Word Counter Reading Level Feature

Word Counter reading level tool
One of the tracking features Word Counter provides in the “Details” section on the right side of the tool is a Reading Level. Of all the metrics the tool keeps track of, this is probably the one we receive the most questions about. With that in mind, we felt it would be beneficial to try to explain in a little bit more detail how this metric works and what exactly it means.

First and foremost, Reading Level isn’t a reflection of your writing skill in any way. You may have excellent writing which ranks at a fourth-grade reading level, while you may have substandard writing which ranks at the college reading level. There seems to be an assumption by many that a higher Reading Level rank means the writing is better. That is, a Reading Level at a college level is better writing than a Reading Level at a tenth-grade level. This is not what this metric is measuring.

The only thing the Reading Level tries to do is give an indicator of the education level a person would need to have in order to understand the words you’re using in your writing. It’s not meant to be a ranking of your writing ability in any way. It’s simply a general guideline so you can anticipate what education level a person would need to have to understand what you have written.

WordCounter assesses Reading Level by using the Dale–Chall readability formula. This formula uses 3,000 common words a fourth grader should understand as its foundation. Basically, if you use only the words found in the list of 3,000 words when you write, your Reading Level rank will be at a fourth-grade level. As you use more words which are not on the list of 3,000 words, the Reading Level will increase. The more words you use that fall outside the core 3,000-word list, the higher level of reading the Reading Level feature will assign to your writing.

When you first begin to type in the text area, Reading Level will display as N/A. In order for a Reading Level to appear, you will need to write a minimum of two sentences. The number of sentences is part of the formula used, and the more sentences in the writing, the more accurate the Readability Level will be. There’s a need for a two-sentence minimum to begin to make an accurate Reading Level determination.

With this in mind, when the metric shows your writing at “college level,” what it’s saying is that you’re using a significant number of words in your writing which a fourth grader won’t be familiar with. If the Reading Level says fourth-grade level, then a fourth-grader would understand the vast majority of the words you used in your writing. If the metric says a seventh-grade level, you’re using some words that a typical fourth-grader wouldn’t understand, but not as many as would be in the writing to rank the Reading Level at the college level.

Reading Level may be important for a number of reasons. If you are attempting to target your article, story or other writing to a specific audience who may be at a certain reading grade level, this metric can help make sure you’re not writing over their heads. At the same time, you may not want your writing to come across as too simplistic by using only common words elementary students would understand, and want to raise the number and variety of vocabulary in your writing to appeal to a higher educated reader.

(Photo courtesy of Kate Ter Haar)

    • Um.. this feature is bad. I was writing a very basic thing and it said I was college level. I’m sure all 4th graders would understand it.

        • when i wrote this clearly rubbish sentence it took me from HS to college LOL:

          “The interrelational level of the synaptic exchange between various idea that, in a post-structural sort of analysis, give way to all the meandering tropes which make up our existences through an intersectional framework all add to the propinquity of intradimensional experiences, all within a subpar trope that mellifluously delineates all our existences’ sakes. “

          • It’s due to the use of higher-level dictionary terms. While it is completely gibberish and makes no sense, passing the paragraph to a typical fourth grader would leave them rather confused about 90% of the words used; the metric uses what a fourth grader would typically understand as the baseline and goes up from there based on the commonality of words pulled from the dictionary it uses for the formula.

          • I doubt a 4th grader would know what a sub-par trope is. Therefore, it’s probably at a level where only college students/graduates would UNDERSTAND it, not necessarily find it sensical.

          • It probably calls that college level because those are real college level words just in a nonsense order.

          • But that really seems complicated…. even I couldn’t really understand it…

          • This is BS! I’m in high school and I’m not a junior high school level. Are you trying to make me mad?!! This tool is way off base and you need to fix it so I don’t get angry every time I come here.

          • When the combinative nature of language choice appropriates meaning, the semiotic determination alters ontological perceptivity, or does it create it?

          • @schnee don’t mean to but coulnd’t help noticing your comprehensive skills when admin emphasized that this function is NOT “a writing level feature”. The fact that this software is freely available for us students to access and use is a huge blessing enough (thank you wordcounter team). You got to understand the costs involved with publishing a more enhanced version of this software unless you wanna help donate on behalf of us and I’ll rest my case. Why not make a trip to the nearest lecturer/ tutor/ teacher/ college-level human and get your document proofread there!

          • It does not see the correctness of the content, just the vocabulary as compared to a fourth-grader. A great tool!!

          • I’m in high school and the words meandering, intersectional, subpar ormellifluously are to big of words for me

          • I’m going to take a stab at making sense of it…

            “The interrelational level of the synaptic exchange between various idea”
            (if ideas is pluralized) = making mental connections to the exchange of ideas in a system of connected relationships

            “that, in a post-structural sort of analysis,”
            = using a post-structural approach, looking at the object itself and the cultural/historical context to reveal underlying structures of knowledge

            “give way to all the meandering tropes which make up our existences”
            = the exchange mentioned above could reveal a stream of cliches that define ourselves

            through an intersectional framework
            = considering all the aspects that make our identities and life experiences

            all add to the propinquity of intradimensional experiences
            = add to our closeness to experiences within this dimension or plane of existence

            , all within a subpar trope that mellifluously delineates all our existences’ sakes
            = using a faulty cliche that mellowly shapes the purpose of our experiences

            Sooooo, you’re basically saying that if you use a “post-structural” approach to look at how people grasp exchanged ideas, you will find that there are a bunch of cliches believed by these people about themselves because of their set of identity traits, which add to the closeness to their experiences in this world through a lousy cliche that gives them purpose.

            I took it down to high school level (I had to separate it into more than one sentence for it to register), but it does make sense (somewhat)! I’m not sure I agree that a post-structural approach is useful for that conclusion, but I do think that internalized tropes based on our intersectional traits dictate our own sense of purpose sometimes… Although something tells me that my interpretation of your intended thoughts may be a bit off! 🙂

          • Using uncommon words to make it complex. A massive number of pedants follow this practice. Great example =)

          • I guess the feature stupidly enough doesn’t take grammar into account because this paragraph is riddled with them. intradimensional isn’t even a word, to begin with.

        • using words like alteration and personification make it collage and im 12 doing a school assessment (I am the best in the country at my age)

          • I can’t help but think that if you were the best in your country, you’d be able to spell alliteration and personification.

          • Kaeli, you do realise that they spelled personification right and alteration is a real word and they might not have meant alliteration. I can’t help but think that if you’re going to be shady like that you’d at least point out their actual errors such as “collage” and “anoymus.” Just saying….

          • I really do believe that you are lying about being the best in the country, you don’t really have the best grammar or spelling…. Who told you that you are the best in the country?

          • Yes, you’re the best in the country but can’t spell college. Good luck to you, buddy.

          • Dear ‘anoymos’
            Considering the fact that you are learning about personification and what i’m assuming is alliteration when you are twelve makes it highly unbelievable that you are the smartest twelve year old in what i’m assuming is a first world developed country such as USA or England in which case if you were to be the smartest twelve year old there you would be far more advanced in the English language than to be going over some poetry terms of which that I learnt when I was 9. I live in New Zealand and am currently 13 and partaking in NCEA Level 1 English, level 2 Physics and History and Level 3 Maths, Biology and Chemistry. So I heavily doubt that you are “the best in the country” for your age.

            As a part-time internet hobo I am fully entitled to write this.

          • Bloody hell, you all take yourselves far too seriously. It was a little kid making a blatantly untrue comment which you didn’t need to take so to heart… chill. out.

          • Odd that you are the best when you can not spell “Anonymous” at 12 years old.

          • Chanel No 1, please calm down. Yes, OP is probably not the most intelligent guy/girl ever, but neither are you. (I also live in New Zealand, and I’m studying second-year Engineering at Massey University at the age of 15.)

            If you’re going to be condescending on the internet, at least use your real name.

          • Guys, You do realize there are other people with the name anonymous so he didn’t spell it wrong, it was just taken so he had to make another anonymous related name. Also he did spell Personification and Alteration right and it doesn’t have to be alliteration. and he might have had a typo or auto-correct or something make it collage, even on the computer it can happen. And yes, he may not be the smartest person in his country at his age, but I’m pretty sure none of you are either, but we all say to ourselves I am the best, I can make it. We encourage ourselves. Now quit discouraging this guy and let him be, because he doesn’t know all the words in the world and neither do any of you!!!! SO ENCOURAGE THIS MAN! YOU ARE THE SMARTEST AT YOUR AGE AND YOU CAN BECOME SMARTER AND MAKE IT THROUGH LIFE WITHOUT ALL THESE DISCOURAGERS AND HATERS STANDING IN YOUR WAY!!!!!

            I know I sound a bit to dramatic and overprotective but I’m only saying this because y’all are dissing his thoughts and beliefs and his tiny little errors that he might not have made. I can’t help but think if y’all are gonna discourage him like that, you’d at least all try to be the best in your countries too. Which I’m not. And neither are any of you!

          • That statement frustrates me because you spelled three words incorrectly and one of them was your username.
            P.S. I am the same age as you are.

          • I never thought a simple word counting website would host so much… salt.

            Perfect for popcorn!

            Fight on. Angry egotistical preteens!

            Fill the world with your trials of intellectual superiority!

            DESTROY

          • Why are you all coming at a 12 year old like this… What kind of superiority issues are you all dealing with…

          • Hahahahahahahah u can’t even spell them words right. Im pretty sure you’re not best in the country for your age.

          • Guys just calm down this is site he just wanted to say something about the result he got on the site for his writing level. give him a break this is not about being the best in your country or what ever i am in an all French school where we have to learn all our english outside of school so most likely I have a whole bunch of mistakes and my sentences are too long but that doesnt matter. what matters is the message that he was trying to get accross like fiftey other prople writing comments on this page. Calm down!!!!!!!

            I am 13 and quiet stupid for my age but I know not to pick on an innocent comment.

          • using words like alteration and personification make it collage and im 12 doing a school assessment (I am the best in the country at my age)

            – ALLITERATION, not alteration.
            – COLLEGE, not collage, which is a completely different thing.
            – I’M, not im.
            – PUNCTUATION?

            You are most likely an average student for your grade, definitely not “the best in the country” at your age. Obviously not.

            Anoymos, you should work on your English.

          • HOW DO YOU KNOW THAT anoymos WILL EVEN READ YOUR COMMENTS

            AND JUST USE A DIFFERENT WORD COUNTING SYSTEM… LIKE “word”, or another website DUH!

          • I’d like to point a few things out to you, as you seem to have a misconception. To begin with, college is spelled with an e, not an a, as you spelled it collage. That is an entirely different word that means a piece of art made by attaching pieces of paper, often from articles or magazines, to another sheet of paper. Next, anonymous, such as in your username, is actually spelled a-n-o-n-y-m-o-u-s, rather than anoymos. I also do not understand how spell check did not catch that, as while collage is a real word in the English language, anoymos is not. I am typing it here and spell check automatically changed it to anomy’s. I had to change it back.

