How to Write a Screenplay: Step by Step, From Idea to Polished Draft

How to write a screenplay in eight steps

Every working screenwriter follows some version of the same path. The order matters more than the method: writers who skip the planning steps almost always stall around page 30, when the setup is spent and nobody knows what the middle is for.

If you are not sure what the finished object should look like, read what is a screenplay first. Then come back and start at step one.

If the form itself is new to you, read what a screenplay is first. It explains what the document contains, who reads it and why the format is not optional, which makes every step below easier to follow.

Steps 1 and 2: turn the idea into a logline

An idea is not a story. "A lighthouse keeper in a storm" is a setting. "A lighthouse keeper who must keep the lamp lit through a storm while the brother she abandoned climbs the stairs to kill her" is a story, because someone wants something, something is in the way, and failure costs. That sentence is a logline, and writing it is the first real test of whether the film exists yet.

The working formula is protagonist plus goal plus obstacle plus stakes, in one or two sentences of about 25 to 35 words. It should be concrete enough that a stranger could tell you the genre and the ending they expect. If the sentence needs a paragraph of explanation, the concept is not ready. The full method, with examples and fixes, is in how to write a logline, and the free logline builder grades a draft sentence against those four slots.

Spend real time here. A weak logline is cheap to fix; a weak script built on it is not. Many professionals refuse to outline until the logline is one they would be happy to say to a producer in a lift.

Steps 3 and 4: outline, beat sheet, treatment

The outline is where you decide what the film is before you spend two months writing it. There are three levels of detail, and most writers use two of them.

• Beat sheet. Ten to fifteen structural turns, each with a page target. It tells you where the inciting incident lands, where the midpoint is, where all is lost. See what is a beat sheet and the fifteen-beat Save the Cat beat sheet for the templates most readers recognise.
• Scene outline. Every scene in order, one or two lines each, usually 40 to 70 scenes for a feature. Index cards are still the fastest way to build and reorder one; the free scene board does the same job in a browser.
• Treatment. The story told as present-tense prose, 2 to 10 pages. Optional for a spec, but it flushes out gaps a list of beats hides. What is a treatment covers when to bother.

Underneath all three sits the same skeleton. A 110-page feature sets up its world in the first ten pages, breaks into the second act around page 25 to 30, turns at the midpoint around page 55, hits bottom around page 85 and resolves in the last ten. The page ranges and why they work are in three-act structure for screenplays. Building the outline itself, card by card, is covered in how to write a screenplay outline.

Beginners resist outlining because it feels like it kills spontaneity. It does the opposite. Knowing that the midpoint is a betrayal on page 55 frees you to invent the scene however you like; not knowing means every scene is also a structural decision, and that is what exhausts writers.

Step 5: write the first draft, with page targets and daily goals

The first draft has one job: to exist. It will be too long, the dialogue will be flat, and act two will sag. That is normal. Speed matters more than quality here because a fast draft keeps the whole story in your head at once, and a slow one loses it.

Page targets. Aim for 90 to 120 pages, and know your genre's norm before you start: comedies and horror run 90 to 100, dramas 100 to 120. First drafts routinely come in 10 to 20 pages over, so if the outline projects 130 pages, cut scenes now rather than later. The limits and what happens when you break them are in how many pages should a screenplay be.

Daily goals. Three pages a day is the standard target for a working writer with a job. That is a 110-page draft in about five weeks. Five pages a day is aggressive but fine when the outline is solid. One page a day still finishes a feature in four months, which beats most first attempts. Pick a number, plug it into the free page goal planner and it turns the draft into a calendar with a finish date.

Write in format from line one. Do not draft in a word processor and plan to fix it later. Reformatting 110 pages of dialogue by hand is a week of tedium. Zen Writer formats every element as you type on iPhone, iPad, Mac and Android, keeps a live page count and runtime estimate, and works offline, so the draft you write on the train is already a script. If you only have a phone, how to write a screenplay on your phone lays out the workflow.

Scene by scene. Every scene needs someone who wants something, and it should end in a different place from where it started. Enter late, leave early. The mechanics are in how to write a scene.

Steps 6 and 7: rewrite in passes, then get feedback

Put the draft away for at least two weeks. Then read it in one sitting, on paper or a tablet, without a pen. You are reading as an audience, not as an editor. Note the places you got bored. Those are structural problems, and structure is fixed first.

