Slick Write
Check your grammar in seconds.
Slick Write is a powerful, free application that makes it easy to check your writing for grammar errors, potential stylistic mistakes, and other features of interest. Whether you're a blogger, novelist, SEO professional, or student writing an essay for school, Slick Write can help take your writing to the next level. Curious? See why Slick Write is the best. Try the interactive demo , or check your own document . No software download or installation is required.
Why Slick Write?
The grammar checker is lightning fast
Customizable feedback to suit your style
We do not redistribute your documents
Add impact to reports
Improve your grades
Engage your audience
Inspire confidence
English is a difficult language, so using correct grammar and diverse vocabulary will set you apart from the crowd. Using good sentence structure and wording improves your content's impact and readability while building your readers' trust. Slick Write goes beyond spell checking to teach you the habits of effective writers. How does your writing rate?
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The job market is competitive. Gain an advantage, impress employers, and land more interviews by demonstrating professionalism and superior communication skills on your resumé.
Get the extensions
Using an extension is the easiest way to submit your work to Slick Write. They are available for Chrome and Firefox .
Bust your writer's block, and create new metaphors by playing the word association game . To begin, type a word or phrase in the box below, and hit enter. To quickly find associations for your own text, highlight a word or phrase in it, and use the toolbox popup.
The associator learns contextual word associations from real literature, so it may return offensive results.
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- Submission Limit There is a limit of 200,000 characters, which is approximately 30,000 words. Anything longer should be submitted in smaller chunks, or it will be automatically trimmed.
- No document It looks like you forgot to enter your document. Paste it in and try again.
- Structure This tab shows sentence structure within the context of the document. Hover over a sentence to see its word count. Select a word or phrase, or click a sentence to get more information.
- Quotes This tab shows your quotations highlighted as Slick Write sees them.
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- Sentence type flow Pieces with good flow will make use of all four sentence types, varying them to keep the reader interested.
- Sentence length flow Sentence length is indirectly related to sentence type, and is a good indicator of flow. Flow can be altered by adding, removing, lengthening, shortening, combining, or splitting sentences. Long sentences will be indicated by a red line on the graph. Sentences that flow poorly with their surroundings will be orange, and the source of the problem can often be found in a nearby sentence.
- Word length flow Word length is a minor contributor to overall flow, but even minor variations are signs of good rhythm.
- Passive Voice Index This is a measure of how frequently the passive voice is used. Consider revising your document if it scores over 100.
- Prepositional Phrase Index This is a measure of how frequently prepositional phrases are used. Consider revising your document if it scores over 100.
- Average sentence length Sentence length is a major contributor to the level of education required to read a body of text.
- Sentence length standard deviation This is a measure of the amount of variation in the length of a text's sentences. In texts that have broad appeal, this tends to fall between 50 and 90% of the average sentence length. You can increase this number by making long sentences longer, and short ones shorter.
- Sentence deviation to length ratio This is a measure of the sentence variety, and a major contributor to flow. Most novels score between 0.5 and 0.9, and popular ones often score near the high end of the range. You can increase this number by making long sentences longer, and short ones shorter.
- Just the stats preset Use this preset when you're only interested in the stats tab. Critique and Flow will be hidden.
- Honesty preset This preset checks for common indicators of deception, either by lying or omission, and is based on the findings of this study . Areas with high concentrations of these indicators should be viewed with skepticism. Note that the presence or absence of these indicators does not guarantee that a statement is true or false, and that the study was done on spoken communications, so it might be more applicable to interviews and speeches. As always, use your brain.
- Doubled words A word used twice in a row may be a typo.
- Commonly confused words This will check for the internet's most frequently confused words and notify you if it looks like you misused one. It is experimental and probably the least reliable feature. Consult a dictionary when necessary.
- Sentences starting with the same word A word should not be used to start more than one sentence in a single paragraph.
- Misplaced conjunctions It is considered poor style to place coordinating conjunctions at either end of a sentence. Placing a subordinating conjunction at the end of a sentence is against the rules.
It is said that one day, passive voice will bring weakness to your prose.
More information » Even more information »
- Overwriting Words like "very" and "really" make sentences wordier and weaken your message. These can be deleted in almost all cases without affecting the meaning of the sentence.
- Abstract words Abstract words lack specificity and overusing them can make even simple concepts difficult to understand. There are times when abstract words are desirable or even necessary; it would be difficult to write about math or programming without mentioning variables or functions, but you should use more specific terms whenever possible.
- Wordy and redundant phrases These phrases make your writing more difficult to understand. In most cases, they can be replaced with one or two words, or even deleted.
- Legalese These antiquated, arcane words and phrases will make your writing look like a contract.
- Double negatives Double negatives are almost always poor style.
- Adverbs They aren't bad in small quantities, but consider revising your document if more than 5.5% of its words are adverbs. Adverbs ending in "-ly" are considered the worst offenders.
- Adjectives They aren't bad in small quantities. A few of the words on this list can also function as other parts of speech. You have been warned.
- Contractions In formal writing, the use of contractions is considered a fault.
The boxer decked his opponent.
- Profanity Profanity should not be used in formal writing outside of direct quotations.
The critic's scathing review hit the nail on the head .
- Similes Similes and metaphors should be used sparingly. This option will detect most common types of similes.
- "Said" replacements Some people think that these substitutes for "said" are weak or obnoxious, especially if overused.
Her dress was long , and it touched the floor.
Her long dress touched the floor.
- Gender-specific pronouns Avoid using gender-specific pronouns in formal writing when the subject's gender is unknown.
- Weasel words Like abstract words, weasel words and phrases lack specificity. At best, they convey uncertainty. At worst, they can be used to "weasel out" of telling the truth in a straightforward manner. When checking a document that is speculative by nature, you might want to disable this detector.
- Third person pronouns According to this study , high concentrations of third person pronouns may indicate deception.
- Bias language These words and phrases often show the author's bias.
- Uncommon words Uncommon words will increase the document's reading difficulty.
Hot peppers burn my mouth, but I eat them anyway .
Since burritos taste good , I like to eat them.
- Sentence fragments A sentence must have at least one noun and one verb. Anything that does not is a fragment, and if it occurs outside of dialog, it should probably be rewritten.
- Long sentences Long sentences tend to be more difficult to read, making them good candidates for trimming or splitting. Alternatively, parallelism may be used to improve their readability, though this will not decrease the ARI score.
- Success with Style: Using Writing Style to Predict the Success of Novels
- Grammar Girl For your obscure writing questions
- Basic Prose and Style Mechanics An excellent, concise resource
- Television Tropes & Idioms Tricks of the trade
- Writing Realistic Injuries An invaluable article for anyone who writes action or horror
- Online Etymology Dictionary Learn the history of English words
- Scribophile Discuss the finer points of writing with other novelists
- Suggestions from the official See Sharp Press blog Learn about the mistakes that will keep your novel from being published.
- Smashwords Easy ebook distribution for indie authors
- Duotrope Find and learn about publishers
- CreateSpace
- Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing
- Creative Writing Prompts and Exercises Spark your creativity
- RhymeZone A popular rhyming dictionary
- Seventh Sanctum Name generators and more
- Apache OpenOffice The best free office software
- Literature & Latte Makers of the popular Scrivener editor
Did you find a bug? Do you want us to add a new feature? We would love to hear about it.