            I’m has a capital I and an apostrophe. You lack beginning-of-sentence capitalization and no period appears at the end. Also, best in the country by what standard? You should realize that, as I was 12 on March 8, 2016, I clearly have better spelling and grammar than you do, and therefore would be ahead of you according to whatever flawed ranking system you are using. Even if I am not first, you could never be, because I am ahead of you. Even if you were second, which is most certainly not correct, that’s still not first. I would then be. You should also realize that these kinds of rankings have ties of several hundred or thousand people. If you get a perfect score on a standardized test of some sort, you do not receive precedence in the ranking over all others with the same score. If that were true, I would be 1st in Michigan as far as 7th-grade ELA scores go, ahead of every single 7th grader in the state! There are quite clearly ties. How else would they establish first, second, and so on?

            I must say, I detest nothing more than liars and tellers of untruths who brag about fake, easy to earn, and redundant accomplishments, or have overinflated egos but nothing to be proud of. How many of you can claim a 35 on ACT writing before 8th grade? How many can even claim that as juniors or seniors in high school?

          • Excuse you, I think being “the best in the country at your age” is a little bit off. Have you gone against any other 12 year-olds outside of your city? I think not. And if you HAVE, actually, used some sort of system that measured you against all those other 12 year-olds, please inform me, for I will gladly supply you with an apology.

          • Guys, this is a 12 year old we’re talking about. And those of you who are literally picking apart the entire sentence and username need to calm down lol. I’m betting that you were extra careful writing your corrections as you usually may write carelessly and more conveniently when writing in an informal tone on the internet.

            Also none of you even considered the fact that they may be an international student who’s first language is not English. They may be at the top of their class or be ONE OF THE top students in their country for other reasons aside from their English skills, especially if that is not one of their core classes. And even so, who’s to say the country is not poor in education, top rank of a country does not mean the kid has top skills on a global scale.

            The fact of the matter is, if you’re actually spending time correcting this kid and telling them that they are most definitely not at the top of their class then you’re being close minded and petty. Please find something better to do with your time.

          • I’m going to be completely honest here. I was actually the most intellgent pre-peubescent in the country. I boast prior Intelligence Quotients of 159 and 170 at the ages of 11 and 12, respectively. I received my Graduate Equivalent Diploma when I was still 12, and I began attending Moorpark College the next semester. Having received my Associate’s Degree from Moorpark, I transferred to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (#3 undergraduate establishment in the world; #1 for undergraduate engineering and applied sciences) at the age of 14. Now completing my senior research at the age of 16, I am have undertaken immunooncology, the study of curing cancer through means of developing an immunity treatment that causes the T-Cells to fight off any cancerous cells. Anyways, so before I’m 18, I will already have a $100,000 job while all of you neanderthals are arguing about who has the ‘superior appendages.’ And anybody that does not understand what that means has no place to participate in an argument that relates to intelligence. I truly feel that our youth is spiraling into inadequacy. As quoted in Catch-22; “Some men are born mediocre. Some men achieve mediocrity, and others have mediocrity thrust upon them.” I’m sure anybody here could guess which group I believe demonstrates the “innovators of tomorrow.” (for anybody that does not understand this satire, the answer is the first clause).

          • Congratulations. You’re a certified genius. Thank you for proving your superiority. I will now get down on my knees and worship you. Exactly what I needed today.
            Also, maybe our youth just has other priorities. Like fun. Anyway, now that you “am have undertaken immunooncology” could you maybe please leave this kid and the rest of us neanderthals alone and go back to your $100,000 job instead of telling us this stuff here. You could be expanding your mind right now-or better yet, exploring the meaning of life. I bid you farewell and adieu, Mr. Einstein.

          • Hey, look, y’all, calm down. It’s a 12-year old kid, and you guys are shooting him down. Maybe he’s not the best, but all of you responding aren’t either. I feel as if some of these answers have employed the usage of thesauruses to make you sound smarter.

            Also, Anonymous who commented on January 3, 2017, you need to calm down too. Your post was simply stating how amazing you are at everything, and you need to realize that no matter how good you think you are, you are not the best. Yeah, I admit you’re pretty good at what you’re doing, but I can’t even say you’re telling the truth.

            As you quoted, “Some men are born mediocre. Some men achieve mediocrity, and others have mediocrity thrust upon them.”

            I feel as if in that quote you’re trying to say you’re a genius. Also, if y’all are going to pick me apart for defending one person who thinks he’s the best and tearing down another one – well, to that I say, one is twelve and one is 16 and obviously isn’t telling the truth.

            Also, whoever posted the first comment was just playing around, and I don’t think what he did should create this huge swamp of people criticizing each other. Everyone, please calm down and stop boasting.

          • Okay guys, come on, a twelve year old simply felt like boasting, I mean, maybe his ego should take it down a notch, or two, or ten, regardless, no harm done, if he wants to be Donald Trump, then let him be Donald Trump (just stop him before he runs for president), as for you other boastful buffoons (and yes, I have good provocation to call you that) need to calm down, if you truly are a genius, then you would be out there helping people rather than picking on some poor (and mildly uninformed) kid about a claim that shouldn’t matter to anyone that actually has a life. Before you shred me to bits, keep in mind that every second you spend taking me out, you could be saving lives, or at least someone’s ego, I an specifically talking to you ‘Channel No 1’ and ‘Anonymous’. If you really feel you need to take someone’s ego down, do it to yourself first.

          • I believe you lads are getting baited. I believe even a 12-year-old could understand what the mysterious red line located under the mistakes would mean. And with so many mistakes within a single sentence, I doubt this could be a simple form of ironic stupidity. I’m sure their’s some child giggling on the other side of the screen at all of the replies he’s gotten from a simple comment.

          • Being the smartest 12 year old in your country must mean most of your country isn’t able to access proper education, considering the so called smartest 12 year old in it doesn’t know basic grammar and punctuation. I think by “country”, you meant “in my mind”.

      • I agree. I had input my whole short story and got a 9th/10th grade level.
        Then I erased it and typed, “The dog eats sandwiches”. That merits a College Graduate level.

        I am fairly certain most of us knew all those words, well before grade 4.

        • You must have left other text in the text area; “The dog eats sandwiches” is too short to register a reading level.

          • Actually, I typed in “The dog eats sandwiches,” and nothing else, and it did indeed register “College Graduate.” It also registered a reading time of 1 minute.

          • Not sure why that is happening — I tried to confirm, but it’s not doing it for me. it shouldn’t register anything until you write a minimum of two sentences. What browser are you using?

          • You are right, I put it in and it said ‘N/A’ indicating that the statement is too short.

          • Probably, the reading level i.e. “college graduate” was for the story you wrote and deleted.

        • I put “The. Dog. Eats. Sandwiches. and it answered “4th grade.” While that may not be a College Graduate, the situation is still clearly ridiculous.

          • I tried that out and guess what, when I typed “The. Dog. E” it said 11-12th grade reading level.

        • In all honesty, why would some one on the internet looking at the word counter website not be able to recognize, “The dog eats sandwiches.” ? If you can not realize that it is super basic, then you should just get off this website, and stop trolling the Admin and let him do his job for the people who actually are having concerning problems. Thanks.

          • THANK YOU! Serious authors use this website as well. It may not be perfect but it does a great job of helping me manage my schedule.

        • Lol!! I’m pretty sure that most preschool-kindergarten students would understand that sentence! Maybe the system was slow because you had just deleted a lot of writing?

      • I also agree with you… when i just wrote 2 paragraphs, it said that it was an 11th grade to 12th grade reading level…. this feature should be fixed….

      • I have noticed i have had the same issue with some of my reports and presentations i was doing for a stu.go. meeting at my school.

      • 13 Colonies Trade
        By
        Cristian S

        I wrote this and it said that im 11-12 grade
        Hello my name is Noah and i’m from the Southern colonies which are Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. And i’m going to tell you about my trade, the process, my colonial life, and conclusion.Hello
        So you’re probably thinking what my job is well i’m a tanner. That means that I tan leather and give it to the tailor and the tailor make shoes out of it or anything else made out of leather.

    • I wrote this and it said I was a college graduate. Try it out and copy and paste it!

      I love Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs, and Paragraphs. I can write that too. I like cheese.

      • I am in grade nine and am writing a story on a shady dude in Colombia. It says “College Graduate” so i assume the word “cannabis” is putting the scores up.

        • I happen to be twelve and knowledgeable enough to understand the word cannabis as well as a few others. Clearly the reading level system is glitchy.

          • No, I don’t think it is. I think it was designed for other things than people intentionally trying to make it glitch.

    • What I think it should do is ask for your grade level, then record the words you use, then if your grade level using a certain word enough it will add to the list, that way its like a self updating survey. This way it will truly every year know how smart, or stupid 4th graders – college people are.

    • I just typed 50 words and it said it was 9-10th grade:
      First of all, its like stale bread with only 11 other players (to my 40) here except for a few totally fortunate people who typed in a bunch of random numbers. I don’t mean to boast, but it’s the unfortunate, sad, brutally truthful way to say. This is 50 words.

      • I typed 50 words too, it said I am a College Graduate… I’m in my high school class, doing absolutely nothing!

  • tbh i wanna know the highest grade level or like and entire reading level rubric thing and it’s not provided. as soon as it’s on here i’ll be happy ok.

    • How the reading level is calculated:

      Select several 100-word samples throughout the text.
      Compute the average sentence length in words (divide the number of words by the number of sentences).
      Compute the percentage of words NOT on the Dale–Chall word list of 3,000 easy words.
      Compute this equation
      Raw score = 0.1579*(PDW) + 0.0496*(ASL) + 3.6365

      Where:

      Raw score = uncorrected reading grade of a student who can answer one-half of the test questions on a passage.
      PDW = Percentage of difficult words not on the Dale–Chall word list.
      ASL = Average sentence length
      Finally, to compensate for the “grade-equivalent curve,” apply the following chart for the Final Score:

      Raw score — Final score
      4.9 and below — Grade 4 and below
      5.0–5.9 — Grades 5–6
      6.0–6.9 — Grades 7–8
      7.0–7.9 — Grades 9–10
      8.0–8.9 — Grades 11–12
      9.0–9.9 — Grades 13–15 (college)
      10 and above — Grades 16 and above.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Readability

      • Congratulations on developing such a unique tool. I use word counter frequently given the unreliability of the Common App’s text box(40 minutes limit).

        I wish all the admins the best of luck in the future.

        Post Scriptum: Love your website!

        • Enough is enough. I’m glad to get to the end of this. I am a compelled reader and have to read anything to the very end. This time it’s 90% BS. Have a wonderful holiday.

