Word-count goals

Where the counts are#

Two counts keep you oriented:

• Today — in the status bar along the bottom of the window, wherever you are in Verkilo. It reads like Today 1,240 / 2,000: the words you’ve written today, then your daily goal, with a progress bar beside it. Once you reach the goal, a trophy appears.
• N words — under the page in the editor, the length of the section you’re in. Hover it for an estimated reading time.

Setting your daily goal#

The quickest way is straight from the status bar:

1. Double-click the Today figure. (Or tab to it and press Enter.)
2. Type the number of words you want to write each day.
3. Press Enter.

To set it from Settings instead:

1. Open Settings (⌘, / Ctrl+,).
2. Find the Writing section.
3. Enter a number in Daily Word Goal.

Either way it’s the same goal — the status bar starts counting against it immediately, and it carries across every project.

Giving sections their own target#

When you’re drafting to a chapter length, a per-section target is more useful than a daily one:

1. Go to Books (⌘1 / Ctrl+1).
2. Click the Book settings button on the book’s card.
3. Set Default Section Target to the word count a typical section should reach.

Reviewing your writing history#

1. Press ⌘⇧A / Ctrl+Shift+A, or choose Go → Analytics. It’s also on the welcome screen as Writing History.
2. Read the heatmap of the past 365 days — darker squares are heavier days.
3. Switch between Daily, Weekly, Monthly, and Sessions to change the grain. Sessions are the stretches you actually wrote in; see The Writing Record for those and for where every word came from.
4. Filter to one book, or leave it on All books for the whole project.

   

If you drafted somewhere other than Verkilo on a given day, you can type a manual adjustment against that date so the record stays honest.

Pairing with a writing mode#

A target and a writing mode work well together: set the number, enter composition mode, and write. When you come back out, the status bar shows how close you got.