How many words can you put on a billboard?
Updated November 14, 2026
A billboard is read by someone who is doing something else: driving. The most common mistake is to put the whole business on the board.
Work out the time
A car at 55 miles an hour covers about 80 feet every second. If a driver can first read your board from 350 feet away, that is about four seconds before it is past. At 35 mph the same board gives about seven seconds. A slower road allows more words, but never as many as you think.
How many words fit
We count about seven tenths of a second for each word, and a logo or a picture counts as a word. A common rule of thumb in the industry is about seven words or fewer. Our Read-at-speed check counts yours against the speed of your road.
What to leave off
- A phone number. Nobody can remember ten digits at speed. Use a short word or a short web address.
- A long web address. If a driver cannot catch it in one glance, it does not work.
- A list. Pick the one thing that matters.
- Small print. If it cannot be read from the road, it does nothing.
What to put on
- Who you are, in big letters.
- One thing you offer.
- One thing to do: where to turn, a word to say or a short address.
Contrast beats clever
Dark letters on a light background, or light on dark. Thick letters. Plenty of empty space around the words. A busy picture behind the words makes them hard to read.
Put the quote in the free calculator, or get the full Board Report with the questions to ask the owner and a contract checklist.
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OutdoorROI is not an advertising agency and does not sell billboards, so we gain nothing from a board being rented. We give you a way to check a price and track a result. We cannot promise sales. The traffic number comes from the board owner or your own count, and we have not checked it.