What are the best apps to improve my writing?

The short answer

The best apps to improve your writing are the ones that show you why something is weak, not only what to change. Hemingway Editor shows you your long sentences and passive voice. ProWritingAid gives you reports on repetition, pacing and overused words. iA Writer’s Style Check flags clichés, fillers and clutter. Grammarly catches spelling, grammar and tone wherever you type. Wretify, for nonfiction, names each grammar mistake it fixes and questions your argument without rewriting it.

In our view, a correction you accept without reading teaches you nothing: the same mistake comes back in the next chapter. An app that explains is slower on the day and faster over a year.

Fixing your writing or improving it — what is the difference?

An app that fixes changes the text for you: accept the suggestion and the sentence is correct. An app that improves your writing shows you a pattern — you use the passive voice, you start three sentences in a row the same way, your argument skips a step — so that you stop doing it. Many apps do both. When choosing, look at how much each one explains, and at whether it can leave your voice alone.

Hemingway Editor — see your sentences clearly

Hemingway colours long and complex sentences, passive voice and words with simpler alternatives, and gives a readability score. It is a fast way to learn what makes your own sentences hard to read. The web editor is free; the desktop app costs $19.99 once and has no AI; Plus, from $100 a year, adds AI rewrites.

ProWritingAid — reports on your habits

ProWritingAid’s more than 25 reports look at repetition, sticky sentences, pacing, structure and overused words across a whole document, which makes it good at showing the habits that only appear over many pages. It says that it will never write your work for you. Free up to 500 words per check.

iA Writer — a quieter page and a style check

iA Writer’s Focus Mode highlights only the sentence you are writing, and its Style Check flags clichés, fillers and clutter on your device. Its Authorship feature marks text pasted from an AI, so you always know which words are yours. One-time purchase from $29.99.

Grammarly — correction everywhere you write

Grammarly checks spelling, grammar and tone in the browser, in Word and Outlook, and on your phone, which makes it the easiest to have with you all the time. It also rewrites and generates text, so it is worth deciding in advance how much of your wording you want it to change. Free, or Pro at $30 a month or $144 a year.

Wretify — an AI that questions your writing instead of rewriting it

Wretify is a writing app for nonfiction. Its AI has read everything you have written and refuses to write for you, so what it offers is questions: select a passage and ask it to explain what the passage is doing, find the blind spot it rests on, test the logic of the argument, or spot a habit you keep repeating. Its grammar pass fixes only what is broken and tells you by name what was wrong, so you stop making the mistake.

How Wretify compares to other writing apps →