Teleprompter for Reels: scripts, word counts and framing

To record a Reel with a teleprompter, write a script of about 75 words for 30 seconds or 150 for 60, open on the line that earns the next three seconds, and read it from a prompter whose text sits directly under the front camera. Hold the phone upright, so it records 9:16, and keep your face in the upper-middle of the frame, clear of the caption and the buttons Instagram lays over the bottom and right edge.

That is the whole method. The rest of this page is the detail that makes it work: the word budget for each length, why the first line matters more on a Reel than anywhere else, and three scripts you can adapt. If you have never used a phone prompter at all, start with how to use a teleprompter on your phone and come back.

How many words fit a Reel?

At a conversational 150 words a minute — the pace most people settle into when they are speaking to camera rather than reciting — these are the budgets. The middle column is the one to write to; the right-hand column is what to cut down to once you have read it aloud.

The “aim to land at” figure is about 10% under the arithmetic, and that gap is not caution for its own sake. You slow down on the hook, you pause after a question, and you leave a beat at the end so the loop does not clip your last word. None of those seconds are in a word count. The full reasoning, and the same table for longer formats, is in how many words is a 1, 2, 3 or 5 minute speech.

If you are not writing in English, the numbers move. A Hindi script reads at fewer words a minute than an English one because the words are longer, and Tamil fewer again; at Orate’s default rates — a starting point, not a measurement — a 30-second Reel is about 65 words of Hindi and 58 of Tamil. Why that happens is in teleprompter speed by language.

How to write a script for an Instagram Reel

A Reel is not a shorter YouTube video. It is watched with the thumb already moving, so the script has a different shape: the payoff goes first, and everything after it is the evidence.

Lead with the hook, not the greeting

“Hi everyone, welcome back” spends two seconds of a fifteen-second Reel telling the viewer nothing. Open on the most specific thing you are going to say. A useful test: if the first line could open anybody’s video, it is not a hook.

• A claim with a number in it. “This one setting added forty minutes to my week.”
• The mistake. “If your Reels look like you’re reading, it’s where the words are, not you.”
• The question the viewer already has. “How do people talk to camera for a minute without notes?”
• The result first. “We sold this flat in nine days. Here’s the one thing we changed.”

One idea per Reel

At 70 words there is room for one point and the reason to believe it. Three tips in thirty seconds becomes a list read at speed, which is the cadence that sounds most scripted. If you have three, you have three Reels.

Write lines you would say, at the length you would say them

Short sentences. Contractions. One clause per line where you can manage it, because each line on a teleprompter is one eye movement, and a long line is a visible sideways sweep. The general craft — line breaks, where to mark pauses, how to spell out numbers so you do not trip on them — is in how to write a teleprompter script. For a Reel, the one rule that matters most is that the first line has to be readable in a single glance.

End on the action, then stop

Say what you want the viewer to do — follow, save, comment a word, tap the link in bio — once, plainly, and then stop talking. Hold your expression for a second after the last word. That second is what makes a loop look intentional instead of cut off.

Three Reel scripts to adapt

Written to the budgets above, and timed at 150 words a minute. Swap the bracketed parts for yours.

1. The single tip (30 seconds, about 75 words)

Stop recording your Reels with the script in the middle of the screen.
Your eyes drop to read it, and everyone watching can see them move.
Put the words right under the camera instead.
Make the text big, so each line is only a few words.
Your eyes stay near the lens, and it looks like you’re talking to one person.
And follow for the next one: [what the next tip is].

2. The before-and-after (60 seconds, about 140 words once filled in)

Six months ago, [the problem, in one line].
Here’s what it looked like.
[One sentence describing the old way, concretely.]
The thing that changed it wasn’t [the obvious fix people assume].
It was [the actual change].
Why it works: [one-sentence reason].
What happened next: [result, with a number if you have one].
If you want to try it, start small.
[First step, in one sentence.]
Then [second step].
Give it a week before you judge it.
Most people quit on day three, which is exactly when [the payoff] starts.
Save this so you have the steps when you need them.
And tell me in the comments: [a question with a one-word answer].

3. The answer to a question (15 seconds, about 35 words once filled in)

“[The question someone asked you, read out.]”
Short answer: [the answer].
The reason is [one clause].
Longer answer’s in my bio.
Send me the next question.

Read each one aloud once before recording. If a line trips you, it will trip you on take four as well; rewrite it then rather than later.

Framing a Reel: 9:16 and the parts Instagram covers

A phone held upright records vertical video, which is the 9:16 shape Reels are built for, so in most cases there is nothing to convert. What needs care is where you are inside that rectangle, because the Reels player draws on top of your video: the caption, your handle and the audio line along the bottom, and the like, comment, share and audio buttons up the right-hand side.

