<p>Stanford says “approximately one page”.
How many words does it mean ?
My essay is 800 words.
Is it too long? Is it a problem?</p>
<p>The common app essay should be between 500-700 words (the closer to 500 the better).</p>
<p>The only real requirement for Stanford’s supplemental essays is to stay in the 1800 character count which should put you right at 1 page.</p>
<p>Just over a thousand.</p>
<p>Keep it long if you have something to say, if you can keep the reader hooked.</p>
<p>If you can remove any part of it without losing meaning, then by all means shorten it.</p>
<p>My commonapp essay was about 600 words. It doesn’t matter how long it is, you just need to make sure you have gotten your message across. If 800 words is the number of words you need to say everything you want to say, then don’t try to shorten it for length’s sake. Have somebody read it over and make sure that it all fits together well.</p>
<p>Mine was originally 1000 and i cut it down to around 800 I think. If every word has meaning and you have trimmed all the fat the word length doesn’t matter.</p>
<p>My original essay was over 700 words. It is now 527.</p>
<p>^mmm, nice.</p>
<p>Mine’s just over 700.</p>
<p>There’s always something to shorten… it can be as simple as combining sentences, if not hacking out entire extraneous sentences.</p>
<ol>
<li>I think it is well written, and I’m glad I used the extra room to get in everything I needed to say</li>
</ol>
<p>mine is like 500something words. "/</p>
<p>mine was over 1000 and i trimmed it down to 700ish</p>
<p>mine was 489 and I submitted yesterday! oh god, what if the adcom thinks that I didn’t work hard enough on it!! T_T</p>
<p>^^^
No way that’s gonna happen based purely on word count. If your essay sucks otherwise, sure, but definitely not coz it’s 489 words. As long as you say everything you have to say, it’s good. A friend of mine wrote an amazing 251 word essay (for real) and is currently at U Chicago.</p>
<p>ok phew 
I don’t think my essay sucked… I hope 
your friend’s essay must have been amazing!</p>
<p>It was pretty beast. Really playful yet powerful. Then again, that might only have been Chicago’s “quirkiness” coming into play</p>
<p>First use the Microsoft Word. Put the Font Size as 12 or 14. Fill in a page…it should be about ummm…600 word. But don’t exceed the one page rule!!</p>
<p>about 700 words</p>
<p>I got accepted to Stanford (yesterday!), and my essay for the common app was ~ 1000 words long. It’s more content based – I’d say.</p>
<p>Congraattsss!!! im so envious</p>
<p>---- my essay is 1,400 ish… i know, too much… already submited. imm sure someone will submit a four paged essay so im not worrying about 2 pages…</p>