How to write a TikTok script
A TikTok script is the text you say to the camera. People hear it in your voice while you look at the lens, so write it to be heard.
Decide the one thing the video says
Before you write any lines, write the point of the video as a single sentence. “Leave your phone in the kitchen for a month and you will read more” is a point. “Morning routines” is a topic, and a topic gives you a list of loosely related lines.
If the point needs two sentences, you probably have two videos. Keep the second one for next time.
Say the point in the first line
Everyone who starts the video hears the first line, and anyone who scrolls away misses the rest. So the first line carries the point, or the reason to stay for it. The middle backs the point up with one example. The last line tells the viewer what to do next, such as answering a question in the comments.
Count words, not seconds
The length you record decides how many words fit. A working figure is about 150 words a minute, and the post on teleprompter speed explains where it comes from and how to time your own pace. At that rate:
| Length of the video | Words, about |
|---|---|
| 15 seconds | 40 |
| 30 seconds | 75 |
| 60 seconds | 150 |
| 3 minutes | 450 |
Write to the number, then read the script aloud with a timer. If it runs long, cut whole sentences rather than reading faster. The same post explains why a prompter should run slower than you read to yourself.
Write lines you can say in one breath
- One idea per sentence. If a comma is holding two ideas together, make it two sentences: “I moved the phone, and I started reading” becomes “I moved the phone. I started reading.”
- Write the way you talk, with contractions and plain verbs.
- Write numbers the way you will say them, “about two hundred” rather than “198”, unless the exact figure is the point.
- Put each sentence on its own line while you draft. A line too long to say in one breath then shows up as a long line.
The guide to writing a teleprompter script goes further on numbers, names, capitals and cues, with a before-and-after example.
An example: a 60-second script
This script is made up for this guide. Its point is that a month without the phone in the bedroom got the speaker reading before breakfast. It is 139 words, a little under a minute at 150 words a minute.
A month without my phone in the bedroom got me reading before breakfast.
Here is what happened.
The first three days were annoying.
Every morning I reached for the bedside table and found a glass of water.
Twice I walked to the kitchen half asleep to fetch the phone.
On the fourth day I put a book next to the glass.
By the second week I was reading for twenty minutes before breakfast.
There was nothing else on the table to pick up.
In the third week I finished the book and started another.
I still wake up at the same time.
The difference is what I see first.
Now it’s a page.
If you try it, move the charger too.
Otherwise you will walk back for the phone.
Tell me what is on your bedside table right now.
The first line is the point and the second promises the rest. The next ten tell what happened, in order. The last three give the viewer something to try and a question to answer, which gives the comments somewhere to start.
Reading it while you record
You can record in TikTok’s own camera and still read the script. Wispim, the teleprompter this site is about, puts the script in a floating window that stays on top of other apps on iPhone, so you can record in Camera, Instagram or TikTok while you read. In Voice mode the text moves as you speak and waits when you stop. Voice following keeps going while you record. If another app does take the microphone, the text holds on the word you reached and the window says “Mic busy”. Reading carries on from that word when the microphone comes back.
The window comes in three shapes: Wide, Tall and Strip. Strip is a thin band sized for two lines, meant to sit just under the front camera so your eyes stay near the lens. Nothing inside the window responds to touch, so five voice commands do the work instead: pause, continue, go back a sentence, start over and go to the end.
On iPhone you can also record in Wispim itself. The script stays in front of you, the video is saved to Photos, and you post it to TikTok from there. The TikTok page has the setup in more detail.
Questions
How long should a TikTok script be?
As long as the video you plan to record, at about 150 words a minute: 75 words for 30 seconds, 150 for a minute. Read it aloud with a timer, because your own pace may be faster or slower.
Do I have to memorise a TikTok script?
No. A prompter just under the lens keeps your eyes close to it while you read the words you chose. Reading a script on camera covers how to do that without looking like you are reading.