Readability scores estimate how much effort a piece of text demands. They are blunt instruments — they count syllables and sentence lengths, not meaning — but they reliably catch the two things that make writing hard to follow: sentences that run too long, and long words used where short ones would do.
How to use the Readability Analyser
- Paste the text you want to analyse
- Read the Flesch Reading Ease score and the grade level
- Look at the average sentence length — over about 20 words is usually where trouble starts
- Split long sentences and replace unnecessary jargon, then re-check
Interpreting the Flesch Reading Ease score
The scale runs from 0 to 100, with higher meaning easier.
- 90–100 — very easy. Roughly 5th-grade level.
- 60–70 — plain English, understood by most 13–15 year olds. This is the target for general web writing.
- 30–50 — difficult. Typical of academic and professional prose.
- 0–30 — very difficult. Legal and heavily technical text lives here.
For most public-facing writing, 60 or above is a reasonable goal. Technical documentation for a specialist audience can sit lower without being badly written.
What the score cannot tell you
The formula counts words per sentence and syllables per word. It has no model of meaning, so it can be gamed and it can be wrong.
Chopping every sentence in half raises the score while making the text choppy and harder to follow. Jargon made of short words — 'the build broke on the dev box after the last push' — scores as easy but is opaque to anyone outside the team. Conversely, a long word that is the correct and familiar term for your audience costs you points for no real loss.
Use the score to find suspicious passages, then read them.
Frequently asked questions
What reading level should I aim for?
For general web content, grade 8–10 (Flesch 60–70). Most major newspapers sit around grade 9. Specialist technical writing can reasonably be higher if the audience is genuinely specialist.
How is the grade level calculated?
From the Flesch–Kincaid formula, which combines average words per sentence and average syllables per word into an approximate US school grade.
Why did my score drop when I added a proper noun?
Long names count as long words. Company names, place names and technical terms all push syllable counts up. This is a known limitation — ignore the penalty when the long word is unavoidable.
Are syllable counts exact?
They are estimated by an algorithm, since English spelling does not map reliably to syllables. It is accurate for most words but will miscount some irregular ones, so treat the score as approximate.