fantasy audiobook
Babel by R.F. Kuang is about 22 hours long at normal speed. At 1.5× that drops to about 14 hr 40 min, and at 2× to about 11 hr.
Runtimes are approximate and vary slightly by edition and retailer. Check the length shown in Audible, Libby, Spotify or Apple Books for your copy.
| Playback speed | Total time |
|---|---|
| 0.8× | 27 hr 30 min |
| 1× | 22 hr |
| 1.25× | 17 hr 36 min |
| 1.5× | 14 hr 40 min |
| 1.75× | 12 hr 34 min |
| 2× | 11 hr |
| 2.5× | 8 hr 48 min |
| 3× | 7 hr 20 min |
Plan your listen
At one hour a day and normal speed, you'll finish in about 22 days. Speed it up to 1.5× and the same hour a day finishes it in about 15 days. At 45 minutes a day and 1.5×, plan on about 20 days.
The table below shows whole days needed for every combination of speed and daily listening time.
| Speed | 15 min | 30 min | 45 min | 1 hr | 1.5 hr | 2 hr |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1× | 88 | 44 | 30 | 22 | 15 | 11 |
| 1.25× | 71 | 36 | 24 | 18 | 12 | 9 |
| 1.5× | 59 | 30 | 20 | 15 | 10 | 8 |
| 2× | 44 | 22 | 15 | 11 | 8 | 6 |
How long, really
At 22 hr, Babel is roughly a full day of non-stop listening, a road trip from Seattle to Denver. That's longer than about 87% of the 169 popular audiobooks we list.
Spoken at an average narration pace, Babel comes to roughly 205,000 words. Narrators vary, so a faster or slower reader will shift that number and the total runtime.
Want to try other speeds or your own schedule? Use the audiobook speed calculator or the listening goal calculator to find the daily minutes you need.
Track it as you listen
Booktrace is an iPhone audiobook tracker that logs your sessions, chapters, narrator and playback speed in one place, so you can see real progress through Babel and how many hours remain, whichever app you listen in.
Common questions
The Babel audiobook by R.F. Kuang runs about 22 hours at normal (1x) speed. Exact runtime can differ by a few minutes between editions and stores.
At 1.5x speed, Babel takes about 14 hours and 40 minutes. At 2x it takes about 11 hours.
At one hour a day and normal speed, Babel takes about 22 days. At 1.5x speed and an hour a day it takes about 15 days. At 30 minutes a day and normal speed it takes about 44 days.
Compared with the 169 popular audiobooks on this site, Babel is longer than about 87% of them. At 22 hr it is roughly a full day of non-stop listening, a road trip from Seattle to Denver.
