Flesch Reading Ease Calculator
Readability formulas turn two measurements into a score: how long your sentences are and how many syllables your words have. Both are easy to count and both predict how hard a text feels.
Flesch Reading Ease
73.04
- Flesch-Kincaid grade level
- 6.05
- Average sentence length
- 12 words
- Syllables per word
- 1.44
- Words
- 48
- Sentences
- 4
- Syllables
- 69
Higher is easier: 60 to 70 suits a general audience, and anything below 50 is written for readers who already know the subject.
The formula this calculator uses
ease = 206.835 - 1.015 x (words / sentences) - 84.6 x (syllables / words)
- words
- Total word count of the passage
- sentences
- Number of sentences, counting each full stop, question mark or exclamation mark
- syllables
- Total syllable count across all words
- ease
- Flesch Reading Ease score, higher meaning easier
How to check the result by hand
- 1
Count the words
Most word processors report this directly. A paragraph of ordinary prose runs about 80 to 120 words.
- 2
Count the sentences
Each full stop, question mark and exclamation mark ends a sentence. Headings and list items are usually excluded because they have no punctuation.
- 3
Count the syllables
This is the fiddly part. The standard approach counts vowel groups and then subtracts one for a silent final e and for common endings such as es and ed.
- 4
Divide words by sentences
For 1000 words in 50 sentences the average is 20 words per sentence, which is already on the long side for general audiences.
- 5
Divide syllables by words and apply the formula
With 1600 syllables over 1000 words the ratio is 1.6. The ease score is 206.835 minus 20.3 minus 135.4, which comes to about 51.
For worked examples, common mistakes and the limits of this formula, read the full How To Calculate Flesch Reading Ease page.