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Readability checker.
Paste a text. You get its Flesch score and grade level, the average sentence length, the share of sentences over 25 words and of words over 3 syllables, and the three sentences to cut first. Everything stays in your browser.
- Free
- Instant access
- Flesch and grade level
- Unlimited text
What is measured
- Flesch reading ease, 0 to 100
- Flesch-Kincaid grade level
- Words per sentence, syllables per word
- Sentences over 25 words, words over 3 syllables
- Sentences built on a passive
- Words
- 59
- Sentences
- 4
- Words / sentence
- 14.8
- Syllables / word
- 1.54
- Grade level
- 8.4
Standard
Flesch reading ease · grade 8.4
- Flesch reading ease of 60 or more 61 · Standard
- Grade level 9 or below grade 8.4
- Under 20 words per sentence 14.8 words
- Few sentences over 25 words 1 of 4 · 25%
- Few words over 3 syllables 3 of 59 · 5%
- Little passive voice 1 of 4 sentences
Longest sentences
- 28 words
When a sentence runs past twenty-five words, carries two subordinate clauses and ends on a qualification whose subject the reader has already forgotten, the point goes with it.
- 14 words
Cut it in two and the score climbs before you change a single word.
- 9 words
Most pages lose their reader in the first paragraph.
Suggestions
The text reads well overall. One sentence of 28 words and one passive are the two things left to look at.
- Words
- Sentences
- Words / sentence
- Syllables / word
- Grade level
Longest sentences
Suggestions
The text reads well: every main readability check passes.
How to read the report.
- 01
The score, then the grade
Flesch reading ease runs from 0 to 100; 60 to 70 is where most web readers are comfortable. The grade level says the same thing as a US school year. Both come from two ratios only: words per sentence and syllables per word.
- 02
Sentences first
The share of sentences over 25 words is the number that moves fastest. The checker quotes the three longest, with their word count. Split those and the score climbs before you touch a single word choice.
- 03
Passive voice, counted
Sentences built on an auxiliary and a participle are counted. One in ten is ordinary prose. One in three reads as evasive. The detection reads the pattern, so check the quoted sentences along with the number.
Written to be read to the end.
Google ranks on what readers do, far more than on a Flesch score, and readers stay with a text they can follow. A sentence of 35 words loses half its readers before the verb, and the page that keeps them past the first paragraph is the one that earns the time, the scroll and the link.
The two ratios behind the score are easy to move in the wrong direction. A specialist writes long sentences because the ideas are connected, and long words because they are the right words. The fix is one idea per sentence, with the long word kept where it belongs.
Run the checker on the article that gets the most impressions with the least time on page. Cut the three sentences it quotes. That is a twenty-minute edit, and it is usually the one that changes the behaviour Google actually measures.
Questions
- What is a good readability score?
- For a general web audience, a Flesch Reading Ease between 60 and 70, roughly an eighth to ninth grade reading level. Technical or professional content sits lower, and that works; what matters is matching the level your reader expects. Legal and medical writing routinely scores under 30 by necessity.
- Does readability affect SEO?
- Indirectly: Google ranks on what readers do, and readability shapes that behavior. Text that is hard to read gets abandoned, while a visit that lasts is the one that converts or earns a link. Readability is a conversion and retention lever that happens to help SEO.
- How is the Flesch Reading Ease calculated?
- From two ratios: average sentence length in words, and average syllables per word. The formula is 206.835 minus 1.015 times the first, minus 84.6 times the second. Longer sentences and longer words push the score down. That is why splitting sentences is the fastest way to raise a score, faster than hunting for shorter synonyms.
- What does the grade level mean?
- The Flesch-Kincaid grade level translates the same two ratios into a US school grade: 8 means an eighth grader can follow the text comfortably. Most web content sits between 7 and 9. Above 12 is college reading, which suits a research paper and is too demanding for a product page.
- Why does passive voice matter?
- Passive constructions add words and hide who does what: "the page was updated" leaves out who updated it. A handful is normal English; a page built from them reads as evasive and takes longer to parse. The checker counts the sentences built on an auxiliary plus a participle so you can decide which ones earn their place. The detection is approximate: it reads the pattern of the words.
- Is this readability checker free?
- Yes: free, unlimited in length and number of texts, and ready to use right on this page. Everything is computed locally in your browser, so everything you paste stays on your device.
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One text is a check. Every article is a standard.
Tonaily writes every article at the reading level its audience expects, scores it before it ships and tracks what readers do after. Connect your site and see which pages it would rewrite first.
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