ProWritingAid is a powerful grammar and style editor that improves your writing quality and skills.
Premium | Premium+ |
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FREE | €0 for up to 1000 requests/month |
$70 per license for the 1-year plan | $80 per license for the 1-year plan |
ProWritingAid is a grammar checker, style editor, vocabulary builder, and editing tool all combined into one multi-functional tool. I use it to edit almost everything I write from emails to blog posts to ebooks. It is simple to use and accurate, making my life much easier.
ProWritingAid: Key Features
Who Should Use ProWritingAid?
Suitable for all kinds of writers and professionals who want to improve the quality of their writing.
How I Learned About ProWritingAid
As a digital marketer, I have to write a wide variety of content for different audiences and purposes. From outreach emails to guest posts to writing posts for my own blog, I write content on a daily basis.
It goes without saying that I do not have a lot of time to spend on proofreading, so, I have been on the lookout for a good editing tool for a long time.
I experimented with several different tools before I stumbled onto ProWritingAid, just out of dumb luck. And, when I checked out their website, I was quite skeptical and thought that it was just another online language editor that only corrects grammar and spelling mistakes.
Oh boy, was I wrong!
I had the good sense to try the tool before judging it and that was the turning point. When I actually tried the Pro Writing Aid editing tool, I saw that it goes beyond correcting spelling and grammar mistakes and gives contextually-relevant suggestions on many other aspects.
Do you know what the best part is? I am a native English speaker and this tool still makes useful suggestions to correct my language and improve my writing process. It's like having my own personal writing mentor.
ProWritingAid is by far the best online language editor that I have ever used. It makes me a better writer.
But, you do not have to take me for my word. You can read about ProWritingAid's features, try it out, and then make the decision yourself.
Ready to learn more about this writing aid and what it can offer you? Keep reading. Also, check out this video:
ProWritingAid – Detailed Review
ProWritingAid is not just a grammar checker. It is an advanced language editor that looks beyond grammar errors and spelling mistakes and takes a more holistic view to help you improve your own writing.
It does so much more than just correct commas and apostrophes, by analyzing your writing at a granular level. The in-depth reports are so thorough that even an experienced human editor cannot find as many errors as it does.
Don't believe me?
Well, I have tested this myself. I'm not kidding when I say that it is sometimes more thorough than a professional human editor.
I conducted an experiment by sending a doc to a friend who has been a professional editor for over a decade. I then checked the same doc using ProWritingAid. To my surprise, the latter was more thorough than the human editor in every aspect.
Now that I think of it, it's actually not that surprising. After all, tools work on algorithms and follow the rules to the letter, without exception. Humans, on the other hand, can make grammar errors or miss a few things from time to time.
But let's get back to ProWritingAid
I know is much better than most other similar tools for several reasons:
- It understands context and does not limit itself to basic grammatical corrections.
- It integrates with more websites and platforms than any other online language editor.
- it is safe to use and you can rest assured that your work is yours and won't be shared with anyone.
Overall, it is a great tool for editing your documents and improving your quality of writing.
In the next section of my ProWritingAid review, I will list the different features of this tool and review them individually.
Excited to learn about these features?
Read on…
Grammar Checker
A grammar checker is an essential feature for any online editor that corrects grammatical mistakes and typos.
Pro Writing Aid's grammar checker can correct hundreds of possible grammar mistakes that you may make while writing including the wrong use of tenses, singular or plural mistakes, missing apostrophes, etc.
And, that's not all.
I was surprised at the level of language proficiency that this grammar checker shows. It does not just make simple grammatical corrections but is capable of identifying advanced grammatical errors as well.
This grammar checker can, for example, identify subject-verb agreements, use of a wrong word, etc.
Here's an example of a subject-verb agreement error and how ProWritingAid's grammar checker suggests corrections:
It tells you what the problem is and how to correct it. In this instance, replacing “have” with “has” will solve the problem. If you click on the suggestion, it will automatically correct the mistake.
It also corrects punctuation mistakes like missing commas, overuse of commas, and others. So, you can rest assured that if you need to add or remove a punctuation mark, it will tell you.
Another feature that I personally like is that it provides detailed explanations of suggested changes. You might not always agree with the suggestions that this tool makes. Knowing why it is making a suggestion will help you make an informed decision.
I think of myself as proficient in English and have, on several occasions, thought that there were no mistakes in my writing. But, when I look at the explanation behind its suggestions, I can see my mistakes clearly.
Excited to try out the ProWritingAid grammar checker? Install it easily here
Style Guide
Now coming to my favorite feature of ProWritingAid—the style guide. The style editor gives context-sensitive writing style suggestions, highlights repeated words to broaden your vocabulary, and more.
One of the writing style edits that I use most is when it suggests better words to use or replaces an entire phrase with a single word. The writing style editor makes my writing crisp and more authoritative.
It also highlights issues like the use of passive voice, vague words, long sentences, etc. These nuanced style edits improve the overall quality of my writing. In fact, I have sometimes learned something new from these writing style edits that I didn't know before.
