How long does it take to read The Art of War?
The Art of War by Sun-Tzu takes about 2 hours 30 minutes to read at 250 words a minute.
About 2 hours 30 minutes
An evening's read
First published 2025. 136 pages, about 37,400 words.
5 days at 30 minutes a day
Estimate based on 275 words per page.
At other speeds
| Slow, 150 words a minute | 4 hours 9 minutes |
| Average, 250 words a minute | 2 hours 30 minutes |
| Fast, 400 words a minute | 1 hour 34 minutes |
The page count is the median across 2 editions, so your copy may differ. How we calculate.
About the book
'The Art of War' is an ancient Chinese military treatise written by Sun Tzu, a high-ranking military general, strategist and tactician. The text is composed of 13 chapters, each of which is devoted to one aspect of warfare. It is commonly known to be the definitive work on military strategy and tactics of its time. It has been the most famous and influential of China's Seven Military Classics, and for the last two thousand years it remained the most important military treatise in Asia, where even the common people knew it by name.Sun Tzu believed war to be an essential wrongdoing that must be got rid of whenever it can be. The war should be fought fleetingly to reduce economic decline. Sun Tzu harped on the significance of placement in military tactics. The planning to position an army must be dependent on the stipulations in the physical surroundings and the subjective thoughts of various militants in those conditions. He believed that strategy cannot be considered as planning with respect to glancing through a previously decided list. It is better represented by the fact that it needs speedy and suitable reactions to altering situations. Planning gives results in restrained surroundings. But in case of an altering environment, similar plans come in each other's ways and give rise to undesired outcomes. It has had an influence on Eastern and Western military thinking, business tactics, legal strategy and beyond.
Subjects: Classics, History, War, Nonfiction, Philosophy
