GRRM's Recent Comments on The Wind's of Winter's Length

Recently u/random_dent posted GRRM Mentions Length of The Winds of Winter on his blog... about GRRM's recent Not a Blog post and the relevant comment for us members of the broken brotherhood was:

THE WINDS OF WINTER is going to be a big book.   The way it is going, it could be bigger than A STORM OF SWORDS or A DANCE WITH DRAGONS, the longest books in the series to date.   I do usually cut and trim once I finish, but I need to finish first.

which was one of the more informative pieces of information in a bit. I thought it would try and gather other quotes he has made that are at least "somewhat relevant" to this one (length of the book, etc.)

Max Book Size

While this quote is from 17 years ago, it seems ~1600 manuscript pages were the biggest a book could be bound at the time (for US publishers, I believe some European languages split both ASOS and ADWD into two books):

George told us a long tale. His publishers told him the mostest (sic) it could be was 1600 manuscript pages. He passed that and a decision was made that it would have to be split in two. He thought about that and rejected it and proposed an alternative. -SSM, Conquest (Kansas City, MO): 28 May 2005

I know nothing about the biggest sizes that books can be made now (especially with many people likely opting to read via a kindle, tablet, etc.

He previously expected it to be at least the same size as ASOS/ADWD

At the Game of Thrones Season 3 premiere, GRRM told an interviewer that he was about a “quarter of the way done” on The Winds of Winter (~375 manuscript pages of an expected 1,500 manuscript page book) -Youtube: Season 3 Premiere (Game of Thrones)

and:

It has been a long journey. Yes, I think I’m starting to see it, but that’s still a very long tunnel. The last book was 1,500 pages in manuscript. I think each of the next two will be at least as long, so that’s 3,000 more pages that I still have to write, and that’s a considerable amount of writing.

Other quotes comparing size

After spending six years writing it, Martin has very nearly completed a book that is whopping even by his standards: over 1,600 pages in manuscript.

and:

Another source of confusion has been the number of pages in the book. In manuscript, A STORM OF SWORDS weighed in at 1500+ pages, some 350 pages longer than A CLASH OF KINGS. But those are manuscript pages. All books shrink somewhat when set in type. I have corrected page proofs of SWORDS, and it will come in at just under 1000 pages. - More News Bits (Elio Garcia): June 2000

Still Resisting a Split into two Books

Some of my publishers have suggested breaking up WINDS as we did with FEAST and DANCE. I am resisting that notion. -SSM, Fire & Blood: 30 April 18

and:

Question: Huge fan of your work, regarding the Winds of Winter, would you consider splitting the book and releasing the first half ASAP and continue working on the second half as you currently are?

GRRM: That would not be my preference. -SSM, Listen to This: 11 Jan 2016

Someone did a pretty good post on max book size and quickest publishing rate awhile back but we are in 2022 (idk if thats a good or bad thing) and not the simpler times of the mid 2000's.

Also I'm trying my best to do my best u/bryndenbfish impression every time we get some "new" info, but please remember:

"When the sun has set, no candle can replace it."

TLDR: From the best information available GRRM seemingly wants to keep The Winds of Winter as one volume that will be ~1600 (or more) manuscript pages and therefore it will likely wind up exceeding the published page #'s for US/British (973/976 pages).