AutoCrit vs ProWritingAid: Which Is Better? (2024)

Improving the quality of your work and looking for mistakes used to be hard (or require an expensive copyeditor), but with modern technology, it’s a lot easier (and cheaper).

Creative writers used to have to pay thousands to their editors to check for grammar and style issues. Now authors can publish without even needing an editor.

ProWritingAid and AutoCrit are two products that help creative writers improve their manuscripts. How does ProWritingAid stack up against the online editing tool AutoCrit? We’ve carried out a direct comparison according to several criteria.

ProWritingAid vs AutoCrit Summary

AutoCrit and ProWritingAid are both designed for fiction authors and creative writers. While they have many of the same features, such as author comparison and dialogue checks, ProWritingAid has more advanced features and includes premium grammar checking.

The key differences are:

• ProWritingAid works across platforms like Word, Scrivener, Google Docs, and browsers via its browser extensions and desktop integrations. AutoCrit only has an online writing environment, which means you have to copy and paste a lot and lose all your formatting.

• ProWritingAid includes world-class grammar checking, similar to Grammarly, so you don’t require a Grammarly Premium license as well. AutoCrit used to include a Grammarly Free integration, but now (as of January 2024) has no grammar checking as Grammarly discontinued their service.

• ProWritingAid has advanced features, like rephrasing, which is designed specifically for creative writers. AutoCrit doesn’t. This means that while AutoCrit can highlight some errors, such as passive voice and repeated words, it can’t show you how you can fix them. ProWritingAid uses AI to suggest different ways you can rephrase your sentences to inspire you and speed up the editing process.

• ProWritingAid has a clear advantage when it comes to the privacy and security of your data. ProWritingAid never uses your text to improve its algorithms. It is externally audited every year for security and its approach to managing customer data.

AutoCrit Overview

AutoCrit is an online editing software designed specifically for fiction writers and creative writers. It aims to help improve storytelling by identifying key issues in your manuscript and providing feedback on areas like pacing, plot structure, characters, dialogue, and more.

Some key features of AutoCrit include:

• Online editing interface: You upload your manuscript to AutoCrit's web-based editing interface. This allows you to access your draft from any device, but you have to copy and paste content back and forth from your main writing tool.

• Pacing analysis: AutoCrit provides charts and metrics on the pacing of your story, highlighting areas that may be too fast or slow. This helps you better structure your plot.

• Dialogue checks: The tool flags dialogue issues like too much or too little dialogue, unbalanced conversations, and repetitive speaker tags. This assists with improving character interactions.

• Characterization: AutoCrit looks at whether you have fully developed, unique characters with logical motivations.

• Repeated words/phrases: It highlights overused words and phrases so you can eliminate repetition.

• Readability score: The tool provides automated readability metrics and grade levels to indicate how easy your writing is to read.

• Author comparison: One of their most sought-after features is their author comparison. You can compare your writing to many bestselling authors to help you cater to your target audience.

Overall, AutoCrit provides helpful big-picture feedback through its pacing and plotting analysis features. However, it lacks robust grammar checking and more advanced editing capabilities. It's easy to use but constrains you to its web interface.

Most of AutoCrit’s best features are behind a paywall. We’ll talk more about the differences in the free and premium versions later.

ProWritingAid Overview

ProWritingAid is an advanced online editing tool designed for creative writers and storytellers. It works across many writing platforms and aims to help writers improve their writing style, catch difficult mistakes, and edit faster.

Key features of ProWritingAid include:

• Platform integrations: ProWritingAid works across platforms like Word, Scrivener, Google Docs, and browsers via its Web Editor, extensions, and desktop apps. This provides flexibility across devices.

• Developmental critique: ProWritingAid offers much more than just line editing. It offers a detailed developmental critique that highlights your strengths, but it also gives you feedback on areas for improvement, such as characters, plot, and use of descriptive language. This is similar to the feedback you might receive from a beta reader.

• Grammar checking: The tool includes context-aware grammar checking to catch complex grammar mistakes.

• Style editing: It has advanced style and consistency editing for issues like passive voice, repetitiveness, vague wording, clichés, and more.

• Pacing analyzer: It provides help with plot flow by providing detailed pacing analysis on chapters and scenes to highlight slow- or fast-moving sections.

• Rewriting tools: A subscription includes a contextual thesaurus and rephrase sentence tool powered by AI to rewrite unclear phrases and inspire creativity.

Overall, ProWritingAid excels in advanced editing features tailored to creative writers across many platforms. The combination of robust grammar checking and an extensive style editor offers a powerful solution to improve fiction manuscripts.

You’re not limited to online-only use with ProWritingAid. You can download it onto your desktop, use it with Microsoft Word and Google Docs, add to Chrome, or use the web editor.

