Free tool
Readability Checker (Flesch Reading Ease)
Paste an ad, a page or an email: the checker counts sentences, words and syllables, then calculates its Flesch Reading Ease score. The higher it is, the easier the text reads, and the checker shows you which sentences to shorten first.
The Flesch Reading Ease score measures how easy a text is to read from two lengths: sentence length, in words, and word length, in syllables. Rudolf Flesch’s formula is 206.835 − 1.015 × words per sentence − 84.6 × syllables per word. The higher the score, the easier the text is to read.
Reading ease score
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- Sentences
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- Words
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- Syllables
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- Words per sentence
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- Syllables per word
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Your three longest sentences
Formula and levels from Rudolf Flesch, The Art of Readable Writing (1949). Syllables are counted with spelling rules: the score is an estimate.
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How the Flesch Reading Ease score is calculated
Score = 206.835 − 1.015 × (Words ÷ Sentences) − 84.6 × (Syllables ÷ Words)
Two lengths are enough. Each extra word per sentence takes about 1 point off the score, each extra tenth of a syllable per word takes off a little more than 8. The sample text has 16.2 words per sentence and 1.30 syllables per word: its score is 80.7, an easy text.
Flesch published the formula in 1948 and explained how to apply it in The Art of Readable Writing (1949). His scale runs from 0, practically unreadable, to 100, easy for any literate person.
The checker splits sentences at periods, exclamation and question marks and line breaks. It counts a contraction or a hyphenated word as one word, as Flesch did, and leaves numbers written in figures out of the calculation, as he advised. Syllables are counted the way you pronounce the word: asked has one, determined three.
What the score changes in your ads
- The sentences to cut first: the checker ranks your three longest sentences. That is often where the score is lost, and a single cut can raise it by several points.
- A page that matches the ad: the ad is read in a few seconds. A landing page with a much lower score asks the visitor for an effort the ad did not ask for.
- Two versions side by side: paste the current version, then the rewritten one. The score tells you which reads more easily, before you even test it in ads.
Frequently asked questions
What is a good Flesch Reading Ease score?
On Flesch’s scale, 60 to 70 is standard, 70 to 80 fairly easy, 80 to 90 easy and above 90 very easy. Below 50 a text becomes difficult, and below 30 very difficult. An ad or a sales page benefits from aiming at the top of the scale.
Is this the same as the Flesch-Kincaid grade level?
No. Flesch-Kincaid uses the same two lengths but turns them into a US school grade, where a lower number means an easier text. The Reading Ease score runs the other way: the higher, the easier.
How accurate is the score?
It is an estimate. Sentence and word counts are exact; syllables are counted with spelling rules, not a dictionary. Tested against the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary on about 9,300 common words, the rules find the right number of syllables for 94 words out of 100, with about 1 % fewer syllables overall.
What does the checker count as a sentence?
Anything ending with a period, an exclamation mark, a question mark or an ellipsis, plus each line of a list or a heading. Flesch also counted some sentences split by colons or semicolons: the checker does not split them, so its score can be slightly stricter.
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