Rewrite in separate passes, one concern at a time, in this order:

1. Structure. Do the turns land where the outline said? Is there a midpoint? Does the protagonist drive the third act, or does it happen to them?
2. Character. Does every major character want something in every scene? Could any two be merged?
3. Scenes. Cut every scene that does not change something. Cut the first and last quarter of most that remain.
4. Dialogue. Remove on-the-nose lines, greetings, and anything a character says that the audience already knows. Craft notes are in how to write dialogue.
5. Action lines. Trim to what the camera sees. Four lines per paragraph, maximum. See how to write action lines.

Then give it to three readers who will be honest and who watch films in your genre. Do not explain the script before they read it. Ask three questions afterwards: where were you confused, where were you bored, and what did you think it was about? Where two readers agree, they are right. Where one reader offers a fix, ignore the fix and look at the problem underneath it.

Step 8: polish, format and prepare to submit

The polish pass is small and unglamorous. Check that every scene heading follows INT./EXT. LOCATION - TIME. Cut stray camera directions. Confirm the title page carries the title, your name and a contact line and nothing else. Spell-check, then read the whole thing aloud once more; your ear catches what your eye has stopped seeing.

Before anyone outside your circle reads it, register the script. How to copyright a screenplay explains the US Copyright Office and WGA registration options in plain terms. Then write the documents that travel with a script: a one-page screenplay synopsis and a short query letter. Both are easier now because the logline and outline already exist.

Export as PDF. Never send an editable file to someone you have not worked with. Zen Writer exports PDF, FDX and Fountain from the same document, so the PDF for a competition and the FDX a producer's office asks for come from one source.

A realistic timeline for a first feature screenplay

Beginners underestimate the planning and rewriting and overestimate the drafting. This schedule assumes an hour or two most days and a three-page daily goal.

Five months is honest. If you want to finish something sooner, write a short first; the whole cycle compresses into a few weeks, and the craft transfers. How to write a short film covers the differences. Everything else in the screenwriting guides hangs off the steps above.

Common mistakes when writing a screenplay for the first time

1. Drafting without an ending. The single biggest cause of abandoned scripts. Decide the last scene before you write the first.
2. A passive protagonist. Things happen to them; they react. Give them a goal they pursue with decisions the audience can see.
3. A 140-page first feature. Nobody will read it. Cut to 120 before it leaves your desk.
4. Rewriting page one for a month. Finish the draft. Perfecting the opening of a story you have not written is procrastination with good posture.
5. Explaining the theme in dialogue. If a character says what the film is about, cut the line and let the ending say it.
6. Writing in a word processor. Formatting by hand costs hours and still reads wrong. Download Zen Writer free, with no account, and the layout is handled.
7. Sending the first draft out. The draft that gets you noticed is the fourth.

Frequently asked questions

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More in screenwriting education

• What Is a Screenplay? Definition, Format and a Sample Page
• How to Write a Screenplay Outline (With a Template and Example)
• Three-Act Structure for a Screenplay: Page Ranges, Table and Example
• What Is a Beat Sheet? Definition, Templates and an Example
• Save the Cat Beat Sheet: All 15 Beats With Page Numbers
• What Is a Logline? Definition, Formula and Examples
• How to Write a Logline: The Formula, the Method and the Tests
• Logline Examples: 20 Loglines by Genre, With Notes on Why They Work
• What Is a Treatment? Screenplay Treatment Format, Length and Example
• How to Write a Screenplay Synopsis (With a One-Page Example)
• How to Write a Scene in a Screenplay: Goal, Conflict, Turn
• How to Write Dialogue in a Screenplay: Subtext, Voice and Rhythm
• How to Write Action Lines in a Screenplay
• How to Write Character Introductions in a Screenplay
• How to Write a Short Film Script: Length, Structure and Endings
• How to Write a TV Pilot Script: Acts, Page Counts and the Series Engine
• How Long Is a Screenplay? Page Counts by Format and Genre
• How Many Screenplay Pages Equal One Minute? The Page-Per-Minute Rule
• How to Copyright a Screenplay: US Copyright Office vs WGA Registration
• How to Write a Query Letter for a Screenplay (With a Full Example)
• How to Write a Screenplay on Your Phone (iPhone and Android)