your real days off. A plan built on seven writing days a week is the single most common reason a drafting month collapses in week two.

Troubleshooting

It says there are no writing days

The deadline is on or before the start date, or every day in the window is a rest day. Both dates are inclusive, so a same-day start and deadline gives one day, not zero.

The daily figures are not all identical

They cannot be unless the words divide exactly by the days. The difference is never more than one word, and the figures sum to the target exactly — which is the property worth having.

Privacy and your data

Your target, your dates and your progress never leave your browser. Nothing is uploaded, nothing is stored between visits, and nothing is written into the page address — which matters more than it sounds, because a URL saying you are 12,000 words into a 90,000-word book due next month is something you may not want in a browser history you share.

Frequently asked questions

Is 1,667 words a day realistic?

For a month, for many people, yes — it is the figure a well-known November drafting challenge is built on, and a great many people hit it. Sustained across a year it is a different proposition. The tool flags a *sustained* rate above about 2,000 a day as not feasible, which is a rule of thumb about drafting in general rather than a judgement about you.

Why does missing a week raise the rate so much?

Because the words do not go anywhere but the days do. Miss ten of thirty and the same 50,000 words now have twenty days, so the rate rises by half. That is exactly why working it out beats guessing: the number feels catastrophic and is usually 2,500.

Should I pick even, front-loaded or ramp up?

Even, unless you have a reason. Front-loaded is genuinely useful if you know the end of the window is risky — a deadline the week after a holiday, for instance. Ramp up suits starting from cold, where the first few days are about establishing the habit rather than the count. The total is the same in all three.

Does it handle revision as well as drafting?

Not well, and it says so. Revising is measured in pages or scenes rather than new words, and a productive revision day often reduces the word count. Use it for drafting, and use a page or scene target for a revision pass.