By kodewright · Published: 2026-04-06 · Updated: 2026-10-13
How to Reduce Word Count — Professional Editing Techniques
Cut 20–30% of your word count without losing meaning. Use our expert 'text refactoring' guide and browser-based tools to make your writing concise.
If you need fewer words, cut filler phrases first ("in order to" becomes "to"), then turn passive sentences into active ones and delete throat-clearing openers. These edits remove words without removing ideas, and they usually get a draft a good way toward its limit before you have to cut any content.
Everything below is line editing: swapping long constructions for short ones. If you need to cut more than line editing can give you, skip ahead to the section on structure.
Replace wordy phrases
Start here because it's mechanical. Some phrases take four or five words to say what one word would. I counted the savings for each of these with the same word segmentation the Word Counter uses:
| Wordy | Tighter | Words saved |
|---|---|---|
| In order to | To | 2 |
| Due to the fact that | Because | 4 |
| At this point in time | Now | 4 |
| In the event that | If | 3 |
| With the exception of | Except | 3 |
| For the purpose of | For | 3 |
| It should be noted that | (delete) | 5 |
In a 1,500-word essay you might hit each of these a few times. Run the seven phrases through Find & Replace and you'll see right away how many there are. Don't use replace-all blindly: "In order to" at the start of a sentence needs "To" with a capital letter, and some phrases need a different word depending on the sentence. The Case Converter can fix capitalization afterwards, but it won't fix a sentence that no longer reads well, so check each change.
Swap adverb plus verb for one verb
Adverbs often prop up a weak verb. Look for "-ly" words and ask whether a more exact verb exists.
- "He ran quickly to the store." (6 words) becomes "He sprinted to the store." (5)
- "She spoke softly to the baby." (6) becomes "She whispered to the baby." (5)
One word saved per sentence sounds small. The point is that the new sentence is also more precise, so the cut costs nothing.
Use active voice
Passive sentences need a helper verb (is, was, were, been) and often hide who did the thing. "The code was reviewed by the senior developer" is 8 words; "The senior developer reviewed the code" is 6. Active voice also lowers the average sentence length, which is one input to the readability scores in the counter.
There are good reasons to keep passive: when the actor is unknown or unimportant ("the window was broken"), or in some scientific writing where the convention is to leave the researcher out. Otherwise, make it active. Note that no tool will find passive sentences for you reliably, so this one is a manual pass.
Delete redundant pairs
English has many pairs where the second word repeats the first.
- Each and every → each
- Past history → history
- End result → result
- Free gift → gift
- Future plans → plans
You can find these by reading carefully. If your draft has accidentally pasted lines repeated, Remove Duplicates will drop exact duplicate lines, but it won't catch a repeated word inside a sentence.
Cut empty openers
Many sentences start with words that only announce the sentence: "I would like to point out that…", "The fact of the matter is that…". Delete them and begin with the actual point. Others can be shortened instead: "There are many people who believe…" becomes "Many believe…". Each one saves 4–8 words, and they tend to cluster at the start of paragraphs.
Limit hedging
"It might possibly be suggested that perhaps…" has four hedges and says nothing firmly. One hedge is enough for caution. Keep the one that fits ("suggests") and delete the rest.
Fix structure when line editing isn't enough
Say you have a 1,200-word draft and need 800, for example to fit 4 double-spaced pages or a 5-minute speech. Swapping phrases won't get you there, because you need to cut a third of the content. Put the most important point in the first paragraph, then ask of every other paragraph whether it supports that point. If it doesn't, cut it. Purdue's Online Writing Lab has a guide to conciseness with more examples of the wording patterns above.
When you can, cut from the middle. In a speech, the opening and close are what listeners remember, so how to structure a speech is a better guide to where cuts should land. A cover letter is similar: the first paragraph decides whether the rest gets read, and how many words a cover letter should be shows what 200, 350 and 500 words look like for the same letter.
Read it aloud
Skimming hides padding, but reading aloud doesn't. If you run out of breath in the middle of a sentence, it's too long. Split it, or cut the clause that doesn't earn its place.
Check your count and focus
After editing, paste the text into the Word Counter for the new count. I built it so the text never leaves your browser; there's no server that could receive it. Also look at keyword density afterwards: if you're writing for search and the main term appears far less than before, a cut may have removed too much of the topic.
Pasting from Google Docs, Word or Slack often brings double spaces and odd line breaks along. Remove Spaces cleans those up. It doesn't change the word count (words are still separated by a space), but it removes hidden characters that can cause trouble in submission forms.