How many chapters are in Jonah?
Jonah has 4 chapters and 48 verses. The King James Version text of Jonah runs 1,320 words, about 6 minutes of reading at 238 words a minute. It is book 32 of the 66 books of the Bible (32nd of the 39 Old Testament books) and the 57th longest by word count.
Verses in each chapter of Jonah
The longest chapter is Jonah 1 with 17 verses; the shortest is Jonah 2 with 10.
Longest and shortest verse in Jonah
Longest: Jonah 4:2, 55 words in the KJV.
And he prayed unto the LORD, and said, I pray thee, O LORD, was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish: for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil.
Shortest: Jonah 2:8, 9 words in the KJV.
They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy.
How Jonah begins and ends
First verse, Jonah 1:1
Now the word of the LORD came unto Jonah the son of Amittai, saying,
Now Yahweh’s word came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying,
Last verse, Jonah 4:11
And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?
Shouldn’t I be concerned for Nineveh, that great city, in which are more than one hundred twenty thousand persons who can’t discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much livestock?”
Jonah in our topic collections
2 verses from Jonah appear on our Bible verse topic pages, most often in these topics:
- Bible Verses About Salvation (1 from Jonah)
- Bible Verses About Thanksgiving (1 from Jonah)
- Bible Verses About Fasting (1 from Jonah)
Jonah: common questions
How many chapters are in the book of Jonah?
Jonah has 4 chapters. The longest chapter is Jonah 1 with 17 verses; the shortest is Jonah 2 with 10.
How many verses are in Jonah?
Jonah has 48 verses in the King James Version, and the same number in the World English Bible.
How long does it take to read Jonah?
About 6 minutes at an average silent reading speed of 238 words a minute. The KJV text is 1,320 words and the World English Bible text is 1,251 words.
What is the longest verse in Jonah?
Jonah 4:2 is the longest verse in Jonah, at 55 words in the King James Version. The shortest is Jonah 2:8 (9 words): "They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy."
Compare all 66 books on how many books are in the Bible, see the Bible by the numbers, or work out how long it takes to read the Bible at your own pace.
Counted by Bible Says About from the full public-domain text of the King James Version (1769 edition) and the World English Bible. Verse text only: headings and psalm titles are left out. A word is a run of letters: a hyphenated name like Beer-sheba counts as two, and an apostrophe stays inside its word (LORD'S is one). Matching ignores capital letters. Data compiled 2026-10-02.