  • This system isn’t very good, as I was typing words basic middle school students should know, instead they commented that I’m at a college graduate level. Unless if this is counting people of which is below their reading level, it really needs to be fixed.

    • I wouldn’t be too sure about that.

      As a “middle school student” I was ALREADY reading “at a college level”, or close to it. Because I enjoyed reading, and would read a lot for pleasure outside of school.

      Furthermore, students are regularly forced to encounter and learn new words and concepts as they go through a school year, with the aim of expanding their vocabulary. Indeed, even adults still continually learn new words as a reader, too. There is no reason that people can’t read “above” their “grade level”; in fact, such things are to be encouraged and celebrated. It’s more a matter of minimum requirements.

      Reading Level should be considered not as the actual average reading capabilities at that grade (which will change over the course of the year anyway, and might change from year to year and also would be really hard to calculate, in comparison), so much as the MINIMUM education a person should be expected to ALREADY have, in order to understand a passage. But a person can be better-educated than the “minimum” standards, pretty easily. Especially in something like reading, where it’s fairly easy to expand your skills outside of school.

      Therefore, you can write in a manner where, yes, most middle school students would understand it, but because you use a wider variety of vocabulary, the “bare minimum” expectation for education is raised, in terms of who you should RELY on being able to read it.

      Just to provide an example, in fact, take the above text; the word variety is just enough that it says the Reading Level is 9th-10th Grade. But yes, the average middle schooler (which depending on your area, is either grades 6-8, 6-9, or 7 and 8) would likely have no problem comprehending it. Because it’s not about actual average reading ability at that “age”, it’s about the base level of suggested education someone of that level should have had by that point.

      This is why they tell you not to worry THAT much about Reading Level; it’s only one component of your writing’s audience to consider. And honestly, unless you are writing a children’s book with explicit intent to be either comprehensible to those of a certain age or teach those of a certain age new words? It’s…nice to know, but probably not a big deal.

      Unless you’re writing at “Grade 16” level and your audience is NOT people with PhDs, in which case dear god please rein it in a little, Mr. Joyce. 😛

        • Correct. Misspelling and proper names (currently — we will be adding them) aren’t found on the list so they wouldn’t register as words a 4th grader would know.

        • I love Paragraphs, Paragraphs, Paragraphs. hey. hey. hi

          i got college grad for that 🙂

          and btw everyone, stop complaining about the website. If you don’t like it, then just don’t use it. There’s seriously no need for this rubbish.

  • tbh I think there is no sure way to determine complexity without a human, as complexity itself has many different parts, some which are not necessarily quantitative. therefore there is no exact equation that may be used to describe “complexity.”

    btw i am in the 8th grade in a highly selective high school which has a lower acc rate than harvard univ. but still i dont think my writing, though better than most kids my age, has the level of “college graduate”. just sayin.

    • but its kinda a fail this sentence got college student

      “hi my name is olya nd im going to tell you why dogs are good. Dogs are good because dogs are dogs”

      • The level is college student because of the spelling mistakes which aren’t words on the 3000-word list and are considered words a 4th grader wouldn’t know.

        • uhh im currently failing english in yr 8 but some how I’m getting college graduate so something is messed up

          • it took me like an hour to get to the bottom of this
            worth forgetting to submit my English assessment tho

          • Congrats you made it to the end! But take a moment and reflect, why did you do this? I know you have work to do… so do it! Anyways to see how many people made it here, like the comment as a little punch in. This way i can see the amount of lazy people not doing their work(dw ill like the comment because im here not doing MY work and writing this comment;). So good luck on the rest of your work

          • you’re not the last comment any longer. haha.
            anyway, this comment section has helped me feel more connected to reality. it was a rather strange journey, but to make it till the end marks the inevitable end of my sanity. i knew this day was coming, that i would waste away an evening reading these instead of doing my mountains of homework piled up on my desk. but it was an impeccable journey being part of this inside joke. at the moment, it is time to bid farewell, but know that someday in the not-so-distant future, i’ll see you all again.
            p.s, don’t feel compelled to get back to work, just live your life, no matter how questionable the choices may be 🙂
            hope this thread still remains active.

          • Now you’re not the last comment. And yes, I agree. Live your life to the fullest. You don’t need to be pressured into doing anything you don’t want to (unless it’s for a grade).

          • damn im writing a speech right now, which I present tomorrow. whatever you are doing right now, i am rooting for you 🙂

  • On a whim, I typed in “I am Bob. I like cheese. I also like pasta. Asparagus is yucky. Fido eats my asparagus.” And it said that it is College Level.

    • Correct, because you used many of the words not on the 3000-word list. It would have been different if you had written “I am me. I like cheese. I also like noodles. Corn is bad. My dog eats my corn.” which would rank 5th-grade level, but says basically the same thing.

      • I’m in 8th grade and it says college graduate when I wrote simplistic sentences I used for not even an English essay but a Science report, so maybe not?

    • It’s not “good” or “bad” — it simply tells you a person who has that level of education would likely be able to understand it and those at a lower grade level may have some difficulty in understanding it.

    • The more words used, the more accurate the reading level will be in most cases. For technical writing like on DNA the way to do it is to define the terms which are above their vocabulary in terms that are easy to understand. Then you would want to do a readability check with the DNA terms you defined absent since the reader should now understand the meaning of them.

  • I think that this should also take into account how short your sentences are, along with illogical words, and if you have strong diction or not. For example, “I showed the ytgab wrong. He did not like me. I frwag seld.” This would bring it up to a very high grade level, however, “showed” is quite weak. So is “used” and “utilized”. Those should bring down the points quite some, and using wrong words should also count.

    • In theory, this is a great idea, but almost impossible to program. The reading level formula isn’t perfect, but it does give a rough idea which is better than nothing.

  • I do not get the explanation. If you say that someone who reads what you wrote has to read at a college level, would that not automatically indicate that the writer is writing at a college level as well? I don’t get it.

    • No. It tells you the words you use are at a college level, but nothing about the writing itself. For example,

      “The biology publication focused on cells and how they interact within the body. He hated the coursework, but he wanted to be a doctor.”

      and

      “The biologies publication focus on cell and how it interacted within the bodies. He hate coursework, but want to doctor.”

      are both college level reading, but both aren’t college level writing.

    • If you use more words that aren’t found in the 3000 word list for 4th graders, it will increase the reading level. While it’s easy to manipulate this score, that’s not what it’s for. It’s to give you a general idea of who can read your writing when you write naturally.

  • It said my reading level was 9th-10th grade when actually it was pretty basic and was just describing a basic item. Can anyone explain?

  • i typed in somthing simple and it said it was college graduate level

    i think the whole idea is a bust but i like the idea if only it actually worked

    • It’s not that it doesn’t work, it’s that the formula depends on word count. Typing one sentence and basing your judgment of the programming on that is foolish on your part. It says right in the explanation that the longer the written work, the more accurate it will be.

      That is because it needs a larger sample environment. I’m seriously surprised so many people aren’t understanding that…

  • I typed an original story of 496 words (up to 600) for SOTA Creative Writing 2016, I am primary 6 (6th Grade) in Singapore, and composed that type of story (I woke up but it wasn’t a dream) and found out that type was for Sec 3 to Sec 4 (9th to 10th grade). *unbelievable*

  • How did my story go from 11th grade-12 grade to 9th-10th grade? I did not change anything, yet the reading appeared differently than it had before?

    • We have started to add more common words to the list (mostly conjunctions, plurals and different tenses of the 3000 words already on the list) to try and make it more accurate. This may have changed the reading level.

      • Ummmm yeh I’m in year 8 at school and I’m not complaining, well not really but i pasted my english essay into it, and every few minutes it changes between 11th-12th grade and college graduate, but totally skips college level. This happened to my friend too. Why is this happening?

  • I love this site. I am doing a project for National History Day and I need it to be 1500 words or more. It’s a great tool and helps me set things out. Thank you for creating an awesome site.

  • I really do love this feature, but I only find it useful when writing non-fiction for school essays. I do a lot of fantasy writing and I find it hard to gage my writing’s level because I am using words that don’t exist because it’s the name of objects, places, creatures and worlds that don’t exist. If I took Erin Hunter’s Warriors, which can be comprehended by a 2nd grader, it would be drastically changed because of the vocabulary used by the cats to describe the things around them (Road=Thunderpath Human=Twoleg Flu=Greencough Noon=Sunhigh) Harry Potter would also be a great example and find itself with a very unfair upgrade. The words used in these books aren’t found in the Dale-Chall formula because they are words that don’t normally exist in the English language. I understand how hard to it to program for these kinds of things, but I do find it frustrating sometimes.

    • Yes, this formula does have limitations — it should only be used as a general guideline and if you’re writing like you suggested above, it’s not going to accurately reflect the reading level.

    • If you find it frustrating, just don’t use it and stop complaining and taking your problems out on other people

      • “If you find it frustrating, just don’t use it and stop complaining and taking your problems out on other people”

        This is almost as bad as the ‘if you have nothing nice to say, then don’t say anything at all’ argument. It’s nothing more than an attempt at deflecting criticism. It’s constructive criticism, too. The commenter wrote about, in detail, the limitations he/she encountered in regard to the system. That’s called ‘constructive critcism’, which is more helpful than any amount of praise. Mere praise is substanceless and says nothing. On the other hand, constructive critcism gives way to perpetual improvement. It feels nice to be praised, sure, but it isn’t helpful. And it may feel bad to be critcised, but it is helpful if you understand what you should be doing to remedy the issue. You could even say that the people who only praise you don’t care enough about you to recognise and/or help you improve your flaws. People who give a lot of constructive criticism devote their own time to improving someone else’s creation. If all humans seek validation, affirmation and understanding, constructive criticism is the purest form of that. Ironically, pure praise is hardly anything like that. Usually, the best kind of constructive criticism is also peppered with positivity AND praise. Praise on its own is substanceless, but when it’s used with constructive criticism, it becomes useful. This is what @Nerdy-Kat129 has done.

        It turns out that nothing could really be done about it, but should he/she really be denied their right to voice their opinion because they don’t ‘have anything nice to say?’ No, I don’t believe so. There was no rude conduct whatsoever in their comment, and it’s still helpful for fantasy writers reading it that may not have considered the possibility. I don’t understand why you ignored the majority of the comment in favour of focusing on the last four words. Constructive criticism can be sseen as complaining, I guess, since all criticism is complaining at heart–but that doesn’t mean that it’s a bad thing. The irony is that you’re substancelessly complaining about another comment with actual substance that is complaining about the feature. That part about ‘taking your problems out on other people’ sounds like a stock phrase you just threw in there without really understanding what it meant. It’s just some light criticism, nothing more. Don’t take it so personally or so seriously.

        And don’t take this comment aggressively, because I’m not being aggressive. If I was being aggressive, it would be lined with far more colourful language.