The writing style editor shortens sentences, identifies and corrects issues like repetitiveness, and enhances readability. This is especially important for me because I run a blog and I need to ensure that my posts are easy to read for my audience.
Pro Tip: Always read explanations of suggested edits before applying them to learn and grow as a writer.
Contextual Thesaurus
While reviewing your work on ProWritingAid, if you want to look for synonyms of any word, you can do so by double-clicking on it. This will show you a list of alternative words that you can use in place of that word.
It also comes with a word explorer feature to learn more about that particular word. This includes the part of speech that this word belongs to, its definitions, and the different parts of speech it can be used as.
You can also learn phrases that use that word, contexts in which it is used, examples of its use, and a lot more. Basically, word explorer tells you everything that you need to know about a word, its history, and its usage.
But that's not all.
ProWritingAid also provides contextually similar words that are related to the word that you explored, in some way or another.
Overall, if you're one of those people who love learning new words and their usage, this tool will blow your mind.
Pro Tip: Don't use this tool just to edit your own writing but also to review good content from brilliant writers, to learn and grow as a writer yourself.
In-Depth Analytics Reports
Next up in this ProWritingAid review, the in-depth analytics reports. This is probably the most useful feature of ProWritingAid and its main USP. This tool gives not one, not two, but 25 different types of reports that analyze your writing.
No, I don't know about you, but I was blown away when I found that out!
I mean, who knew there were so many aspects of writing that you'd need 25 reports to improve, right?
But, this editing software has outdone itself when it comes to writing analysis and the identification of improvement areas.
Here are some of the types of detailed reports that this editing software provides to help you improve your writing:
Style
This report shows how your writing can be improved in areas like:
- Readability
- Use of passive verbs
- Use of long subordinate clauses
- Emotional tells
- Repeated sentence starts
- Overuse of adverbs
- Use of weak adjectives
Repetitions
This report identifies repetitions and frequently-used words and phrases in your writing. It does this by showing repetitive phrases of different lengths, as shown below.
Sentence Length
This report provides information on the average sentence length for your writing and identifies long sentences. Long sentences affect readability, so you can use these insights to shorten your sentences and improve readability.
Structure
This report analyzes your sentence structures and compares them to the average for published writing. It mainly focuses on how you start a sentence and guides you to use different ways to start a sentence based on analysis of other published work.
Here's what this report looks like on ProWritingAid:
Diction
This is a very useful report that gives you a list of vague words and of words where you can improve your diction.
Vague words are words or phrases like “some,” “a lot,” “about,” etc. that do not provide clarity and leave things undefined or unquantified. You can improve on this aspect by replacing vague words with specific numbers or facts.
For example, instead of using “some,” you can add the exact number of whatever or whoever you're talking about.
Now, coming to the diction part. I find this very useful as it helps me improve my vocabulary. For each word identified under the list “diction” in this report, ProWritingAid suggests alternatives.
These suggestions are meant to simplify your writing and improve readability. The tool suggests simpler words in place of complex or lesser-known words so that anyone can easily read and understand your writing.
Pro Tip: Use this feature only if you want to cater to all audience types. However, if you're writing a technical paper or something targeted at experts, then you need not simplify.
Want to check out more of these reports? Use ProWritingAid for free and check out everything that this tool has to offer.
Integrations
One key aspect in which ProWritingAid is better than other language editors is that it provides many more integrations than any of its counterparts.
It integrates with all major writing platforms like Google Docs, Microsoft Word, Apache OpenOffice, Scrivener, etc. So, whichever platform you use for writing, you can simply integrate ProWritingAid into it and edit as you write.
It has a Chrome extension that lets you edit documents directly from your browser.
What's more?
It also has extensions for less-popular browsers like Safari and Firefox. This is something that you don't find with most other online editors.
Apart from that, it supports both Mac and Windows, so you can use it on different devices.
Ready to try one of the integrations? Click here to get the Chrome extension
I have tried to cover ProWritingAid's features in as much detail as I could in this ProWritingAid review. However, I strongly suggest that you try the tool yourself to understand firsthand how powerful this tool is.
Still wondering if this tool is right for you?
Perhaps a pros and cons list is exactly what you need…
ProWritingAid Review: Benefits, Drawbacks, and Pricing
In this section of my ProWritingAid review, I'll go over the pros and cons of ProWritingAid that I have noticed after using this tool personally. This ProWritingAid review would not be complete without looking at both sides of the coin.
I will also cover the product's pricing details to help you make an informed decision on whether this tool is meant for you or not.
Ready? Let's get into it…
Benefits
- Suitable for all kinds of writers
- Provides detailed reports to improve your writing skills
- Integrates with all major platforms and browsers including Microsoft Word and Google Docs
- No limit on how many words it can edit
- Provides value for the money
- Accurate and comprehensive grammar and style suggestions
- ProWritingAid free trial available and 14-day refund option
- Can be used on both Mac and Windows
Drawbacks
- Many features, which may take users some time to learn
- Can become slow when editing very large documents
Price
You can try the ProWritingAid free trial option. And, if you do decide to get a paid plan, they offer a 14-day money-back guarantee, in case you don't like the tool.
