How Many Books Are in the Bible? Books, Chapters and Verses Explained

The Protestant Bible has 66 books: 39 in the Old Testament and 27 in the New Testament. Together they contain 1,189 chapters and 31,102 verses, counted with the versification used by the King James Version.

Old and New Testament in numbers

A few modern translations divide some verses differently, so their totals can differ by a handful of verses.

How the 66 books are grouped

• Law (5): Genesis to Deuteronomy.
• History (12): Joshua to Esther.
• Poetry and Wisdom (5): Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs.
• Major Prophets (5): Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel.
• Minor Prophets (12): Hosea to Malachi.
• Gospels (4): Matthew, Mark, Luke, John.
• Acts (1).
• Letters (21): Romans to Jude, 13 of them opening with Paul’s name.
• Revelation (1).

Catholic and Orthodox Bibles

Catholic Bibles include seven additional books in the Old Testament, known as the deuterocanonical books, for a total of 73. Eastern Orthodox Bibles include a few more, and the exact list varies between Orthodox churches.

Longest and shortest

• Most chapters: Psalms, with 150.
• Longest chapter: Psalm 119, with 176 verses.
• Fewest verses: 2 John, with 13.
• Shortest verse: John 11:35, “Jesus wept.” See What is the shortest verse in the Bible?

How long it takes to read or write

Reading three chapters a day, the whole Bible takes a little over a year. Writing it all out by hand is a much bigger project: see how long it takes to write the Bible by hand. If you want to start small, Penned Grace lets you handwrite one verse at a time on iPhone, iPad or Android.