Grammarly Review Summary by Software for Writers:
A better grammar checker than Microsoft Word – at a price
Grammarly Overall Rating: 8/10 – Value for Money 5/10
I don’t like grammar checkers, but I do like Grammarly. It tidies up your draft and helps you spot slips or errors you might miss. It’s the best grammar checker I reviewed.
I’ve followed the progress of grammar checkers since they were first introduced for the PC with Grammatik in the early 1980s. In 1992, Microsoft added a grammar checker, based on Houghton Mifflin’s CorrecText, to Word. WordPerfect added Grammatik.
Grammar checkers have always had their limitations. They fail to spot many errors, incorrectly identify good English as bad, and sometimes offer ungrammatical advice. Professor Daniel Kies at the Department of English, College of DuPage, has conducted a 20-year study of grammar checkers. The latest study showed Grammarly found only 30 percent of grammatical errors in the sentences he tested. He summarises his findings: “After two decades of benchmarking the progress of these grammar-checking programs, not one of them has made significant improvements toward creating a system that can reliably find and correct the twenty most common usage errors made by first-year students at American colleges and universities.”
But in testing Grammarly I was often impressed.
Correcting basic grammar errors
Grammarly will correct basic grammatical errors. It does it by underlining the potential error and offering a suggested correction.
But Grammarly is inconsistent. Good English treats collective nouns such as jury, politics, and team as singular. For example:
Wrong: The jury are examining the evidence.
Correct: The jury is examining the evidence.
Wrong: Politics are a dirty business.
Correct: Politics is a dirty business.
Grammarly picks up the error with the jury but misses the error with politics.
Putting your Apostrophes in their Place
Grammarly is good at spotting missing apostrophes – a common mistake in writing.
Wrong: The leaders position was outlined in the parties manifesto.
Correct: The leader’s position was outlined in the party’s manifesto.
This is impressive. Not only does Grammarly pick up the two missing apostrophes, but it also works out that the plural form of parties should be the singular, possessive form, party’s.
So is this the end of the greengrocers’ apostrophe? This is a British term for signs outside shops saying: Apple’s, Orange’s and Pear’s for sale or Avodcado’s only $1.
Grammarly gets it right.
Wrong: Apple’s, Orange’s, Pear’s for sale.
Grammarly: Apples, Oranges, and Pears for sale.
But then it spoils it all by suggesting you replace sale with purchase!
Grammarly didn’t correct Avocado’s only $1. However, we should commend the Grammarly designers for fixing the misuse of apostrophes.
Why I’d Use Grammarly
Despite Grammarly being inconsistent and failing to find many genuine grammatical mistakes, I’d still use it. It will find errors. Here are some examples.
Original:
Add to that an increasing number of ever smaller low birth weight babies who survive but with some neurologic impairment, and increasing number of babies born to unmarried teenage mothers.
Grammarly:
Add to that an increasing number of ever smaller low birth weight babies who survive but with some neurologic impairment, and an increasing number of babies born to unmarried teenage mothers.
Original:
The Presidents Committee on Mental Retardation created a landmark occasion in the February 1991 Summit Conference. An array of Federal, State and community agencies joined in support of a national event with a prevention theme.
Grammarly:
The President’s Committee on Mental Retardation created a landmark occasion at the February 1991 Summit Conference. An array of Federal, State, and community agencies joined in support of a national event with a prevention theme.
Original:
The determination of the needs of the child and family or caretakers may vary considerably from child to child as well as with the time in the life of the child with a HIV infection that he or she is either first diagnosed as having a HIV infection or is brought to the attention of service providers.
Grammarly:
The determination of the needs of the child and family or caretakers may vary considerably from child to child as well as with the time in the life of the child with an HIV infection that he or she is either first diagnosed as having an HIV infection or is brought to the attention of service providers.
Original: See Article 3.23, page 3-13.
Grammarly: See Article 3.23, pages 3-13.
Grammarly Gives Bad Advice
Grammarly is good, but Grammarly is not perfect. It occasionally offers the wrong advice.
The original is correct. There’s a constant danger that the lazy user will accept Grammarly’s advice and replace good English with bad English. The writer often needs to know enough grammar to dismiss Grammarly’s suggestion.
Sometimes the explanation offered by Grammarly needs a grammarian to understand it and know whether it is relevant.
Example:
Organizations can use this feature to audit the quality of documents.
What I don’t like about Grammarly
In reviewing Grammarly, I had problems. It kept asking for an internet connection when I had one. It often asked me to log in to my account and sometimes I had to close Word and restart it. Occasionally it simply stopped working.
But most annoying was the time wasted when rechecking the document or closing Microsoft Word. Grammarly constantly rechecks the document, usually when I went into Word to make a manual change. This could take up to 20 seconds on a long document. I also noticed when using Grammarly on long documents, Word slowed down and took around 15 seconds to close. Frustrating.
The Engagement Check is Useless
Grammarly has a thesaurus suggesting words to engage the reader. It’s dreadful. Here’s are two examples:
Original: She described the achievement of consensus as the objectives were framed.
Grammarly: She described the achievement of consensus as the dreams were framed.
Original: What I don’t like about Grammarly
Grammarly: What I wouldn’t say I like about Grammarly.
Here are some of the words and their suggested engagement replacements:
abbreviations acronyms
basic essential
central major
certainly undoubtedly
chose decided
difficult complex
fully entirely
greater more
inadequate insufficient
intelligence brightness
special unique
true actual
wonderful incredible
word phrase
writing essay
This produces nonsense suggestions. When I wrote: PerfectIt is a basic text checker, Grammarly suggests PerfectIt is an essential text checker. Grammarly changes the meaning for no rational reason. Other nonsense suggestions include:
- The central government’s policy… becomes: The major government’s policy…
- Older people’s independent living… becomes: Older people’s separate living…
The engagement feature also introduces errors. Acronyms are not the same as abbreviations and special is not the same as unique. Ignoring Grammarly’s advice is often better than following it. I ignored almost all of the engagement suggestions.