  • This website is wonderful, thank you. Also, I do not understand how people do not understand the “Reading Level” function. The Author explains it clearly in the original post. Also, before commenting, one should read through the other comments to avoid being redundant. I saw the same question asked 6 different times by 6 different people. A question that is clearly explained in the beginning anyhow. I mean…you all know how to read, correct? 🙂

    Thanks for the website, it’s a great tool and I use it often.

  • This is an awesome system, I’ll give you that, but I myself was very concerned when my 200 word small essay was rated as college level. After a small research, I discovered that the reason for this was that I was writing in Finnish therefore every word was outside the 3 000 words of a fourth grader. Other than using a foreign language, I think this website in genius and I plan to use it when actually writing something in English!

  • I have been searching in google for an online word counting tool. I ended up at your site.
    Later on, I have visited the others. This is by far the best word count tool out there. Thank you!

  • I literally wrote the title and it said college student. I like the unique tool, but I don’t think it is very reliable. I love the website though.
    My title, however, was: What are the writer’s thoughts and feelings on ‘The Merchant of Venice’?

  • It is (almost) impossible to make a really good reading level thingy. i wrote “Insidious potatoes, insulated rueing, altruistic spellchecker, current affairs. ” and copy/pasted it many times. gave me a college graduate level. Pasted my essay, and it gave me college graduate. I’m not even the equivalent of 10th grade…

    • You might want to read the article. If you do, you’ll understand why you got the reading level you did. If you haven’t read the article, then you shouldn’t be commenting.

  • The idea behind this is nice, but I don’t think it provides any useful information whatsoever. I can see the potential, but at its current state it will only manage to befuddle a user if anything.

    Main problems are that it doesn’t recognise plural form/passive form of words, and that the whole 3k word concept is a little silly to begin with. Having multiple dictionaries (one for each level) would work much better. But yeah, i don’t know if you can find word lists like that..

    Plural thing example:

    I like apple. I hate bee. I love girl. <4th Grade
    I like apples. I hate bees. I love girls. 11-12th Grade

  • I typed in “The dog eats sandwiches” and then typed “.” and made an space after that and then it said reading level “collage graduate”. I like the idea but doesn’t work all that well

    • It’s due to the plurals — we are working on a fix. If you write “The dog eat sandwich.” it come sin at below 4th grade.

  • Seriously, I found the Math Captcha harder to cypher than the idea of reading levels. I popped in to see if there was a rating above College Level, and was surprised at some of the criticism people type.

    After using this website for two years, about 100 times, I can say that it does work. Sometimes my writing comes out College on the first time; others, it can be 9/10 or 11/12th grade; I’ll use the word frequency feature, include common words, and am usually surprised to see how many times I used “the, and, from”.

    After a little editing, I’ll remove some words, rewrite/substitute this and that, and watch the writing level increase.

  • Dear Word Counter. The reading level rating is an great feature but when i get up to two sentences its says “collage graduate”. Even when i type in things like for an example ” The dogs eats sandwiches”. Is it something wrong with my computer or is this för everyone?

    • ump actually everyone is frustrated that they are getting high levels for simple writing. Seriously people just stop complaining. Admin can’t do anything about the fact that you don’t suck. If you are just going to keep complaining please stop. If you hate it that much either stop using the website or just make your own if your that smart because hey everyone is write. Everyones getting college graduate aren’t they??? 😐

  • Hi there. Here to voice my appraisal for this website (despite what all you negative people above are saying).
    I am using this to aid in writing my book and I am really pleased with it’s software. This has helped me structuralise and manage the content of the book I am currently in progress of writing. Keep up the good work, site admins! 🙂

    • yeah, I wish everyone would just STOP COMPLAINING. as if they could do any better. This is actually a really smart website and if you think it’s not then just stop acting as if you’re so smart because unless you can make a new better website, you can’t be that smart.

  • I typed in this, “”A dog akuefbaubdmcjbk sandwiches.”Saijsbuffebw fjskefbhfhe dog. Wilfred said i jslifdw ej hfilsie jjufbaekd v”, after reading some of the comments and indeed is said I am a college graduate. I believe you need to rethink your reading level.

    • Of course — if you make up nonsense words that don’t exist, then they wouldn’t be recognized by a 4th grader or be on the list.

  • My writing level is usually 9/10th grade but sometimes if I put some effort, I get 11/12th grade. BUT it’s killing me how my friends most of the time gets 11/12th and hardly anything lower than that- their lowest would be 9/10th. I keep asking myself what I’ve been doing wrong. As a writer, it kind of makes me feel small.

    • It’s reading level, not writing level. You shouldn’t feel bad about it since it doesn’t say anything about how well you write.

    • I’m about 5 years late, but if it makes you feel better reading level in no way indicates how well you write. For examples, Ernest Hemingway, one of the greatest writers of all time, is clocked in at 4th grade reading level for “The Old Man and the Sea”. There’s much more to great writing than the diction you use.

  • I was wondering about this, I’ve been at the 11-12th grade level for my story and a chapter brought it down to 9-10th. Is this even a reliable metric to use?

  • It’s important for someone to do their research before putting discouraging posts on someone’s website that show nothing more or less than your own inability to read. The administrator of this site made it very clear what the so-called “readability” level is. This is not a random or arbitrary score given by this website. It is a scale invented by Dale and Chall in 1945 and updated 50 years later. It has been accepted by statisticians and linguists as an accurate estimate (note, not exact end-all-beat-all fact, just an estimate) of what level an individual’s reading capacity would need to be in order to understand 100% of the document. I know that, for myself, I was reading on a high school level by kindergarten, but my little brother who is in middle school struggles to read on-grade-level books. Meanwhile, he was helping me with my high school math homework when he was not even in school yet. Everyone’s mind is wired differently. This scale in no way suggests that you (the reader) could not read more than 3,000 basic words by fourth grade or that you (the writer) are not able to write to your target audience. This scale is more of a measurement of the commonality of the words you use and the length of your sentences than it is a measurement of your “ability”. Then again, if you are one of those who thinks the system is broken because you typed in so much nonsense and were told that you must be a college graduate clearly lack the ability to read this article (which is on an 11th-12th grade level). To write at a 4th grade level, your words need to (on average) be shorter than 4 letters, while to write on a college graduate level, they only need to be (on average) about 5 letters long. This is a consistent trend that can be measured, so for those of you who think you can make a paper or short story “higher level” by using bigger words, there is minimal evidence of this. Better to stick with how you can write comfortably and leave the administrator of this site be. (Note, I write most comfortably between a 9th and 12th grade level. If you read this thinking “wow, he’s a hypocrite, using a bunch of big words and long sentences just so he can sound more “complicated”, this passage ranked at 11th-12th grade, and that’s where I like it!)

    • Thank you Linguist! I was getting tired of scrolling through the SAME comments looking for anything USEFUL! You nailed it!
      To the young folks, in the future, consider taking time to read through previous comments before repeating and arguing about an issue that has already been addressed. Thanks.

      • yes, omg. That is so true, its actually so annoying that people are so stupid today.
        I’m only 12 years old, and let me tell all you negative people out there who have nothing better to do with their lives than post negative comments on a smart website that you can not use, then you are a waste of space and your wasting your breath. The admins on this website have to keep replying to your stupid posts, just scroll up and you’ll be able to see 5000000000 of the same frickin’ questions – all negative might i add. Just get a life and stop ruining other peoples including the admins who have just created this website for people who are going to use it and find it useful, not for people who just complain about it the whole time.

  • Posted a Shakespearean sonnet into this, reading level was 9’th grade. Shakespeare says : website doth be’th 10/10

  • This is a cool tool! I can see this reversed as an added tool for HR departments. There’s so much automation as it is, but companies would definitely pay for something like this.

  • I like roses. Roses are red. Red roses have thorns. Roses can be pink. Pink roses are pretty. I like pink roses.
    I’m sorry but there is no way the above sentences does not make 4th grade.
    Red, roses, thorn, and like are all words used in dr Seuss books. I see absolutely no reason this qualifies as high school intellect requirements. I understand the basics of what has been discussed above, but I believe until this bug is fixed, it might be best to advise it’s broken or remove it. As all I have to say is green eggs and ham would likely generate a higher level when only two random versus of…
    I would not like them
    here or there.
    I would not like them
    anywhere.
    I do not like
    green eggs and ham.
    I do not like them,
    Sam-I-am
    Rates as 5-6 th grade.

    • It’s due to the plurals used instead of the singular. If you write that “rose” instead of “roses” it comes out as 5th grade. We will have an update for the plural issue soon.

  • If you guys read the previous comments before asking questions to the admin and complaining about the reading system, it would save the admin a lot of time. Thanks!

  • It’s fantastic that you have put together a tool like this. I like to know the reading level so I’m not writing in a way that others won’t be able to understand. It’s a great resource and helps me make sure I’m writing at the correct level.

  • Love this tool. Gonna drop a link on my college’s discussion board since we have word count requirements for our posts. Should be useful and send you some of that tasty ad revenue 😀 Thanks.

  • I love how all these keyboard warrior kids think using big words and sophisticated paragraphing techniques gives them the status of a college graduate, when in reality, in higher education, you get awarded more marks and get given better results for writing in a more simple fashion so anyone who reads it will have a better understanding, in other words getting your point across to everyone. What use is it being smart and pompous when only 3 people can understand wtf you’re talking about.

  • One thing that hasn’t been mentioned, or at least i haven’t noticed being mentioned is that sentence length seems to play a role, so if someone blotches their sentence with comma splices and other errors it will raise the reading level. one way to test this is to simply write the word “the” a bunch of times, adding periods through out; the more periods the shorter the sentences the lower the reading level, less periods longer sentences higher reading level. While i agree that college and university students and graduates to write longer sentences, i don’t think it should be a part of the reading level as it may encourage other to comma splice or otherwise inappropriately combine two independent clauses.

  • I am a 7th grader writing a book report on the spy so far i have 714 words and 3848 characters and it says the level is 11-12th i really dont belive it at all :/ but i like the feature its pretty cool i just wish it worked better

    • This records the reading level of your book report, not your writing level. People reading your book report may need a minimum requirement of 11-12th high school education or higher to understand 100% of your work. This does not matter in your case, as your teacher or instructor should already be finished with high school.

  • I’ve been using Word Counter for the last three years, at least, to help me along as I write fiction. Keeping a reliable word and page count has made my life so much easier. I was nothing short of thrilled when I discovered the auto-save function — much more reliable than Word for my scatterbrained self. Not to mention the keyword density, arguably my favourite of the available features. I’d always been curious about the reading level function. Thank you for this article, for your endless patience, and for this tool!

  • Does this tool work with foreign languages ? I wrote a long text in French and this said this was college graduate level so i assume this is not working with french, does someone knows were i could actually find such a useful tool for other languages than English. thanks

    • No, this only works in English.

      I’m not aware of one that gives reading levels in other languages other than English.

