Three-Act Structure
Aristotle said a whole story has a beginning, middle and end. Screenwriting teacher Syd Field turned that into three acts split roughly 25% / 50% / 25%, with plot points that hinge each act into the next. In flash fiction the acts shrink to paragraphs, but the hinges still do the work.
Step through the 7 beats
Click a point, use the buttons, or focus the diagram and press ← →. Drag the length slider to turn percentages into word positions.
Act I: the character, their world and what they want.
In flash fiction: Act I is often just the first paragraph.
Example beatMara, the lens, thirty years of nights.
Three-Act Structure beats in a 500-word story
| # | Beat | What happens | Starts near word | Example |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Setup | Act I: the character, their world and what they want. | 0 | Mara, the lens, thirty years of nights. |
| 2 | Inciting incident | The event that starts the story proper. | 50 | The switch-off letter. |
| 3 | Plot point 1 | The character commits; we enter Act II. | 125 | She decides to stay the last night in the tower. |
| 4 | Midpoint | A reversal or revelation that raises the stakes. | 250 | The radio: a boat is lost in the storm. |
| 5 | Plot point 2 | The low point; everything seems lost. Act III begins. | 375 | The power fails. The automatic lamp goes dark. |
| 6 | Climax | The final confrontation. | 450 | She lights the oil lamp and turns the crank by hand all night. |
| 7 | Resolution | The new normal. | 500 | The boat in the harbour; the lamp, still warm. |
Three-Act Structure: common questions
What are the three acts?
Act I (setup, roughly the first quarter), Act II (confrontation, the middle half) and Act III (resolution, the final quarter). Plot points at about 25% and 75% hinge the acts together.
Who invented three-act structure?
The idea of beginning, middle and end goes back to Aristotle's Poetics. Syd Field's 1979 book Screenplay popularised the modern three-act model with plot points.
How long is each act in a 1,000-word story?
Roughly 250 / 500 / 250 words. Many flash writers front-load even harder: 150 words of setup, then straight into the complication.