Standard screenplay format uses 12-point Courier, five element types with fixed margins, and roughly one page per minute of screen time. It is an industry convention rather than a style choice, and getting it wrong signals unfamiliarity before a reader has judged a single line.
How to format a screenplay
The five elements and their margins
These are the standard US-derived conventions used across the UK industry. Any dedicated screenwriting software applies them automatically — the point of knowing them is recognising when something has gone wrong.
| Element | What it is | Left margin | Convention |
|---|---|---|---|
| Scene heading (slugline) | INT. KITCHEN – NIGHT | 1.5" | Always capitals. INT or EXT, location, then time of day. |
| Action | What we see happening | 1.5" | Present tense. Character names capitalised on first appearance only. |
| Character cue | MARGARET | 3.7" | Capitals. (V.O.) or (O.S.) appended where needed. |
| Parenthetical | (quietly) | 3.1" | Sparingly. Directors and actors resent being told how to do their jobs. |
| Dialogue | What they say | 2.5" | Roughly 3.5 inches wide. Never right-justified. |
| Transition | CUT TO: | Right-aligned | Largely omitted in modern spec scripts. Use rarely or not at all. |
The screenplay submission checklist
Formatting standards, length by slot, title-page conventions and the errors readers see most — plus the UK submission routes worth knowing. Emailed as a printable page.
Why Courier, and why one page equals a minute
Courier is a monospaced typeface, so every character occupies the same width. That makes page count a reliable proxy for screen time — approximately one minute per page — which is why the whole industry standardised on it decades ago and has not moved.
That relationship is the reason the format is inflexible. A producer glancing at a 140-page script knows it is a two-hour-twenty-minute film before reading a word, and knows it will not be made.
Use 12-point Courier or Courier New. Not a proportional typeface, however much nicer it looks.
Length, by what you are writing
Feature film: 90–120 pages. A spec script over 120 is read as a warning sign; under 85 reads as underwritten.
UK television: driven by the slot. A 30-minute comedy runs roughly 28–32 pages; a 60-minute drama 55–65. Continuing drama has house rules — ask for them.
Short film: under 30 pages, and in practice most produced shorts are well under 15.
Pilot: the same as the slot it is written for, plus a series document explaining where it goes.
These are not arbitrary. They map to budgets and schedules, and a script outside them signals that the writer has not worked out what they are pitching.
The errors readers see most
Camera directions. We PAN across the room. Directing on the page is the most common giveaway in an amateur spec, and it irritates the people you are trying to impress.
Overwritten action. Four-line paragraphs of description. Screenplays are read fast; action blocks should be three lines or fewer, and white space on the page is a virtue.
Too many parentheticals. Telling actors how to say every line reads as distrust.
Interior thoughts. She remembers her father. If a camera cannot photograph it, it does not belong in action.
Wrong or missing scene headings. Every location and time change needs one.
A cast list, character biographies or a preface. Scripts start on page one with FADE IN or the first slugline. Nothing before it.
Submission and the title page
A title page carries the title, written by and your name, and your contact details in the bottom corner. Nothing else — no draft number for a spec, no copyright notice, no logline, no image.
Send a PDF. Never a Word file or a formatting-software project file.
Name the file properly: `Title - Your Name.pdf`.
For UK submissions, know who you are writing to. The BBC Writersroom opens for specific windows and has its own requirements; production companies and agents differ. Read the guidelines each time — this is an industry that treats following instructions as a proxy for professionalism, and not unreasonably.
What Your Book Pro does here
Your Book Pro is a British book-writing platform. You bring a book — an idea, a folder of notes, half a draft, or a finished manuscript written somewhere else — and it gives you the editorial process a publisher would run: a plan, structured feedback, a simulated beta read, a line edit, a proofread, a cover, a blurb and a print-ready file. You can type it, upload it or speak it. The tools sit in one place and work on the same manuscript, so the feedback compounds instead of arriving as twelve disconnected opinions.
For scripts specifically: Mode Guards hold screenplay structure through every pass. Element types and margins survive editing, feedback and export — nothing reflows dialogue into prose or loses a character cue, which is the failure mode of general writing tools applied to scripts.
That means the rest of the platform is usable on a screenplay without risk: Plan Feedback on the structure, Detailed Editorial Feedback on whether the story works, Ask the Editor for the specific question, and export at the end in a form you can send.
And you can talk dialogue rather than typing it — many writers find scenes come out better spoken, because dialogue is speech and the ear catches what the eye does not.
What a script editor still gives you: knowledge of what is being commissioned right now, by whom, and whether your script fits any of it. That is market judgement, it is specific to people, and for a script going to producers it is worth the £300–£1,200.
See the rules we hold
Upload a script written anywhere
Email me the checklistQuestions people ask
- What font should a screenplay use?
- 12-point Courier or Courier New. The monospacing is what makes page count correspond to screen time, and that correspondence is the reason the convention exists.
- How long should a screenplay be?
- 90–120 pages for a feature. UK television follows the slot: roughly 28–32 pages for a half hour, 55–65 for an hour.
- Should I include camera directions?
- No. Directing on the page is the clearest amateur signal in a spec script. Write what we see, not how the camera sees it.
- Do I need screenwriting software?
- Not strictly, but it removes an entire category of error and most options are free or cheap. What matters is that the output is correctly formatted, however you get there.
- How do I protect my script?
- Register with the Writers' Guild of Great Britain or a registration service, and keep dated drafts. Do not put a copyright notice on the title page of a spec — it reads as inexperience.