    • My writing level is much higher than 7th grade! This tool sucks. How dare you tell me that my writing level is at a 7th grade when I’m in college. I wouldn’t be in college if I could only write at a 7th grade level. This is a disgrace!

  • I can’t believe the amount of stupidity in the comments here. This is a tool that gives you an estimate on what level student would be able to understand your writing. Of course, you can manipulate it to come up with unrealistic reading levels. That doesn’t mean that the tool is useful. Maybe if all of you spent more time trying to improve your writing rather than trying to find ways to manipulate the formula you would be doing better in school.

  • I typed in an obviously stupid sentence (with an okay one as well), and the result was college graduate. The thing I typed in was as follows:
    “Zia Rey had finally exited the hospital with her son and her friend.
    DOGGIES. IS. MY. LIFEY. YEEEEEE. HUEHUEHUEHE. ME. HATEY. DAWGIE-WAHGGYS. ME WUFFY-CHUFFY. KITTY POO POO PIEZ.”
    (Don’t judge me.)
    That was college graduate.
    Alright. That happened.

    • Again, if the words aren’t on the list of 3000 words (such as a person’s name) or just strange rarely used words, it’s going to rank the level high.

  • I am in fourth grade. My reading level is 10th-12th grade??? I think something might be a little bit wrong.

  • When will this feature be corrected? I literally typed in “Yejh uwiwejhu hwr oerwoj foew. ewifw jimef w. ji wifuew df.” and it said “College Graduate”. Granted, I am a college graduate, but this is pure gibberish. Lol.

    • There is nothing to correct. Jibberish wouldn’t be part of the 3000 common words, so of course it would rank at college reading level.

  • I wrote this : dark souls. dark souls. dark souls. and it gave me a college graduate and I tried refreshing the page as well but it still gave me college graduate (I’m using Microsoft edge if you are wondering)

    • Please read the article and other comments I’ve replied to which have written similar short sentences as you have. It will explain why this is the case.

    • WHY? What does that prove? It proves that the algorithm is only set to tell you that you are using bigger words than a 4th grader would understand in the sequence you are using them. Honestly, all of you trying this kind of stuff have already been told what the program will and will not do so why are you playing childish games trying to mess with the program. That you are doing this at all only shows your mental age – a child playing a meaningless game to try to prove something that has already been proven and stated as such.

  • This is an interesting tool. I think the reading level feature is beneficial, but I’d like to see a writing level tool as well. That would be great and would help a lot to improve my writing. Then I’d know if I was writing at my grade level or above.

  • “””
    Silly people did not read the page. So they do not know how the tool works. If they read the page all the way through they would not post silly things.
    “””

    There we go. To continue a trend, pop that in the box. It returns <4th grade. Hopefully that means the people posting ridiculous questions realise they look quite 'silly'.

  • This reading level tool is an excellent idea but I think it needs some fine-tuning. It distinguishes only between two kinds of words: 4th-grader words and not 4th-grader words.

    That means that if you use enough words a fifth-grader ought to know, it will still rate it as college-level reading, not fifth-grade reading.

    Now of course it would be a monstrously ambitious project to rate EVERY word in the English language as a specific grade level, but if this was at least done for a set of common enough words (500~1000 per grade level past 4th), then it would already significantly improve the accuracy of the rating. All words that aren’t given such a rating can safely be assumed to be college-level vocabulary because they’re too obscure for the raters to have remembered.

  • Haha we don’t use “grade” here so I have no idea what it would actually stand for here. But that’s also partly because I don’t know much stuff in the first place 🙂

  • Word counter is really useful though, especially for the school essays and project. I just wish I actually understood what the grades mean. It’ll help a lot ((especially since I keep forgetting and start typing in short forms, it shows me the spelling errors)) xD

    • “Grades” are the same as primary school years. Fourth grade is primary school 4th year. Junior High school is usually years 7 and 8 and high school is years 9 through 12.

    • Its reading level not writing level. I can guarantee that no 4th grader will be able to understand that, which is why it ranks so high.

  • Dear admin, have you considered using the reading level to augment the reading speed (i.e. to use it as a multiplier)? Technical papers would certainly be ranked at colleague graduate level, simply because of the density of jargons used. Reading speeds would be lower in such instances. Kindly consider.

    • While not exactly what you’re requesting here, you can adjust the reading speed manually (Click on Options, then Details — find Reading Speed and click on the wrench next to it). This will allow you to adjust the reading speed higher or lower depending on your needs.

    • If you write in any language other than English, you’ll get a college graduate rating because the system is based on 3000 common English words. If you’re writing German, you would not be using any of them.

  • ok, this has apparently nothing to do with the reading level, but I have one problem. I was typing an essay for school and I went to another tab to do some research. When I went back to the Word Counter tab, the number of words dropped from 528 to 502. So now I’m quite confused which number of word I should use… Other than that, Word Counter has been a great help!!!

    • I’m not sure why that would happen — if you want to send us the writing you were counting, we can take a look to see if we can replicate what happened and see if we can solve the mystery.

      • It’s fine! I guess I’ll go with the 502 as I saved and closed the tab then it showed 502. Thanks!

  • Perhaps you should stick the word “Beta” after the Reading Level feature on the count page. It might cut down on the number of times you have to explain the same exact thing over and over and over and over again. They’ll just go “Oh, it’s in Beta”, and move on with their lives. Considering how stupid some of these responses I’ve read so far have been, it’s pretty likely. Kinda like how when Valve stuck the random stick things on the back of Chell’s legs in Portal, and playtesters stopped asking how she survived dropping so far.

  • I was curious about what it meant and came to check this page and all I find is a bunch of assholes complaining about everything

  • This tool isn’t exactly correct. You should fix it. If I can manipulate it to get a higher reading level, then I can never be sure it’s the correct reading level. You should make it so it can;t be manipulated. Then we can trust it!

  • This load of garbage is apparently college grad level:
    The dog eats sandwiches through which quantum entanglement causes apocalyptic flame to spew from the ashes of the nether worlds. Although obscene and vulgar the knowledge of wherewith the sacrament of illogical catalysts register a sense of zen. Hereupon, let it be known that although mortal knowledge is easy to acquiesce it is indeed a gem of the froth of power.

    • Please read the article. Reading level has to do with words a person would understand, not the actual writing.

    • You DO know that what you said is somewhat mean and I am 11, taking algebra 2. Also, one AP class isn’t all that impressive.

  • Wow.
    Wow can a word counter site create so much hate?!
    I LOVE IT!
    Keep going you keyboard warriors! 🙂
    You bring so much joy to the world.
    PSYCH! you guys have no lives, just like Poke hunters have no lives.
    Get out of your mom’s basement, you’re 34 and a half, obese and without friends
    (HINT: get some friends, and a life (visit black.market.international to buy some friends if you cant make any)).

  • I can’t believe all the complaining going on here for a tool that’s here to help improve writing. if you think it’s so awful, build a better one!

  • What is the highest level? College Graduate?

    This got College Graduate:
    Insiduous precipitate insular cognitive osculator consensus iniquitous oxymoron ostentious corollary commission reverberation sanctify pious exoneration exploit reinforce cancerous nebulous nematode cognitive reverence reticence promiscuous pulmonary propinquity pension treaty of Versailles masque vermillion respiration fermentation dollop systemic cancerous faculty heinous vehement sought neigh balustrade balustrade iniquitous iniquituous

  • This is apparently college graduate type of work:
    .Uay vary VARY VARY correact stoary.
    Bi ASHY LENE
    once there was a bad guy named tomooogoa. he likwed to eat liattle hippos and techers. he had very avanded ways of catchibg thim.
    hippos were not very smaert so theay ware eaesily cauight.
    Look at the spidaer on may waell. And me scquished it and now it’s daed. Me I’mn hungary. Oh lookit the pretti lamp. Sicccors are very danugerous. You cannot keep thim aeround hippos.

    • If only I could write as well as you can when I’m drunk. Seriously, Hemingway’s Lemonade doesn’t work for me. Good on you.

  • I typed in … I am too cool 4 u kid. Get rekt or jump off a bidge. Go poo yrsekf and got 11th-12th grade
    P.S. I am pretty sure a 3rd grader could type better.

  • Everyone leaving a comment here is so pretentious. Who cares if you’re a 4th grader with a 12th grade reading level. That means NOTHING kiddo. This website is an excellent tool for writing essays, not to brag about how smart you think you are. The reading level thing is just an algorithm to give you a basic approximation. Of course it’s not going to be perfect.

  • For my GCSE photography course we had to write about a photographer of our choice, so i wrote it in word counter just so i could estimate the amount of room i would need/how many pages i would need to fit my writing in. When i had done 86 words i looked across and it said my writing level was a 4th grade, i then went downstairs to get a drink. My cat walked on my laptop, specifically the ‘x’ key. When i got back i noticed my kitty had added ‘x x x x xxxxxxxxxxxxx x x x x x x x’ etc my writing level went up to a college student. Not trying to bash here, just stating my experience

    • This is because the program does not recognize misspelled words, in this case, the word, or letter, ‘x’, as part of the 3000 common words it uses to determine readability, and therefore thinks you use lots of hard to understand, or ‘College Level’ words.

  • Huh, this word counter actually recognizes that using simple to read and concise sentences is college level writing. I wrote a really simple blurb for my music theory class and was just checking the word count when the reading level surprised me.
    “The beat unit for simple meters is a non dotted quarter note.  Examples of simple meters include, 2/4, 3/4, and 4/4. The beat unit for compound meters is a dotted quarter note.  Examples of compound meters include 3/8, 6/8, and 9/8,
    The natural subdivision of a simple meter is a quarter note into two eighth notes. A half note in simple meter could be subdivided into 4 eighth notes. The natural subdivision of a compound meter is a dotted quarter note into a triplet of eighth notes. A dotted half note in compound meter could be subdivided into 6 eighth notes.
    The simple 2/4 meter is most closely related to the compound 6/8 meter. 2/4 contains 2 pulses of quarter notes per measure, while 6/8 contains 2 pulses per measure as well, except the beat is on a dotted quarter note instead.
    The 3/4 simple meter is most closely related to the compound 9/8 meter. 3/4 contains 3 pulses of quarter notes per measure, while 9/8 contains 3 pulses of dotted quarter notes per measure.
    The 4/4 simple meter is most closely related to the compound 12/8 meter. 4/4 contains 4 pulses of quarter notes per measure, while 12/8 contains 4 pulses of dotted quarter notes per measure.
    While playing music, I prefer simple meter, as it is easier to read and interpret, and pieces tend to be written in simple meter anyways. I do enjoy listening to compound meter, where it is easier to write swing rhythms whatnot. I do not have any real preference for either kind of meter, both are important parts of music.
    Washington Post March by John Philip Sousa is an example of a piece in compound meter (6/8).
    Rhapsody in Blue by George Gershwin is an example of a piece in simple meter (4/4).”
    Really, some kid in elementary school band should be able to understand this … music harder than writing confirmed??? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

  • Yo, I thought you said that I would be able to understand this!
    Haha. yea but, you’re just too stupid lol
    What?!
    *Sticks tongue out* Mehhh Go away dummy! Haha!

    I’m pretty sure what I wrote about isn’t a grade 11-12 reading level… ^^;;

  • Admin: I think a link to the 3000 words would stop the same questions repeated over and over and over and over and over and ……. I’m sure you get it. If you put a link in the article and said it was a list of 3000 words expected to be known by grade ? (age ?) in the USA (?) you might not find yourself answering the same question again and again.

    I am assuming it’s a US list because of your use of ‘grade’ and not age. This means writing in ‘English English’ words such as ‘colour’ (color) and many more, will not be on the list either, I’m guessing..?

    Is there a standardised list for other grades in the US or are all other levels calculated purely by the equation (words per sentences etc.) you have written above? I’m just curious there – I’m from the UK.

    I like the site, this is actually the first time I’ve been concerned with reading level – I’m trying to simplify what I’m writing, but mostly that’s ensuring medical terminology is understood by using the commonly used word in parenthesis afterwards – e.g. scapula (shoulder blade), so unless I removed all the medical terms to test it I’m not going to get a different result. Reading time and words per sentence, number if sentences etc. is more helpful while I’m comparing various options for a collaborative piece of writing.

    I clicked to see how the reading level was assessed, to see how/ if I should try other ways to lower it, but it’s not necessary. I scrolled through the comments section and thought I’d add a positive comment noting how useful the tool is when it’s used correctly and understood because of the number of comments basically showing people don’t seem to understand the explanation fully.

    I’m a linguist (psycho-neuro-cognitive linguist, specifically, at postgrad level) so I suggest an example often used in distinguishing between syntax and semantics – at the basis of the argument ‘what is a sentence?’ – Usually described as a grouping of words that adheres to grammatical rules in a language and makes sense. Noam Chomsky (‘father of modern linguistics’) proved a sentence could be completely correct in its use of syntax, but entirely nonsensical, semantically: “Colorless green ideas sleep furiously.” One of the most famous linguists, Steven Pinker uses the example in his popsci book, The Language Instinct and it’s constantly used in linguistic arguments. I’m aware you may know all this, having created this site, but if not, it is an example that is easy to look up if you wanted to add to your explanation of the difference between reading level and writing level – anyone can stick that specific sentence into Google and read 40 years of linguistic debate.

    Sorry, just thinking……… while procrastinating over the actual writing I’m trying to do that doesn’t interest me, whereas this analysis does. Good site!

  • To be honest, I persuaded myself to not comment after viewing some of the ridiculous comments in response to this article. I originally used this site to check the word count on a piece of writing I was assigned to complete in my English class. I spotted the reading level as I read the word count. However, I became very offended when it claimed my writing was at seventh to eighth grade reading level. To familiarize you with myself, I am an eleventh grade student who skipped a year of school and is one of the smartest in my honors classes. I have scored immensely well on the SAT writing portion and as a seventh grader and as an eleventh grader. Without exception, I scored an A on my pieces of writing for school. As a curious and inquiring mind, I decided to test the authenticity of the reading level. The following was considered college level: “Hence, heathens stood lackadaisically. Therefore, dauntless must diverge.” A few of you might see some familiar words in those two sentences. The first is an allusion to the song “Heathens” from the movie, “Suicide Squad,” contains my favorite word (a form of lackadaisical), and also alluded to a viral post about the number of degrees required for ‘hence’ not to be considered plagiarism. The second is a reference to the book “Divergent” by Veronica Roth. Due to sheer insanity and boredom, I decided to see the reading level on this comment and it was considered an eleventh to twelfth grade reading level.

    • Before I get a million trolls scavenging around the mistake in my comment, I just noticed the extra ‘and’ in the first sentence about myself. Therefore, I trolled myself.

    • There’s a quote that says “Easy reading is damned hard writing.” – Unknown

      In other words. If your writing is easy to read, you should be very pleased with yourself.

    • LOL I tried it after you said that. I said: El perro tiene hambre. Yo le voy a dar comida. Ya no tiene hambre.

      I could have read that in first grade! It reads: the dog is hungry. I will feed it. It is not hungry anymore.

  • Thanks so much for this tool. This is great for students and people in any industry. Very helpful technology. Thank you so much.

  • Many people are immune to pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis but some times pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis is very common especially around volcanos. It’s due to the use of higher-level dictionary terms. While it is completely gibberish and makes no sense, passing the paragraph to a typical fourth grader would leave them rather confused about 90% of the words used; the metric uses what a fourth grader would typically understand as the baseline and goes up from there based on the commonality of words pulled from the dictionary it uses for the formula. “The interrelational level of the synaptic exchange between various idea that, in a post-structural sort of analysis, give way to all the meandering tropes which make up our existences through an intersectional framework all add to the propinquity of intradimensional experiences, all within a subpar trope that mellifluously delineates all our existences’ sakes. “ Many accoutrements are used for gasconading. always stay equanimity when going through pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis.

  • hi everyone I love word counter its really helped me with my 10 000 word essay I didn’t hav 2 count it all by myself I found this and fell in love with it I recommend it 2 anyone.!!!***

  • Do not take this as criticism it is simply an idea. What if you also took in the vocabulary from the grade textbooks as they usually have very specific words or even use the words from them in general as I have noticed each year they subtly increase in vocabulary strength. Also anyone whom wants to complain please read all other comments as they have repeated the same complaints various times. Leave the creators alone as this idea is quite amazing and stop repeating complaints as this is no longer constructive and is simply annoying.

    Ps. Please don’t comment on my grammar as I am aware it is terrible.

  • I wrote about articles related to driving licence and used this site to check functionality, result came is “College Student”, which is closest to relevancy. 🙂 Thanks

  • Like everything, people who do nothing complain and nit-pick the most.

    Great website, great explanation. Nothing’s perfect, but what this provides is 1000x’s more beneficial than the nothing than constant detractors provide.

  • Despite my grammatical errors, and nonsensical phrasing, the following was deemed College Graduate:
    “circumlocutions gregarious finite element analysis dynamic planar kinematic multivariate calculus. Propulsion physicist berate bereaved asymptotic asymmetrically. Unbeknownst partition undersecretary vector integrate professionally dictate criterion abalone distinguished foolhardy”

    Dang, I’m smarted, huh?

  • A few summers ago – I don’t remember which year – there was a period of time at the airport where we could ride in a small, four-seat plane. I sat in the copilot’s seat, and even got to fly the plane alone! For about thirty seconds, but it felt like hours!

    5-6 grade

    A few summers ago – I don’t remember which year – there was a period of time at the airport where we could ride in a small, four-seat plane. I sat in the copilot’s seat, and even got to fly the plane alone! For about thirty seconds, but it felt like hours! Ever since, I have loved any type of flying- Flying on a commercial or private plane, watching a commercial or private plane fly, or even watching birds fly.

    9-10 grade

    srsly… 1 sentence and up like 5 grades…. wow….

    (not trying to hate, srry!)

  • Most the people (not counting the people with common sense) on here seem to think that computer AI systems can calculate the same way that humans can. It’s very simple. If you are in college you can still write an elementary level novel if you use the words learned in the average elementary school. This AI doesn’t care about your writing style or how many times you repeat a word. It does not understand your mockery, it just wants to be friendly. Don’t judge it by it’s face value. It’s a tool to judge your writing so you judge who your future audience will be. Now I sound like one of those douches who answer yahoo answers. Thank you society for forcing me to put training wheels on your bicycles.

  • elucidate ones mental state in its highest form of mastery as one when combined with thermodynamic fusion and chemical entropy. As the mass-energy equivalence of our geometric majesty reaches heights not seen since the coming of enlightenment when we reached that pinnacle of human endeavour we shall see the glorious coming of the most radiant of them.

    We shall be masters of reality as we strive to the betterment of glorious hydrophilic ant men

    This was college graduate level. LOL

  • I just used it on a 18,000 word story. It told me the reading level was 10th grade level. I would consider this accurate.

    • Stories tend to be repetitive in its usage of basic words. Essay-writing includes completely different intentions, after all.

  • I think it worked perfectly for me. I heard somewhere that a newspaper is written at a 5th-6th grade reading level, so that just about anyone who knows how to read at a 5th grade level can comprehend it. That makes perfect sense to me. They are trying to make it so that the highest number of people possible can understand what is going on in the world, and also that makes their potential subscriber base larger.

    I just wrote an article for my blog and it ranked it at a 5th-6th grade reading level. It seems to line up perfectly with the way I wrote my article, since I also wrote it so that as many people possible can read and comprehend it. I think this is a great tool. I originally just for the word counter, but found the other features interesting so I tried them.

    • If you find yourself needing to use a very precise word, I would suggest inserting a link to the definition that sends users to either m. webster or wiki. Also, including the definition as an overlay footnote that appears when you hover your mouse over the word would be pretty cool.

  • Yeah i felt like I was writing a very intricate novel and it said I had a level of 7th-8th grade which I am in 8th grade but take Honors classes and it usually says my level is 11th-12th grade I don’t understand

    • The feature does not determine how well-written or ‘good’ your writing is, it merely guesses what the minimum level of education someone would need to read it is.

  • I honestly think that this feature isn’t the best to use for reading level. Instead you should just get a peer to read it it, if your situation is urgent.

  • I’m 13 and in 7th grade and I have a college reading level.
    Just saying that I wrote:
    I like Artichokes. I like smears of saltine fish on moldy grains of grainy sand. Take your pregnant female dog and stick her in a whelping box in a contained area.

    It said that this was “college graduate”.
    Also I like dogs and read big books about them so I knew these words.

    • You disgust me. Salted fish with a dollop of sand? Ewe.
      The bit about the pregnant dog? I’ll drink to that.

      The two lines above earned me a 9th-10th grade level, and removing the word “dollop” earned me 7th-8th….This won’t do. Look for a different site.

  • I love that so many of these people that left a comment, either spelled something wrong or used incorrect grammar while saying something about someone else doing that exact thing. Really, to all the people who were being nice, thank you for not being a petty internet troll. YOU are important to this world!!

  • I can write something every first grader can understand that says college graduate level.

    I lyk food. i lyk cheaz. I like appyls. i lyk ise cream. I lyk bananos.

  • I wrote a small story that a my fourth grade daughter can understand, but it says it’s 9-10 grader lever. This is not accurate at all.

  • This is not wright because I’m a seventh grader and it say’s my reading level is a college student; so explain why it thinks I’m at a college level.

  • i wrote something and im in grade 8 and it thinks its year 11 to 12 dont think im that smart if so i hope i get an A

  • Perhaps people would understand this metric better if it were titled more descriptively. Something like “Word Difficulty”, which reflects the relationship to the use of specific words.

