How do you treat essay word limits?

ko · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 8:42 am

There are a lot of people that say they don't worry about going over the word limits by a bit, and there are a lot of people that make sure their essays don't exceed the word limits at all.

What do each of you do personally on your essays?

As for me, I'm a "not over by a single word" person. None of my essays exceed the word limits, but that's just my personal preference. Of course, it's an individual decision, as the schools rarely take an official stance (in my experience). I'm just curious what everyone else does.

isa · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 8:53 am

10% for me...

Raabend · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 8:58 am

I have been exact or under except for Tuck (10%) but Tuck doesnt have a strict limit...just a suggestion.

bball · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 9:02 am

I'm OCD so I try to make my essay lengths exactly the word limit... even if it means adding in or taking out adjectives... anyone weird like me?

Ntang · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 9:08 am

I think a lot of applicants tend to overestimate how interesting their essays probably are to those poor schmucks reading them. I'd imagine that 90% of them say substantially the same things, and it's pretty damned hard to be THAT interesting while still answering the questions they ask. Thus, unless you're Hemmingway, I wouldn't go over the limits. You're just asking for an eye-roll by the guy who still has 500 more essays to read.

Tarmac · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 9:12 am

I observe the strict limit, at least as counted by MS Word. If anything, I tend to come in about 10 words under. I suppose there are different ways to count words? I remember learning in grade school that some methods simply count every 5 spaces as a word. Is that true?

Anyway, I always feel that shorter is better. Not because it makes the actual words sound better, but because each adcom is reading 50 different essays on the same topic. Chop it down, distill it, make it extra concentrated.

One note: There were some EXTREMELY long essays in the Montauk book. I couldn't stand reading them simply due to their rambling length, and I don't know how they got around the word limit. As an adcom I would be upset that they so blatantly ignored the rules. Apparently, they still got accepted.

Travel09 · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 10:03 am

For longer essays (750 + word limits) I'm with-in 3-5% of word limit. For shorter essays (400-500 word limit) I'm exceeding by 8- 10%.

balki1867 · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 10:11 am

I give myself a padding of about 20 extra words (10 for shorter essays).

I want to be respectful of the AdCom's wishes but I also realize that the number is arbitrary. MS Word counts hyphenated words as only one word, but it definitely requires the effort of reading 2.

In general, I agree with the sentiments I've seen. You (and I) are not as interesting as you think you are. Show a little love for the AdCom, but if you really feel you're butchering your essay by taking out those last few words or a single sentence, then by all means leave it in.

k88 · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 10:29 am

I observe the limit pretty strictly, it helps me select my words more carefully as well. The only app I went over on was for Stanfords and that was by ~5% or so.

walker · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 10:33 am

For me limits are respect for adcom's time. Therefore I follow them strictly.

Rubashov1 · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 11:25 am

I was strict for all but one, in which I was over by 1% (5 words).

Yahsek · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 11:33 am

10%, but only if absolutely necessary.

msday · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 12:27 pm

Followed exactly...limits are there for a reason. In most cases, I was under by <10 words.

terp26 · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 12:34 pm

An extra 50 words is like 2 or 3 sentences. Pretty much unnoticeable. If your essay is good enough they will want to read it and if your essay is boring and drags then they wish it was half the word limit.

greenoak · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 12:53 pm

I observe the limit strictly. Who knows, maybe the adcom is very punctual and actually uses some software to verify the word count.
The problem is that my draft versions are always longer than allowed, no matter what is the word limit. Even for 2000-word Oxford essay the first version was about 500 words longer.

Virflo · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 2:28 pm

Exceeded the word limit once :oops:

... by four words! :lol:

Omne · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 6:04 pm

I generally keep to within 10% of the limit. I think that's a decent limit, as anything more would be noticeable

aviroop · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 7:23 pm

usually adcom dont measure essays with a stick per se, but its a good rule to stick within 5%.

Howoever, dont write a 4 page essay when the school asks for one page. That shows complete disrespect for rules. Such examples have been used by adcom to let applicants know what is right and wrong about following essay guidelines.

I think Montauk essays are not up to date with the current essay rules established by schools. So follow the school limits.

balki1867 · **Posted:** Tue Oct 28, 2008 7:56 pm

aviroop wrote:

I think Montauk essays are not up to date with the current essay rules established by schools. So follow the school limits.

On a semi-unrelated note, I think a good portion of Montauk's entire book is not up to date with the current application process.

The GMAT scores have completely changed, so its not even worth working with those.

The number of applicants has increased dramatically and in turn, the allowable essay length has changed, so we're limited in our content.

The book is a good resource to get information about B-schools, but I wouldn't use any of the data or essays as guidelines for any part of my application.

Oski · **Posted:** Wed Oct 29, 2008 1:27 am

I made a point of reaching EXACTLY the word-limit for every essays.

Took a little time at the end for editing but gave me one less thing to worry about

Similar topics	Author	Replies	Views	Last post
Essay Word Count - How close do you stick to the limit? in The B-School Application	ThomasD	7	4824	Mon Mar 15, 2010 7:10 pm
Do you exceed word limit? in The B-School Application	Piter	8	513	Tue Sep 18, 2007 10:47 am
Word Count Limits on Essays - How critical? in The B-School Application	glettian	13	1220	Sun Aug 24, 2008 8:32 pm
essay words limit in Ask Accepted.com	pusht	1	1148	Mon May 17, 2004 1:54 am
word limits in Essays in Ask Accepted.com	kchatterjee	1	916	Wed Dec 16, 2009 10:19 am

How do you treat essay word limits?

Who is online

Main Navigation

GMAT Resources

Partners

MBA Resources