ProWritingAid has two paid plans — Premium and Premium Plus.
Premium
This plan has all the features of ProWritingAid, except for the plagiarism checker. The pricing usually starts at $70 per user per year for one year. However, there is an ongoing discount until April 10, 2020, during which you can get this plan for $52.
Premium Plus
This plan has everything that the premium plan has and also has the plagiarism checker. With this plan, you can do 50 plagiarism checks in a year. The normal price is $80 per year for the 1-year plan and the current discounted price is $60 (until April 10, 2020).
Other Discounts
ProWritingAid also provides bulk-purchase and student discounts on their regular prices.
Here are the bulk purchase discounts that they offer:
- 3-4 licenses: 10% discount
- 5-9 licenses: 15% discount
- 10-15 licenses: 20% discount
- 16 or more licenses: 25% discount
Apart from this, students can get a 20% discount on the Premium plan.
How to Use ProWritingAid
You can use ProWritingAid in 3 different ways:
- Integrate it with the writing platform that you use like Microsoft Word or Google Docs.
- Directly use the app from ProWritingAid's website.
- Use ProWritingAid's browser extension to edit documents online.
I've found ProWritingAid's app interface to be the easiest and most interactive of all the tools I've tried. You can simply copy-paste your text or upload a document and start using it. This is what it looks like:
However, if you want to optimize your writing as you write, then integrating it with your preferred platform before you use ProWritingAid is the best way to go.
ProWritingAid provides numerous integrations, but for the sake of simplicity, I will explain how you can integrate it with Google Docs. It is one of the most popular platforms, along with Microsoft Word, and is used by a majority of people.
Ready to learn how it works?
Here we go…
How to Use ProWritingAid with Google Docs
Before we start, make sure that you have registered your Google email address with ProWritingAid and have bought their Premium plan. If these two conditions are met, then it is fairly simple to install and use ProWritingAid on Google Docs.
Step 1: Find the Google Docs add-on on ProWritingAid's website.
Step 2: Once you click on the install option, the add-on will be automatically installed and visible on Google Docs Interface. It will appear under the “document add-ons” tab in Google Docs.
Step 3: The Google Docs add-on will show all of the ProWritingAid features and reports that you normally see on the app. You can click on any of these to see the detailed report.
However, you do not need to go anywhere to see grammar and style edits as they will appear as colored underlines or highlights within your doc. As soon as you start writing, you will see suggestions to improve your writing.
Yes, it is that simple. No muss, no fuss.
Don't believe me? See what other users have to say about this tool, in the next section of this ProWritingAid review.
What Their Customers Have to Say
FAQs
Q1. Why should I use ProWritingAid?
A. To edit any piece of content that you write and to improve your writing skills over time.
Q2. Can I use ProWritingAid on multiple devices?
A. You can use it on multiple devices with the same license as long as there is only one person using it.
Moreover, it is compatible with both Mac and Windows, so you can use it with any computer or laptop. You can also use the web editor from your mobile browser.
Q3. Is there a word limit?
A. There is no word limit. However, content pieces longer than 150,000 characters (~30,000 words) need to be broken down into different sections.
Please note that it is best to use the app to check 10,000 words or less at a time, to ensure the best results.
Q4. Is my work secure?
A. Yes, your work is completely secure as they don't store your data on their servers. And, only you have access to your documents and no one else can look at them. They also encrypt your data for better privacy and security.
Q5. What is the difference between free and paid plans?
A. The main difference is that ProWritingAid free users only get to edit 500 words at a time, while there is no word limit for Premium plan users. If you're using the tool for free, then you can only do so from their website, not from any other platform.
Another advantage that Premium plan users have is that they can access multiple documents at the same time.
Q6. What is their refund policy?
A. They have a 14-day, complete money-back policy. You can get a refund by emailing them at [email protected].
Q7. Are there extensions for Firefox and Safari as well?
A. Yes, there are extensions for both of these and for Chrome.
Firefox extension | Safari extension | Chrome extension
Q8. If I pay once, will my license auto-renew?
A. No, it will not and you will not be charged automatically. If you want to renew your license, just log into your account and go to our purchase page.
Q9. Are there any discounts for group purchases?
A. Yes, there are discounts on bulk purchases starting from 10% off for 3-4 licenses to 25% off on 16 or more.
ProWritingAid Review: What's the Final Verdict?
It's judgment time! Ready for the final verdict of this ProWritingAid review?
I have been using ProWritingAid for a while now and can confidently say that it is an advanced online language editor. It is exhaustive in terms of the language improvements that it suggests and is fairly easy to use. I might even go as far as to say that it is on par with a human editor.
Overall, I give this tool a big thumbs up!
Try using this tool yourself and share your experience with me in the comments section.
Your method of explaining the whole thing in this post was very effective. Thanks a lot.