How To Set New Goal with Word Count Widget in WordPress

Track Your Progress: Total Word Count Dashboard Widget for WordPress.
Want to see how many words you’ve written on your WordPress blog? Learn how to add a custom dashboard widget that tracks your total word count and shows your progress toward a 1 million word goal.

📊 Track Your Progress with a Total Word Count Widget in WordPress

Whether you’re a prolific blogger or working toward a big writing goal like one million words, it’s motivating to see your progress grow. WordPress doesn’t display this kind of data by default, but with just a bit of code, you can add a dashboard widget to track your total published word count.

In this tutorial, you’ll learn how to:

• Add a custom admin widget in WordPress
• Count the total number of words in published posts
• Show a progress bar toward a goal (like 1 million words)
• Keep yourself motivated and organized!

Let’s dive in.

🛠️ Why Track Word Count in WordPress?

If you’re serious about content marketing, SEO, or personal milestones (like writing 1 million words), then tracking how much you’ve written is more than a vanity metric. It helps you:

• Measure consistency
• Set realistic publishing goals
• Compare writing volume month-to-month
• Celebrate major milestones

And the best part? You can visualize it right inside your dashboard!

🧩 How the Word Count Widget Works

This custom widget does three key things:

1. Counts words in all published blog posts
2. Displays the total word count in a styled box
3. Shows a progress bar toward a 1,000,000-word goal

It’s simple, clean, and fast with zero performance lag.

💻 Add the Code to Your Theme (or Plugin)

Copy the following code and paste it into your theme’s functions php file (or create a custom plugin if you prefer):

// Create a WordPress Dashboard Widget for Total Word Count
function hz_total_word_count_dashboard_widget() {
    wp_add_dashboard_widget(
        'hz_total_word_count',
        'Total Word Count',
        'hz_display_total_word_count'
    );
}
add_action('wp_dashboard_setup', 'hz_total_word_count_dashboard_widget');

// Callback to calculate and display total word count
function hz_display_total_word_count() {
    $total_words = 0;
    $args = array(
        'post_type' => 'post',
        'post_status' => 'publish',
        'posts_per_page' => -1
    );

    $all_posts = get_posts($args);

    foreach ($all_posts as $post) {
        $total_words += str_word_count(strip_tags($post->post_content));
    }

    echo '<p><strong>' . number_format($total_words) . '</strong> words published across all blog posts.</p>';

    // Word Count Goal
    $goal = 1000000;
    $percent = min(100, ($total_words / $goal) * 100);
    echo '<p>Progress to 1 Million Words: <strong>' . number_format($percent, 2) . '%</strong></p>';

    // Progress Bar
    echo '<div style="background:#eee;border-radius:4px;width:100%;height:20px;overflow:hidden;">
            <div style="background:#0073aa;width:' . $percent . '%;height:100%;text-align:center;color:white;font-size:12px;">
                ' . number_format($percent, 2) . '%
            </div>
          </div>';
}

📈 See It in Action

Once you’ve added the code, go to your WordPress dashboard. You’ll see a new box titled “📊 Total Word Count”. It will:

• Instantly show how many words you’ve published
• Calculate the % progress to 1 million
• Display a simple progress bar

It’s lightweight and efficient and doesn’t affect your site performance.

🎯 Customize It for Your Needs

Want to extend it further? Here are some ideas:

• Include word counts for pages, not just posts
• Add filters by author or date range
• Display daily or weekly averages
• Set a different goal (e.g., 500K or 2 million words)

With just a bit of PHP knowledge, this widget is super flexible.

🚀 Conclusion

Setting writing goals keeps you on track but watching your progress is what keeps you motivated. This custom WordPress widget is a perfect way to visualize your journey toward big milestones like writing 1 million words.

You don’t need a plugin, just a snippet and some focus.

📩 Do you have questions or suggestions? Leave a comment or contact us!
🏷️ Tags: wordpress tutorial, word count, wordpress dashboard, writing goal, php widget, wordpress admin, code snippet, blogging productivity, wordpress tips, content marketing