What Is the Average Blog Post Reading Time in 2025?
On average, readers spend 96 seconds on blog posts. For B2C websites, the average session duration is 92.33 seconds, while B2B readers engage for 77.61 seconds.
How much time do internet users spend reading website content?
Whether you’re a small business or an established online brand, benchmarking how long your audience spends on your pages is crucial for success.
In this post, we’ll dive into key blogging and blog post statistics that will provide you with valuable insights into how people consume content online.
Let’s get started.
Key Statistics on Blog Reading Time
General Blog Reading Statistics
Let’s kick things off by looking at general statistics on blog reading time.
- In 2024, people spent an average of 96 seconds reading a blog post.
- Benchmark data reveals that readers spend an average of 77.61 seconds on B2B websites — whether it’s reading a single post or browsing multiple pages.
- For B2C websites, the average session duration is 92.33 seconds.
- Readers who come to a website from search engines open an average of 5.8 posts or pages in one visit.
- In contrast, people who click ads only open an average of 2.9 pages.
How Blog Post Length Affects Reading Time
It should come as no surprise that, the longer the blog post, the more time readers need to spend on the page.
- Reader engagement hits its peak if a blog post takes 7 minutes (between 1,500 and 2,000 words) to complete.
- Reading time can dip to below 10 seconds if the post takes over 14 minutes to finish.
- 94% of all blog posts that capture stable reader engagement have a post length that takes under 6 minutes to finish.
Do Desktop Users Spend More Time Reading Blogs?
While it makes sense for businesses to create longer content for maximum engagement, they also need to factor in the preferences of mobile users.
- Mobile users generally spend less time reading content on websites — averaging anywhere between 704 and 775 seconds.
- Since people prefer doing more research on their computers, desktop users spend between 996 and 1,918 seconds on websites.
How Multimedia Can Impact Reading Time
Remember, reading time is all about grabbing and retaining attention. One way to do that is to incorporate multimedia assets into your content.
- Visual elements like icons and stylized fonts can increase reading time by up to 100%.
- Engaging visual content, such as videos, infographics, and data charts, further increases time spent on a website by 47%.
Dissecting Reading Patterns by Audience Type
Some demographic groups have more active online reading habits than others.
- Generally speaking, Asians and Caucasians spend the most time reading content per day (0.29 hours).
- Internet users aged between 8 and 12 years old spend an average of 9 minutes reading digital media.
- Teenagers (13-18 years old) spend an average of 15 minutes reading online content.
- Business users (millennials to Gen X) spend the most time reading content online — around 48 minutes per day to be precise.
- In terms of reading content for fun, 20-34-year-olds spend around 9.6 minutes, 35-54-year-olds spend around 12.3 minutes, while 55-74-year-olds spend around 24.3 minutes on average.
Skimming vs Deep Reading: What’s the Average Reading Behavior?
Not all readers are the same. Some read online articles to do in-depth research, while others only want to check headings and subheadings.
- Admittedly, 35% of online users mostly skim through website content.
- 38% of online readers do a combination of deep reading and skimming.
- Only 13% of readers are more likely to do deep reading than skimming.
- 8% of readers immediately scan content for the specific information they need, then continue to read some more.
- 6% of readers immediately look for the specific information they need, then leave.
How Headlines and Intros Keep Customers Reading
Content headlines and intros are among the first things readers see upon arriving at a page. As such, they play a huge role in how long your audience will actually spend on your content.
- 80% of internet users only read headlines, significantly reducing reading time.
- Headlines that are 6-8 words long get up to 21% more clicks and engagement.
- Creating short intros with clickable elements (i.e., Table of Contents) can double reading time.
Understanding Bounce Rate and Time Spent on Page
Time on page and bounce rate are two metrics directly related to reading time. Whenever a bounce occurs, analytics tools like Google Analytics will record “0” seconds as the session’s time on page — significantly skewing your blog reading time metric.
- If a website’s bounce rate is 70%, it means it struggles to achieve an average reading time of 10 seconds.
- The average bounce rate (less than 10 seconds average reading time) for consulting and professional service businesses is 49.47%.
- The average bounce rate for SaaS companies is 48.24%.
- For fashion companies, the average bounce rate is 27.92% — making it a relatively easy niche for attaining long reading times.
How Content Structure Impacts Engagement
Past your headline and intro, your content structure is also a key difference-maker in determining blog reading time. This includes the types of content sections you include in your article.
- Adding interactive content sections like quizzes and surveys increases reading time by up to 13 minutes on average.
- Adding a Table of Contents increases reading time by 22%.
- Including a “post summary” section at the beginning of your article can improve reading time by 39%.
- Throwing lists, subheadings, and short paragraphs into the mix can add 2 minutes to your total blog reading time.
Industry-Specific Reading Time Statistics
Different industries attract different kinds of readers. This, in turn, results in different engagement metrics across niches.
- The financial services niche gets the longest reading time of around 4 minutes and 56 seconds.
- B2B SaaS websites get the second longest reading time of around 4 minutes and 26 seconds.
- IT & managed services also have a decent average reading time, clocking in at 4 minutes and 16 seconds.
- In the ecommerce space, the average reading time is measurably lower at 2 minutes and 3 seconds.
Here are a few reading time stats for a handful of other niches:
| Industry | Session Duration (Average) |
|---|---|
| Automotive | 2 minutes 41 seconds |
| Cybersecurity | 2 minutes 47 seconds |
| Healthcare | 2 minutes 58 seconds |
| Higher education | 2 minutes 25 seconds |
| Home builders | 3 minutes 11 seconds |
| Real estate | 3 minutes 52 seconds |
| Software development | 2 minutes 38 seconds |
Can Calls-To-Action (CTAs) Impact Reading Time?
CTAs not only help you stimulate conversions from your content. With the right tactics, it can also benefit user engagement and reading time.
- Studies show that CTAs above the fold can increase reading time, but only when surrounded by a “mini experience” that provides information on key deciding factors.
- CTAs in the middle of the article can also increase reading times if you include directional cues or use storytelling.
- Personalized CTAs can be 202% more effective in retaining user engagement — thus, boosting reading time.
How Mobile Optimization Affects Reading Time
With a significant share of online traffic now coming from mobile devices, it would be a huge oversight not to focus on mobile optimization — especially if your goal is to maximize reading time.
- If your website fails to load in 3 seconds or less, 53% of mobile users leave immediately, which substantially drags down your average reading time.
- On mobile, over 70% of the average session duration benchmarks exceed 3 minutes and 30 seconds.
Does Seasonality Affect Reading Time?
Seasonality is a proven phenomenon that describes how people maintain predictable shopping behavior based on the time of year. But what about in terms of reading time?
- Retail websites are proven to get lower bounce rates and extended reading times during holiday seasons.
- Low reading times will shrink as the seasonal or trend-reliant demand for a product diminishes.
Your Next Steps
Now that you know how reading time affects engagement, it’s time to optimize your content. Here’s how you can get started:
