Readability Score Calculator

What Is a Readability Score?

A readability score is an estimate of how hard a piece of writing is to understand. These scores use simple text statistics such as sentence length and word length to approximate how much effort a typical reader needs to understand your content.

On this page, the Readability Score Calculator focuses on two closely related and widely used formulas:

• Flesch Reading Ease – gives a score from 0 to 100, where higher scores are easier to read.
• Flesch–Kincaid Grade Level – converts the same information into a U.S. school grade level (for example, 7.5 ≈ 7th–8th grade).

These formulas were designed for English prose but are now used across education, publishing, UX writing, marketing, and technical communication. They are not perfect, but they provide a fast, objective way to compare drafts and aim your writing at the right audience.

How This Readability Score Calculator Works

When you paste text into the calculator and select Analyze Text, the tool performs a series of steps directly in your browser:

1. Detect sentences by looking for punctuation such as periods, exclamation points, and question marks.
2. Count words in each sentence.
3. Estimate syllables for every word using a heuristic (rule-based) approach.
4. Compute averages such as average sentence length and average syllables per word.
5. Apply the Flesch formulas to calculate Reading Ease and Grade Level.

All of this processing happens on your device. No text is sent to a server, which helps keep drafts, student work, or confidential documents private.

Flesch Reading Ease Formula

The Flesch Reading Ease score returns a number between 0 and 100. Higher scores mean the passage is easier to read. The formula uses the average number of words per sentence and the average number of syllables per word.

In mathematical form:

Where:

• is the Flesch Reading Ease score.
• is the total number of words.
• is the total number of sentences.
• is the total number of syllables.

Short sentences and short words (in syllables) increase the score. Long sentences and multi-syllable words decrease it.

Flesch–Kincaid Grade Level Formula

The Flesch–Kincaid Grade Level expresses the same underlying information as a U.S. school grade level. A result of 6.0 suggests that a typical sixth-grade student should be able to understand the text.

The formula is:

Here:

• is the Flesch–Kincaid Grade Level.
• The other symbols match the previous formula: words, sentences, and syllables.

As the average sentence gets longer, or as words contain more syllables, the grade level increases, signaling more complex text.

What Is a Good Readability Score?

The ideal readability score depends on your audience and purpose. A children’s story should be much easier to read than a medical journal article. Use the table below as a quick reference for typical ranges.

For most public-facing websites, help centers, and product documentation, aiming for a Flesch Reading Ease of 60–80 (roughly grades 6–9) is a good starting point.

How to Interpret Your Results

When you run the calculator, you typically see several pieces of information together. Here is how to read them and decide what to do next.

• Flesch Reading Ease – Ask whether the number fits your audience. If you are writing for the general public and see a score around 40, consider simplifying.
• Flesch–Kincaid Grade Level – Compare the grade with your intended readers. For example, an 11.5 grade level might be fine for a university syllabus, but high for a customer support page.
• Average sentence length – Long averages (over 20 words) often indicate that you could split sentences in two for better clarity.
• Average syllables per word – High values suggest a lot of jargon or multi-syllable terms. Replacing them with simpler synonyms can help.

Use these values together, not in isolation. A single complex sentence in an otherwise simple paragraph is rarely a problem, but many long sentences in a row can quickly exhaust readers.

Worked Example: From Draft to Clearer Text

To see how the calculator can guide edits, imagine you paste the following paragraph into the tool:

Our organization endeavors to facilitate the optimization of cross-functional communication by implementing comprehensive procedural frameworks that stakeholders can reference in order to streamline collaborative initiatives.

A typical analysis might produce results in this range (your exact scores may differ):

• Flesch Reading Ease: 28 (very difficult)
• Flesch–Kincaid Grade Level: 15.0
• Average sentence length: 31 words
• Average syllables per word: 2.2

These numbers suggest that the sentence is long, full of abstract nouns, and likely too complex for many everyday readers.

