Want to improve your writing? Stop using Grammarly

Grammarly is the worst thing to have happened to writing. It is too intrusive. It will tell you to change words and restructure sentences even though they are absolutely grammatically correct. That is because Grammarly is fixated on certain writing styles; it will change anything that does not fit Grammarly’s template. It will eventually rob your confidence and turn you into a clone of itself.

Good writing is about developing an individual identity, which Grammarly absolutely hates. Of course, you can use Grammarly for basic grammar checks by disabling the functions that take care of style-related changes. Then remember, you have paid for those functions. You can do basic grammar checks for free using Google Docs.

As someone who cannot write a single paragraph without making some errors like spelling and punctuation, particularly while writing LinkedIn posts, I needed a tool that can fix basic issues like spelling errors and comma splices. After a few months of trying unsuccessfully to customize Grammarly as per my needs, I decided to remove it permanently. A couple of months post Grammarly, I feel much better these days while writing.

These days I mostly use Google Docs. It lets you be what you are. Of course, Google Docs is not for someone who is still learning grammar. It will not bother to check contextual issues. In fact, Grammarly too misses contextual errors sometimes.

In doubt, mostly when I am in a hurry, I use ChatGPT for fixing grammatical issues. Remember, ChatGPT will work pretty much like Grammarly, that is, modifying sentences unnecessarily. I also do not like ChatGPT’s excessive use of em dashes (—). (If you see someone’s post having too many em dashes, safely assume that ChatGPT is heavily employed.)

If you want to use ChatGPT for fixing basic grammatical issues, use prompts like “Fix spelling and grammatical errors without doing unnecessary changes.” Find a prompt that works for you. Remember, ChatGPT will forget the prompt even within the same window due to limited memory. So, you will need to use the prompt again and again.

Of course, the best thing you can do is buy a book on advanced writing. There are many you can find in the market; choose one that is easily available and you are comfortable with.