Hemingway vs. Grammarly Review – Which is Better?

Probably every living being who uses the Internet has seen ads for Grammarly in their browser. Although Hemingway doesn’t have that aggressive marketing campaign, its reputation has equally grown by word of mouth. If you still haven’t checked them out, you’re probably feeling you’re missing out on something, and that could be the case. But which one of these apps could improve your writing?

Grammarly

Neat & Tidy

The first impression of this app leaves you with a feeling of impeccable organization. Right after you’ve installed the plugin for the web browser, you have the option to set up your account along with your preferences.

Even the dashboard on the Grammarly website looks neat and tidy, and it provides you with just the right amount of necessary options.

In the Profile option, you can edit your account information, as well as change language preferences and add words to your dictionary. In the Apps option, you’ll be able to install plugins for Windows, Office, and your browser, so you can use the app on the go.

As for the premium option, it will unlock all of the app’s features. Grammarly has a pretty good sales tactic since the app shows you hidden mistakes you can see only after the purchase. When it comes to pricing, you can choose between monthly, quarterly, and annual plans. The yearly plan billed as one payment of $139.95, but you might want to wait a bit and catch the occasional 40% off sale deal.

Editing Made Easy

Small corrections and suggestions in the free version are pretty useful. There’s a high chance that the app will point out some frequent errors you weren’t aware of in your writing. And the best thing about it is the thoroughness in the approach to mistakes – every mistake has the “More“ option, which carefully explains why it is wrong.

This feature is probably the best thing about the app since the information about the mistake can help you to improve in the future.

If you install the recommended browser plugin, it will also check your spelling and grammar on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Gmail, and other sites.

Set Your Goals

Grammarly provides you with an option to personalize your goals for each document. You can choose your intention, target audience, style, and even emotion you’re trying to convey.

But, as much as the intention is excellent, the execution is somewhat weak. Among many on-the-point corrections, there ’s also a great deal of those that are “probably correct. “ Despite personalization, Grammarly will correct you based on personal preference on numerous occasions.

The fact is that the app is not able to fully understand the context of your writing, but it also doesn’t pretend to. You can choose whether or not to accept any found mistake. Corrections out of context can be a flaw, but not if you’re entirely confident in what you have to say.

Go Beyond Your Grammar?

If you choose to pay for the premium version, it will be an upgrade, for sure. Suggestions about sentence structure can sometimes be hit and miss, due to the above-mentioned context-related issue. Paying for the app won’t make it understand you better. Recommendations regarding comma placement and removal do get better over time, however.

The most valuable tool the Premium version offers is auto-thesaurus. It will enable you to check for synonyms for every word just by double-clicking it. That’s extremely handy, but as beyond grammar as it goes.

Hemingway

All the Colors of the English Language

The first thing you’ll see when you open Hemingway is beautiful, various colors. Their purpose is to give you an equally beautiful breakdown, analyzing multiple aspects of your writing.

While Grammarly mainly focuses on spelling and grammar, Hemingway accents readability, and sentence structure. It’s very good at discovering all the shades of language. When you see a word highlighted in pink, it makes you think about alternative phrases. When it marks all the adverbs in blue, it’s easy to see if you made it a bit excessive.

There is a paid desktop version that costs $19.99, but I think that the free online version is already a great tool to tighten up your prose, especially for newer writers who are looking to improve quickly. After you copy and paste your articles, it will outline passive voice, words you should omit, better choice of words, as well as hard to read and confusing sentences.

Clear Cut & Filler-Free

Similar to Ernest Hemingway’s famous clear cut and filler-free writing style, this app will certainly teach you how to fix those hard-to-read and monotonous passages. It is an excellent opportunity to pick up some sharp skills and incorporate them naturally in your work. Nevertheless, sometimes the app takes this too far due to the same flaw Grammarly has – it can’t understand the context of your writing.

Although it offers somewhat better suggestions than Grammarly, you need to decide when to skip and when to incorporate them. Just following the recommendations blindly, you’ll probably lose your voice, and the world doesn’t need two Hemingways. Nevertheless, the most significant value of this app is that it makes you think about the very nature of the writing process.

Who Wins?

As you can see, these apps are quite different, so it all comes down to your goals and self-confidence. Grammarly is a useful tool for improving your spelling and grammar, and if your goal is to improve the technical aspect of your writing.

If you’re still looking for your style, Hemingway will make you think about the writing process and give you many useful tips. However, you might need more self-confidence with this app.

Do you use any of the apps? If you do, how would you rate them? Are they helpful? Which one’s better? Let us know in the comments section below.