AutoCrit vs ProWritingAid Editing Features

If you look at a side-by-side comparison of AutoCrit vs ProWritingAid, you’ll see that many of the writing style reports are similar.

Both offer comparisons to bestselling authors and genre-specific feedback. Both apps also provide detailed suggestions on the following features:

• Sentence structure and variation

• Pacing

• Dialogue analysis

• Adverbs

• Sensory details/show, don’t tell

• Clichés

• Redundancies

• Unnecessary words

• Word choice

• Consistency

• Repeated words

• Readability

AutoCrit offers creative writing details for fiction writers in a few of these categories. For example, it will look for generic descriptions, POV consistency, and paragraph variation.

ProWritingAid offers other writing reports, such as diction, which looks for vague words, transitions, and even alliteration. You can also use the plagiarism checker and set house rules for your specific style guides.

The Word Explorer is another unique feature in ProWritingAid. It’s a built-in dictionary and thesaurus, but it can also help you find contextually related words, rhymes, alliterations, idioms, and more. You can always find exactly the right word with this online tool.

Another thing that makes ProWritingAid stand out from its competitors is the visual summary report. You can see graphs and charts showing the strengths and weaknesses in your writing, which are great for visual learners.

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Additional Features in AutoCrit vs ProWritingAid

Both writing apps come with additional features beyond the editing tools.

AutoCrit has a voice reader with 11 voice options. This is a great accessibility feature for people with vision issues and dyslexia. It’s also helpful for self-editing, so you can hear mistakes you might have missed. AutoCrit also offers services like first chapter critiques and feedback on your pitch to literary agents for additional fees.

ProWritingAid also has additional benefits. We have a blog full of helpful articles for fiction writers, freelance writers, students, business writers, and more. We offer free workshops and webinars frequently, as well as a useful library of e-books.

Additionally, you can attend ProWritingAid’s free Writers’ Weeks and learn from bestselling authors and professional editors. Currently, we offer Writers’ Weeks in the following genres: fantasy, romance, science fiction, and crime.

Rather than just accepting suggestions, ProWritingAid wants to help you become a better writer. You can check out in-app videos, articles, and quizzes to learn more about writing rules.

It’s obvious that both ProWritingAid and AutoCrit offer some useful features. The biggest difference lies in what you get in the free version vs the Premium version. Let’s take a closer look at the actual value of each app.

Free Versions of ProWritingAid vs AutoCrit

Both ProWritingAid and AutoCrit offer some analysis for free, but ProWritingAid offers its free users many more features.

AutoCrit boasts an unlimited word count for its free users, but that comes with a catch. Nearly every editing and analysis feature is only accessible for Premium users. In fact, you can only access seven out of their dozens of reports for free. You don’t even get a summary report of your writing on the free plan.

While you get access to the plotting tools with a free account, you can’t access their author comparisons or genre analysis. Free users don’t get any community features like guest Q&As or discussion forums.

ProWritingAid takes a different approach to free users. We’d rather limit the word count rather than the valuable feedback you get. This means you can access every ProWritingAid Report for free on up to 500 words at a time.

You can also get the ProWritingAid Chrome extension and Google Docs add-on for free, so you can improve your writing style wherever you write.

Cost of AutoCrit vs ProWritingAid Premium

You definitely get the most value in ProWritingAid’s free version. But what if you want to invest in your writing and purchase a Premium subscription? Let’s see how AutoCrit Pro compares to ProWritingAid Premium.

AutoCrit Cost

To get all of AutoCrit’s features, you’ll need to subscribe either monthly or yearly. The monthly subscription is $30, and the annual is $180 a year (at the time of this article’s writing). Both paid subscriptions give you access to the full editing tool as well as a private member community. There’s no lifetime subscription option with AutoCrit.

While the AutoCrit professional plan will give you some free workshops, you still need to pay for other courses. You can also get a discount on AutoCrit’s critique services with the Pro plan.

ProWritingAid Premium Cost

ProWritingAid also offers a monthly and yearly subscription as well as a lifetime plan. Pay $30 a month, or save money by paying $120 a year. The lifetime subscription is only $399.

ProWritingAid Premium gives you an unlimited word count, access to our desktop app, author comparisons, text snippets, and custom style guides. You also get unlimited document storage and collaboration features.

AutoCrit vs ProWritingAid Value

AutoCrit vs ProWritingAid: Which Is the Best Writing Tool?

AutoCrit is a great tool, but if you’re a fiction writer looking for the best editor and online writing mentor, ProWritingAid is the way to go.

Not only is ProWritingAid available everywhere you write, but it also provides a high-quality grammar checker in the price. This means you’ll be getting the equivalent of Grammarly Premium and AutoCrit for the same price as just one.

Are you ready to try out ProWritingAid for yourself to see what makes us the best?