  • EJ, If your 1 word was college level, then that makes 100% of words (1) in the story is college level, making the story college level. If have a college level word and a 4th grade level word then 50% of the words (2) are college level, making the story 8th grade level. You see how it works? It’s basic mathematics.

    • Apparently, I need this “Jesus Christ” character to save me from something for whatever reasons you haven’t shared. It seems wise to suspect the truth of your claim.

      • Well, the reasons are that there is this horrible place call “Hell” (You might know about it) and if Jesus Christ dose not save us, then we will go there when we die. But I’m not a Pastor, so you should ask one. 😀

        P.s Hope it helped a little! 😉

          • That’s the point of spreading the Gospel…if you aren’t saved, you will go to Hell. We want everyone to be
            a Christian – meaning that you declare with your mouth that Jesus Christ is Lord and believe that God raised Him from the dead – so that you will be saved from the consequences of your own wrongdoings (and we have all done something wrong; nobody is perfect)

    • Does he know the modern rules of vocabulary? No slur intended, just a question since I didn’t think this was a religious form.

  • Type in “Pickle. X. Bag. Red. Y” and you get a college graduate phrase lol

  • Wordcounter.net is something I use rather frequently, I am a thirteen year old girl, who loves to write a read. I have to write thousands of words or hundreds everyday. So thank you, admin, for making wordcounter.

  • I wrote “Hi, my name is Joe. I like pie. I also like cheese.” Then I got a 7-8th grade level. What words are making these seemingly simple sentences so difficult?

    • Probably the name Joe, names aren’t usually seen in vocabulary lists, but Joe is a simple one. Try replacing Joe with some other name and see if your level changes.

  • I was writing a simple summary of William Wordsworth’s life and apparently, that is college level. They may want to review this feature.

    • That’s pretty cool I guess. But AI’s like this, (as stated in the article), based it on the word range or difficulty of the following words. Besides, the designer of it would have designed it by a certain school curriculum that recommended that a certain grade level student should know the definition of the words. It may just be that you’re studying in a slightly harder curriculum. Anyway, it’s actually pretty common that 7-8th graders can read “college-level” books. Of course, you can just be great at reading because you simply enjoy reading and like challenging yourself to higher levels. I know a lot of books that would be great to extend on such as:
      Much Ado About Nothing (Shakespeare)
      Jane Eyre(Charlotte Bronte)
      The Portrait of a Lady( Henry James )
      Reminder: You only know you are understanding a book when you are able to imagine scenery of the ongoing events. If you are unable to, set the book aside, search up the book. Images on google can be a good resource, if they are related to the book. I recommend looking at the images of the time period the certain book was written in, so you can get a better idea of the scenes, dressing, clothing etc. You never need to force yourself to read a book.(Trust me, I tried that once I ended up screaming).
      Jane Eyre is my personal favorite though. Very dramatic, but well written. If you know french, it would be great to do so as some of the speeches between the characters are in French.

      • I’m don’t think you’ll read this but could you tell me how old 11-12 graders would be and what year they would be in in England?
        from a mysterious person in year six who needs an answer

        • Grades are Year – 1. For example, you’d be in Grade 5 – so the 11-12 graders are in years 12-13.

          As an English person myself, I understand your confusion. I had to look it up.

          • That’s not true if you are 12-13 you would be in grade 7 it does not go by year so if you are one you are not in grade one. School starts when you are around 5 years old and you would be in pre kindergarden or kindergarden which is before grade one.

          • They were explaining what ‘year in England’ the students would be, they were not asking what age the children were.

            In England, someone saying they are in grade 5 could say they are in Year 6. Grade 5 + 1 = England Year.

      • Jane Eyre is the BEST book ever written. For those of you who don’t understand or haven’t read Jane Eyre, GET WITH THE PROGRAM!! You haven’t read good literature if you haven’t read the classics.

  • All of the people on here are just trying to manipulate the system, when really it’s just a tool to try and help people. Honestly, it’s a little thing on the side of a word counter website, and this article has 200+ comments?! Seriously? = |

    • Usually AI’s can’t be necessarily trusted when writing a book and actually publishing it. I would say getting an actual kid to read it. See if they understand. Or better just do a fun research! Get around 10 kids and make them read the story. If they understand it, you’re good to go! Oh and also run it through an editor/publisher who is experienced in children’s books.

  • If you type:
    P.S Please send Me a letter soon!
    P.P.S I will send photos in my next letter!
    P.P.S.S I might not be able to send photos though.
    P.P.P.S.S Sorry for all the P.S’s.
    P.P.P.S.S.S Have you ever seen the show Spirit? Its on Netflix!
    P.P.P.P.S.S.S Sorry again, Bye!
    It says you are a College Graduate!
    Lol!!!

  • I have conducted some very scientific research.
    I learned that the Fitnessgram Pacer Test ranks at a 7th-8th grade level.
    The Bee Movie script (9,155 words) recieved a similar result.
    So did the text displayed at ddlc.moe (The introduction introducing the main characters).
    This very paragraph scores College Graduate ._.

  • Hi! I’m a 6th grader and I got 7th-8th grade on my spelling. Dose that mean I’m improving my vocabulary?
    Thanks!

  • I’m writing a story and I got 7-8th grade, which I would say is reasonable because of my writing style. (Interestingly, the chapter I’m writing is from the POV of an 11 year old boy, so maybe that contributed to it.) I just think it’s kind of funny because even though a twelve year old can understand it, my story is not targeted to that audience (it’s for teens and adults)! However, when I checked several paragraphs that I wrote today it got 11-12 grade. I’m not sure how that happened, but I feel proud of those few paragraphs!

  • Another thing to consider is if you are writing fantasy, then any made up names, places, etc., are going to count as college-level words.

    And btw, ya’ll need Grammarly because your grammar is … well, fourth grade XD Lol just kidding (no I’m not).

  • I’m in year 8 and I have a college graduate writing skill, so this thing says that I’m better than a year12 student? I officially declare this a dope software

  • anyone else get super proud of their writing when it says college grad even though it doesn’t really mean anything

  • I entered “Mo Bamba” lyrics into this and it got college graduate level reading. I also entered “Bohemian Rhapsody” which got a 7th-8th grade rating. We can finally tell who are the true poets.

  • I should be continuing my 2000 word essay but here I am.. looking at comments from 2016 whoop loving life, GG everyone

  • Hi, so I’ve been writing my story recently and it says I have 11th – 12th grade reading level, is that bad because I’m only in 8th grade. Please Tell me!!!

  • Legit has to be the longest comment section I have ever seen in my life. Such entertainment for procrastinating on homework. How lovely it was reading those ‘beautiful’ comments.

  • I don’t know why but I low key find it funny that I have College student writing (according to this) when I’m still in grade 8.

  • “Words that are the most easily understood make the strongest impression; hence, in general, the writer’s vocabulary is made more strong by the use of common words, words of the home and of everyday life, words expressing simple relations.” John F. Genung, Outlines of Rhetoric 117-18 (1893).

  • Just FYI, most readability measures are based on text size (average words per sentence, average letters per word etc.). Thus, the results here do not coincide with any of the common readability scores (FK, Gunning Fog, etc.). The texts I tested – 7th and 9th grade according to all other measures – were both rated here as 12th grade.

  • Kind of biased in a way. For example, by assuming a “reading level” it kind of assumes an intelligence-hierarchy of sorts that is associated with a linear and/or rote kind of system (with learning/knowledge/etc.). If I write in a level beneath the “highest level” it is in a sense merely classifying my work as subpar based on some vague set of words. It’s known that outside of common, everyday words the majority of people do not study nor make it their mission to learn “unusual words” or words less common — hence we come to the conclusion that this is a caste or class-based paradigm of word-knowledge ego-stroking. One’s familiarity with certain words or not shouldn’t be a strong basis in determining their education level alone. I personally never attended school at all, but my writing style/choices come across as too broad or the like for some readers. In short, the systemic outlines of reading/writing ability in-line with a hierarchy, compulsory and/or specific educational basis of word understanding has its roots in some sort of educational-intelligence composition in society/culture, which irks me as a short-sighted way of looking at writing/reading means.

    • Could not read your comment. Massively boring. Please upgrade your writing to a 4th-grade level and try again. wordcounter.net may be able to help. I am able to read these words and am sure I would understand them if they werea bit more spread out, but my eyes glazed over after the second sentence. However, I spotted “in short,” three lines before the end and would like to say, what is your definition of “in short?” Please clarify.
      TL;DR: TL;DR

      • Ha! I agree. Also, in Hargboy’s comment he wrote that using fancy words is….

        “a caste or class-based paradigm of word-knowledge ego-stroking,” meaning that it just stokes their ego…

        Am I allowed to say hypocrite?

    • Here is a tip for future writing taught to me by many college professors. Never use overly “smart” words; you don’t sound smart, and you sound like someone who can’t get to the point. If you need to use thesaurus.com for every other sentence, you need to check your writing.

      This sentence, for example, “hence we come to the conclusion that this is a caste or class-based paradigm of word-knowledge ego-stroking.”

      Doesn’t flow properly, it’s not a good sentence, and sounds more like brain vomit.

      I understand you said that you’ve never attended school, and if that is true, your writing is exceptional; however, as I’ve learned, writing is re-writing. If something is straightforward to read, it usually means the author/writer spent a long time on it. Not to dumb themselves down but to broaden their audience. I’m not saying my writing is perfect; it has flaws. However, as I’ve said before, the above-quoted sentence is a horrible read and ruins credibility.

  • Im in 8th grade and i did a science project and i got college writing for one slide.

    The Brain is made up of three major components. The brain stem. The Cerebellum. And the Cerebrum. The brainstem is a stem that connects the spinal cord with the brain. In the cord it controls the automatic functions such as breathing, heart rate, body temperature, wake and sleep cycles, digesting sneezing, coughing, vomiting, and swallowing. Without the brainstem the body would not function properly and the body will not survive without the automatic functions of the human body. The Cerebellum objective is to maintain posture, balance and operate muscular movement. Without the Cerebellum the body would not be able to move their muscles and their posture as well as balance would collapse and possibly kill the human being. The Cerebrum is the composed of two hemispheres where left controls the right side of the human anatomy and the right side controls the left side of the human anatomy. It performs higher functions like interpreting touch, vision and hearing, as well as speech, reasoning, emotions, learning, and fine control of movement. The cerebrum also consists of the corpus callosum which is a bundle of fibers connecting the two hemispheres. Without the Cerebrum the human would not have the capability to question, reason, think, nor have the ability to interpret their five senses. These are the main components of the human brain.

  • This is pretty US-centric with the reference to grades. It would be helpful to have a table linking grades to typical ages/education levels.

  • Congratulations on developing such a unique tool. I use word counter frequently given the unreliability of the Common App’s text box(40 minutes limit).

    I wish all the admins the best of luck in the future.

    Post Scriptum: Love your website!

