AI writing assistant that catches everything from typos to tone.
Grammarly is everywhere — browser extensions, desktop apps, mobile keyboards. Beyond catching typos, it analyzes tone, clarity, and engagement. The free tier is genuinely useful, and Team plans offer style guides for consistent brand voice.
Grammarly has achieved something rare in software: ubiquity. With browser extensions for Chrome, Safari, Firefox, and Edge, desktop apps for Mac and Windows, mobile keyboards for iOS and Android, and integrations with Google Docs, Slack, Notion, and more — Grammarly is present wherever you write. This omnipresence is its killer feature. You don't have to remember to check your writing; Grammarly checks it as you go.
Beyond basic grammar and spelling correction, Grammarly analyzes tone, clarity, engagement, and delivery. The tone detector can tell you if your email sounds "confident," "friendly," "formal," or "assertive" — and suggest changes to shift the tone. For non-native English speakers or anyone who struggles with tone in professional communication, this is genuinely valuable.
The free tier catches spelling errors, basic grammar mistakes, and punctuation issues. It's genuinely useful — most people can get significant value without paying. The Premium tier ($12/month) adds advanced grammar, tone adjustments, word choice suggestions, and plagiarism detection. Business tier ($30/user/month) adds style guides, brand tone settings, and analytics.
For teams, Grammarly's style guide feature is underrated. Define your company's preferred spelling (e.g., "email" not "e-mail"), banned words, and tone guidelines. Every team member's writing is automatically checked against the style guide, ensuring consistency across all customer-facing communication.
The affiliate program pays $20-200 per activation (varies by plan and region), which is a solid one-time payout for referring a writing tool.
Privacy is the elephant in the room. Grammarly reads everything you type in every field where it's active. The company states they don't sell data and use encryption, but the fundamental reality is that a third party is processing every word you write. For some users and organizations, this is a dealbreaker.
Grammarly is English-only. For a tool this popular, the lack of multilingual support is notable. If you write in Spanish, French, or Mandarin, Grammarly won't help you.
Grammarly has been running in my browser for over two years and it's caught hundreds of mistakes I would have sent to clients and colleagues. The tone detector has saved me multiple times: I drafted what I thought was a "firm but friendly" follow-up email, and Grammarly flagged it as "aggressive." I rewrote it, and the response was positive instead of defensive. The free tier caught 90% of my errors — typos, subject-verb agreement, missing articles. Premium added value with word choice suggestions (replacing "very good" with "excellent") and the plagiarism checker for blog posts. For our team, the style guide feature was unexpectedly useful: we defined "API" as always capitalized, banned "utilize" in favor of "use," and set a friendly but professional tone. Every team member's emails and docs now conform to the same standards. The privacy aspect does give me pause — I disabled Grammarly in password fields and sensitive document tools. But for everyday writing, the quality improvement is worth the trade-off.
Only works for English writing. Teams that need multilingual support should look at LanguageTool. Privacy-sensitive organizations (legal, healthcare, finance) should evaluate whether Grammarly's data processing meets their compliance requirements. Writers who rely too heavily on Grammarly may find their unassisted writing quality declining.
Grammarly is the writing assistant that everyone should have installed. The free tier catches real errors, Premium elevates your writing quality, and the team features ensure consistent brand voice. The privacy trade-off is real but manageable for most users.