Now consider a revised version:

We help teams communicate better by creating clear processes that everyone can follow.

The recalculated results might look more like:

• Flesch Reading Ease: 68 (standard, easy to read)
• Flesch–Kincaid Grade Level: 7.5
• Average sentence length: 15 words
• Average syllables per word: 1.4

By shortening the sentence, replacing jargon with common words (“endeavors to facilitate” → “helps”), and using concrete language, you make the text more approachable without changing the core meaning.

Practical Targets for Different Use Cases

You can use the readability scores to set goals for specific types of content:

• School assignments – Teachers may ask students to write at or slightly above their grade level. A 7th grade essay might target a grade level between 6 and 8.
• Public websites and blogs – Many organizations aim for a Flesch Reading Ease of 60–80, roughly grades 6–9, to reach a broad audience.
• Help center articles and FAQs – Aim for the easier end of the range (Reading Ease 70–90). Clearer writing often reduces support requests.
• Legal, medical, or technical content – Some complexity is unavoidable, but plain-language summaries, glossaries, and short paragraphs can move scores into a more approachable band.
• UX writing and microcopy – Even small bits of interface text benefit from simple wording and short sentences. A high Reading Ease score is usually desirable here.

How to Improve Your Readability Scores

If your initial results are harder than you would like, use the scores as a starting point for revision rather than a final verdict. Helpful strategies include:

Shorten and Simplify Sentences

• Break long sentences into two or three shorter ones.
• Limit each sentence to one main idea where possible.
• Use punctuation such as periods and commas to create natural pauses.

Prefer Everyday Words Over Jargon

• Replace complex phrases like “utilize” with simpler choices such as “use.”
• Avoid unnecessary buzzwords and acronyms. If you must use them, define them once.
• Favor concrete nouns and verbs that describe specific actions.

Make Paragraphs Easy to Scan

• Keep paragraphs short, often 2–4 sentences.
• Use headings and bullet lists (like this one) to break up dense text.
• Highlight key terms or actions in bold to guide skimming.

Use the Calculator in Your Writing Workflow

• Draft your content normally.
• Paste it into the Readability Score Calculator and review the results.
• Edit for clarity and concision, then run the analysis again to see how the scores change.

Limitations and Assumptions of Readability Scores

Readability formulas are useful, but they are not perfect. Understanding their limits helps you interpret results more accurately.

• Language focus – Flesch-based formulas were developed for English. Results for other languages, or for heavily mixed-language text, may be unreliable.
• Short or unusual text – Very short passages, headlines, bullet lists, and fragments can produce unstable scores because the formulas assume normal sentence structure.
• Content and context – Readability metrics do not account for prior knowledge, cultural references, layout, or visuals. A text can be “readable” by the numbers but still confusing.
• Syllable estimation – Automated syllable counting is approximate. It usually performs well across many words but can miscount unusual terms or proper names.
• Not a quality score – A high Reading Ease does not automatically mean good writing, and a demanding academic article is not “bad” simply because it gets a low score.

Because of these limitations, use readability scores as one input alongside human editing, user feedback, and subject-matter review.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is a good Flesch Reading Ease score?

For general audiences, many writers aim for a score between 60 and 80. This range usually corresponds to middle-school reading levels, which most adults can read quickly and comfortably.

How accurate are readability formulas?

They are reasonably accurate for comparing similar texts and spotting major issues such as very long sentences or heavy jargon. However, they cannot judge argument quality, tone, or whether your explanation is correct. Always combine automated scores with human review.

Can readability scores help with SEO?

Search engines do not publish exact formulas, but readable content tends to keep visitors on the page longer and reduce confusion. Clear writing often improves engagement, which can indirectly support search performance.

What grade level should web content target?

Many organizations choose a grade level between 6 and 9 for public-facing pages. Highly specialized sites may go higher, but even then, plain language summaries are helpful for readers who are new to the topic.