    Post Post Scriptum: Love your comment as a schematic!

  • I’m pretty sure I’m only getting 11th-12th grade reading level because I’m using Japanese honorifics… XP

  • I found it funny that when I copied and pasted this article into wordcounter itself, it received a 9-10th grade reading level…

  • It was really helpful! It said that the reading level was 11-12 and that is because I needed to know something like that to make sure my teacher would understand it and love it.

  • Here is my college level essay, it is about a character, Bob, getting milk from a store.

    Bob ventured to the market. Within the market, Bob proclaimed non-verbally that he was in dire need of a lactose substance, to which he then made a monetary exchange with clerk. Bob expressed the monetary value he had on his persons to which the teller responded with gratitude. “I am here declaring for your record, that I am greatly pleased by your currency. I will now provide you with your lactose substance and the means to transport it”. The clerk transmitted to Bob’s person a flexible container consisting of a thin polymer. After this noble gesture, Bob expressed his gratitude once more to which he then exited the premises.

  • Okay, I’m going to ask this question but is everyone just says something about either how bad they right, how high their reading level is or just being mean to random people they don’t even know. If they are, just stop because that’s not what this is supposed to be used for.

  • I’m writing an Annotated Bibliography for my ENC1101 class and it says I reached a college graduate reading level and I’m happy because I’m only a junior in high school! 🙂

    • I’m also Korean, and I doubt that the level has much to do with our actual reading level.

      When I write reflections, I get 11~ 12, and when I write a research paper, I get college graduate which is a huge gap. (And I know that I’m not there yet)

      I just like to look at the levels for fun 🙂

  • Do NOT respond to this comment or you will live to regret it.
    Seriously Folks! This is 9th to 10th grade reading level.

  • HAHA! I have a 9-10th grade reading level as a non-native. I have finally reached perfection! No need to take exams anymore! Got to bose around my English teachers!

  • What a delightfully pointless and off topic series of ramblings and jokes in a Word Counter forum, of all places. Thank you Bill Cosby! You truly have created a movement.

  • Dude it says my “this I believe” essay is 8th grade lvl (im older than 8th tho. but i may be correct cuz it’s written in my typical style haha) and my “Shrek’s Carnival Craze Review” is college-level 0-0

    • yeah, to test this out I wrote a few pretty simple sentences in french (probably elementary school level) and it said college graduate level lmao

  • I am merely a glint in the milkman’s eye yet I have college level writing.

    Also without wishing to be pedantic but being so anyway…. Those among you debating what is/isn’t acceptable subject matter for debate “on this forum” are all wrong since this is merely a comments section, as opposed to a forum.

    I thank you. Where do I collect my prize?

  • This comment section is filled with schadenfreude (don’t worry this word is german origin even if it is in the english dictionary)

  • I entered this whole thread and there’s 26945 words, a reading time of one hour and thirty-eight minutes and 11-12th grade.

  • This boy is Dylan and he never knew who his parents were. Dylan was around 22. When he started committing crimes and getting engaged with the world’s strongest mafia named ‘The Blue Ruby’.

    How is this 11-12th … I’m really confused

    plis help… ;-;

  • What age is 11th grade? It’s a different school system in England. would be easier if it said the age rather than the grade, far more universal.

    • well, ages say nothing to be honest how can you incorporate age into what a reading level or audience is? I could be 23 but not know how to read.

  • Does anyone know the levels on this I’m writing a college application essay but it’s reading at only 11th-12th grade level? I mean I know I’m way better at creative writing but this can’t be that bad can it?

    • honestly your college essay doesn’t necessarily have to use sophisticated language to be good– im applying right now too and the advice my college counselor gave me was to make sure the essay had my voice in it. so, it could be a good thing that it reads at an 11th-12th grade level since you’re a 12th grader (I’m assuming). it makes sense. you actually might be done with the apps by now but here’s my two cents anyway

  • I don’t know why people keep saying I got 11-12th grd how did I get that? wtf it is simple either read the article or the comments

  • Wow, I came on here to check the number of words I had for my History paper, but I am really enjoying the comment section here.

  • i use this to count words for my fanfiction and- i wrote one part it said 12th grade- i wrote a smut scene and it went down to 9th- keep in mind im in 6th doing this-

  • This reading feature is way off don’t trust the reading level or speaking time. For speaking time putting the words through google translate and timing it is much more accurate than this site. Thank you and happy writing!

  • get ready famous writers, this 9-year-old has collage level skills. beat: It makes weird noises…”. I peer out of the window and see a fluffy, maple-brown coloured dog. It’s wearing a wooly coral-pink onesie with colourful flowers scattered over it.

    • “It’s” should only be used if you are saying that something belongs to it. The contraction of “it is” is its. Note that there is no apostrophe. To improve your writing skills, I also suggest using a variety of sentence starters. Good luck on your writing!

  • To be honest, I strive for my writing to be in the 11th-12th grades because that means my novels can have a wider demographic.

  • At the start of a not-so-usual journey to America, a trader ship, called the USS Mystery, had some unusual predicaments regarding travel. At first, the voyage started smoothly, reaching ten meters in five seconds. Right at the fifth second, the people on board realised that Norman, the new guy, went overboard. So, they had to turn back and sail at the same speed for three seconds. It took 5 seconds to rescue Norman from the depths of the sea. The crew sailed on at high speeds for two seconds, reaching the twelve-second mark. Then, the crew realised that Norman dropped his favorite wooden boat. The ship sailed backwards, slowing down to spot the toy, then, rescuing the wooden toy, Norman got thrown overboard at a tropical island. The ship set sail again for America without any more delays.

    This was an 11th to 12th grade level. It’s funny too. lol

  • I stopped reading by the stop it Sara part all my homophobic homies wya lets sh*t on the queer bags.

  • When you’re in college and compare your English classmate’s essays and you are the only one who got “college level” lmao

  • I think the reading level should have something about names. For instance, I use the word counter to make sure my Warrior Cats fan articles are long enough, and I doubt warrior names (Firestar, Graystripe, Sandpaw, etc.) would be included in the list of words that a fourth-grader knows. There are also names like Kitaya and Elvei, which make a red misspelling line on my computer and are therefore unlikely to be included.

  • Guys I need help for an essay, I wanted to ask this question
    I’m reading the boy in the striped pyjamas and I have to write an essay about it, I have to describe three themes in the essay and have chosen friendship, human nature and hope. Does anyone have like any ideas about human nature in the book (if you’ve read it)

  • This comment section is equal parts hilarious and disturbing. I often have concern for the inevitable fate of humanity.

      • We should change that, so as to encourage our college graduates to improve–to give them something to strive for.

        I propose we add “Average Homeschooled Kid” as the highest level. Or if that isn’t enough, maybe above that can be “Victorian-Era Child.”

  • I was rated a 9-10. idk what that means but I only just started secondary school and I would like know what the highest level is. can you please tell me?

  • I just wrote a bunch of random crap that sounds super scientifical and it said collage graduate so does this mean that I’m super duper smart?

  • Just saying: I’m 11 and the writing I entered was for 11-12th grade. This does not make sense. I am not a genius so all I can say is that you should not really trust what has been said.

  • oh okay then- anyways, here’s this essay about invasive species (-conclusion) I wrote in grade 5 😐

    Invasive species have been a problem in America for a long time. An Invasive species is a plant or animal that harms other species or land around it. Although Invasive species have been
    a problem for a long time, Scientists have found solutions to get rid of some.

    First of all, Invasive species have been a problem because they can Kill/hurt other species, and cause people to lose their jobs. In the article Vampire in the deep, it says. “Like a vampire in a horror film, lampreys attach themselves to other fish, drilling a hole into their flesh, and sucking their blood.” This is saying that the sea lampreys were killing the fish, and with no fish that meant the people could not catch them, and they could possibly lose their jobs.

    Even though there are many problems Invasive species cause, there are many solutions to them. Such as, using them for something useful! In the article People and Invasive species, it says. “ Some Invasive plants can be turned into paper. Invasive fish such as Lionfish can be eaten as a delicacy (complete with the slogan “if you can’t beat ‘em eat ‘em).” In this part of the article it’s saying that invasive species can be very useful for a lot of things, so instead of just killing them, we could use them.

  • i need to form a habit to translate the ‘college graduate’ ramble in my head into something more readable for my age group T^T currently using disciplines from a marketing strategy. if i can convince other people my age to buy into the subjects i talk about, especially from audiences that dont partake in the esoteric language *without reducing compexity through compression* i may be less alone. GGs, we shall see where it goes. you guys should look at the formulas they use for reading level, theyre pretty interesting as another objective perspective on your writing, maybe you guys can think of something greater or more accurate for a certain purpose, i certainly will.

  • Here I am just trying to write my essay and I stumble upon this, just reading the top few comments. I scroll and read some more but then I look to the right and see just how small the scrolling square is…. guys thank you for making my night, finally made it to the end.

  • Understand that people comprehend things differently. So just stop wasting your life on here and do better things in your life.

    • According to Dale-Chall’s readability formula, a score between 9.0 and 9.9 is the highest and classifies a text as “easily understood by an average college student”.

  • This may be one of the greatest comments sections of all time, honestly. Everybody who has talked here over 8 years has a combined total of about 4 brain cells and it is absolutely beautiful; the character development and progression between arcs is hauntingly poignant and fluid. Reaching into the depths of Sara’s revival and infinite same-phrase reply chains makes me feel like a historian. Also, changing your username per-post might be one of the dumbest ideas ever introduced to a website – its like a troupe of clowns with a rapidly-rotating collection of wigs. If you’re reading this, I sincerely hope you feel the same as me

    • Using 1 name per comment is used because there is no point in a website like WordCounter using resources for server space to store something like account data, which would keep track of mapping usernames to comments. None of the comments here are worth the effort especially yours

  • did you know that you have rights? constitution says you do, and so do i. i believe that until proven guilty, every man woman and child in this country is innocent. and thats why i fight for you, albuquerque!

  • Remember, if anyone ever asks if you’re really qualified to perform brain surgery with a rusty bread knife show them your college graduate reading level on word counter and they’ll shut up.

  • you do know that its been years and this is the funniest and most pointless comment section I’ve ever seen but this thread has to live on so here I am to keep it alive.

  • I am offended that my level is that of a college graduate. There has to be a higher level for those just using this for word/page count for their professional development.

  • Lmao, I just put in “Utterly flabbergasting! Amaizingly done! Astonishing!” and it gave me collage graduate, so if you’re nine or something and want to flex on your friends, just write some fancy words, and bam.

  • so i entered part of my essay (just the contents) into and it said ‘college student’ but when i included everything it said ‘college graduate’ so i’m a bit confused? not that i mean to complain, ofc. i love getting my ego stoked. but ig i didn’t get the difference

  • my procrastination is so severe that i’m really putting off writing college essays by reading about… the dale-chall readability formula?

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