Readability checker
Four standard scores, one plain answer about the reading level, and a count of exactly what is dragging it down.
Drop your files here
.txt, .md · up to 5 MB
How to check readability
- 1
Paste your text
Or drop a .txt or .md file. Markdown syntax is ignored by default.
- 2
Read the level
One headline number, four standard scores underneath, updating as you edit.
- 3
Fix what it points at
The count of long sentences and long words tells you where to cut.
What the four scores actually measure
Flesch Reading Ease runs from 0 to 100 and goes up as text gets easier: above 60 is comfortable for a general audience, under 30 is specialist. Flesch-Kincaid converts the same inputs into a US school grade. Gunning Fog counts words of three syllables or more, on the theory that long words are what slows a reader down. The Automated Readability Index ignores syllables entirely and counts letters instead, which makes it the useful cross-check: it cannot be thrown off by a syllable estimate, so when it agrees with the other three the number is solid, and when it does not the text is unusual in some way worth looking at.
Why the headline number is a median, not an average
Three of the scores report a school grade, and on short text they disagree wildly: two long words in three sentences are enough to send Gunning Fog to postgraduate level. An average follows that outlier straight up. The median ignores it and reports what the other two agree on, which is why the headline number here stays steady while you edit and only moves when the text genuinely changes. Under a hundred words even that is unreliable, and the page says so rather than showing a confident number nobody should trust.
Syllables are estimated, and the estimate has known limits
No formula counts English syllables without error, because English spelling does not encode them. The usual approach counts groups of vowels and then corrects for silent endings, which is right about 85 per cent of the time and wrong in predictable places: business is two syllables rather than three, wanted is two rather than one, and queue is one rather than three. A dictionary of nearly two hundred of those common exceptions sits on top of the estimate here. ARI is included precisely because it needs none of this; it counts characters, so it is the score to trust when the text is full of unusual words.
These formulas are for English only
All four were derived and validated on English prose, and every one of them depends on something English-specific: syllable counts, the length of a typical word, the idea that a three-syllable word is hard. Applied to Russian, where words are longer as a rule, they report gibberish that looks like a measurement. The same goes for Chinese, which has no syllables in the sense the formula means, and for Arabic and Hindi. When the text is not mostly Latin script the scores here are dimmed and labelled, rather than quietly shown as if they meant something.
Your text is never uploaded
Scoring happens in your browser as you type. There is no server, no account and no storage of any kind. The syllable dictionary is a small JSON file that ships with the page, and once the page is open it works with the network disconnected. Close the tab and the text is gone.
Frequently asked questions
What is a good Flesch Reading Ease score?
For general audiences, 60 to 70, roughly what a well-edited newspaper achieves. Above 90 reads as very simple, below 30 is specialist writing that assumes the reader already knows the field. Marketing copy usually aims for 60 or above.
Why does the score differ from another checker?
Almost always because of syllable counting, which every tool estimates slightly differently, and sentence splitting: abbreviations and decimal numbers are kept inside their sentence here, which changes the words-per-sentence figure that all four formulas depend on.
Does it work for languages other than English?
No, and it says so. The formulas were derived for English and produce meaningless numbers for other languages, so for non-Latin text the scores are dimmed with a note rather than presented as a result.
What counts as a long sentence?
Twenty-five words by default, which is where most style guides start warning. You can move the threshold anywhere between ten and sixty words.
Should I ignore Markdown?
Yes for anything written in Markdown, which is the default: heading marks, list bullets and code blocks are syntax rather than prose and distort the sentence count. Turn it off only if you want the raw text scored exactly as typed.
Can I score paragraphs separately?
Yes. Turning that on adds a per-paragraph table, which is the fastest way to find the one dense paragraph that is pulling a whole page down.
Is my text sent anywhere?
No. Everything is calculated in your browser and nothing is uploaded or stored.
Related tools
Word CounterCharacters, words, sentences, paragraphs and reading time, updated as you type, with post, SMS and meta description limits in front of you.
Word FrequencyWhich words a text actually leans on, how often, and what share of it they are, for single words, pairs and triples, with common words filtered out.
Compare TextTwo columns, deletions in red and additions in green, with the changed words picked out inside each line.