A student recently asked me, “How long does it take to get good at stand-up?”
Great question. Unfortunately, comedy does not have a black belt system. Nobody watches your 200th open mic, hands you a certificate and says, “Congratulations. You are now funny. On Monday morning you will report to Don’t Tell Comedy.”
The annoying answer is: it depends. But almost everyone gets noticeably better with consistent writing and stage time. In the beginning, you’re learning several skills at once: how to write a joke, how to perform it, how to be comfortable onstage, how to pause for laughs, and how to figure out why the brilliant joke your friends loved received complete silence from 37 strangers and how not to panic about it.
One reason people have wildly different timelines is that “doing stand-up for a year” can mean almost anything. One comic performs twenty times a week, writes constantly and listens back to every set. Another performs once every six weeks, hasn’t rewritten a joke since February and spends most of their creative energy shutting down the bar. Technically, they’ve both been doing comedy for a year.
Your first goal also shouldn’t be “become good.” That’s too vague. Try to get better at specific things. Can you consistently get laughs during a five-minute set? Can you cut unnecessary words? Can you recover when a joke doesn’t work instead of looking like someone just told you your dog died? Can you tell the difference between a joke that needs rewriting and a joke that needs to be taken out back like Old Yeller?
And progress in comedy is annoyingly uneven. You might improve dramatically for six months, then feel stuck for two years. You might suddenly write your best joke ever and then spend two weeks writing material that should be investigated by the local DA. That’s normal. Getting better doesn’t mean every new joke is better than the last one.
The biggest thing you can control is reps with intention. Write. Perform. Record your sets. Listen to them. Notice where people laughed. Deliberately choose one specific change/new line to test during each. Or one new way to say an existing joke. Then do it. Notice where you expected them to laugh and they stared at you. Rewrite. Try it again. Merely standing onstage a lot while people stare at you helps, but repeating the exact same mistakes 300 times is technically experience too.
Also, don’t compare your timeline too closely to another comedian’s. Someone in your class might seem naturally comfortable because they’ve acted for fifteen years. Someone else may write quickly because they’ve been a professional writer. Another person might improve faster because they’re performing constantly. And someone who appears to be crushing after six months might simply have four excellent minutes and be out of comedy in another two years.
So how long does it take to get good at stand-up? Longer than you’d like but less time than you fear. You can absolutely become noticeably funnier within weeks or months of focused practice. Becoming consistently good in different rooms, with different audiences, when you’re tired, when they’re tired, and when the microphone smells suspicious—that takes years. Also as you get better, your standards go up, so you’ll probably never actually be satisfied. That’s a good thing!
Fortunately, you don’t have to wait until you’re “good” to enjoy doing comedy. You’re allowed to be a beginner. You’re allowed to have three good jokes and seven terrible ones. You’re allowed to improve in public. That’s basically the entire business.
So instead of asking, “How long until I’m good?” ask: “Am I better than I was six months ago?” If the answer is yes, keep going. If the answer is no, change how you’re practicing.
Then hop on Amazon and treat yourself to a black belt.