We could not find a safe-zone diagram for Reels in Instagram’s own Help Center, and the overlay moves as the app is redesigned, so treat any pixel-exact template you find with suspicion. The rules of thumb that hold up:

• Eyes in the upper third. It is where a viewer looks first and nothing is drawn over it.
• Nothing important in the bottom fifth. That is caption territory. Do not hold a product there.
• Leave the right edge empty. The button column sits over it.
• Arm’s length or a little more. Closer than that and a phone’s wide front lens enlarges your nose and shrinks your ears. A tripod a metre away with the phone at eye height looks far better than a selfie grip.

Instagram’s Help Center says Reels can be recorded and edited up to 20 minutes long, but only Reels of 3 minutes or less are recommended to people who do not already follow you (checked October 2026). Both limits are generous; the budgets above are about attention, not the cap.

Why Reels read off a prompter often look read

The tell is almost never the voice. It is the eyes. When the script fills the screen, the words you are reading sit several centimetres below the lens, and every line moves your gaze down and across — small on the phone, obvious on the viewer’s. We worked through the geometry in why teleprompter videos still look like you’re reading; the short version is that the closer the words are to the lens, and the shorter each line, the smaller that angle gets.

The other tell is rhythm. A script read at an even pace with no pauses sounds recited, however good the words. How to sound natural when reading a script covers the fixes — most of them are things you write into the script rather than things you do on the take.

Recording a Reel in Orate

This is the workflow we built Orate for, so here it is step by step:

1. Write or paste the script. Or import a .txt file. The read time under it is worked out from the script’s writing system, so a 70-word English Reel shows about 28 seconds and a Hindi one of the same length shows longer.
2. Set the text large. The default is 34 point; for a Reel, where you want three to five words per line, go bigger. Larger text means less sideways eye movement.
3. Leave the reading window small. It defaults to 45% of the screen and goes down to 15%. A short band holds your eyes still, and the band sits directly under the front camera, so they are as near the lens as the phone allows.
4. Press record. After the countdown (three seconds by default), the script starts scrolling when recording does. If the pace is wrong, drag the pace slider on the recorder mid-take; the script keeps its place instead of jumping.
5. Trim the ends. The take preview has a filmstrip trimmer, so the half-second of reaching for the phone comes off before you post.
6. Crop only if you need to. A take shot upright is already 9:16. If you want the 4:5 shape for the main grid, the crop sheet has it, and each shape is labelled with where it fits.
7. Save or share. Export is free on both tiers and there is no watermark, so the file you post to Instagram is the file you recorded.

If the app is killed halfway through a long take — a call, a flat battery — you lose at most the last couple of seconds, the fragment that was being written, rather than the whole take. That matters less for a fifteen-second Reel than for a three-minute one, but it is there either way. For what the other options do — including Instagram’s own — see the Instagram Edits teleprompter and what to do when it stops scrolling and the CapCut teleprompter guide.

A checklist before you post

• The first line is specific enough that it could only open this Reel.
• The script is under the “aim to land at” count for its length.
• You read it aloud once, and rewrote the line you stumbled on.
• Eyes in the upper third; nothing important along the bottom or the right edge.
• A second of held expression after the last word.
• Captions added in Instagram or your editor — plenty of people scroll with the sound off, and captions are not something a teleprompter adds for you.

Questions people ask

How many words should a 30-second Reel script be?

About 75 words of English at a conversational 150 words a minute. Write 90 and cut to 70, because a Reel needs a beat of silence at the end and you will slow down on the hook.

Does Instagram have its own teleprompter?

Yes. Instagram's Edits app added a teleprompter in June 2025, and since mid-2026 Instagram has been bringing it to the main Reels camera too. It suits short Reels made and posted inside Instagram; a separate prompter app that records the video itself gives more control over where the text sits and how it moves.

How long can an Instagram Reel be?

Instagram's Help Center says Reels can be recorded and edited up to 20 minutes long, but only Reels of 3 minutes or less are recommended to people who do not follow you (checked October 2026). Most Reels that hold attention are far shorter than either figure.

Should I record Reels with the front or back camera?

The front camera, if you are reading a script, because the words have to be on the screen you are facing. The back camera is sharper but you cannot see a prompter on it without a second screen or a mirror rig.

What aspect ratio should a Reel be?

Vertical 9:16, which is what a phone held upright records. If you shot something else, crop to 9:16 before posting rather than letting Instagram letterbox or crop it for you.

Is it obvious when someone reads a Reel off a teleprompter?

It is when the words sit far from the lens or the lines are long, because the eyes visibly scan. Keep the reading band under the camera, make the text large, and read in short lines.