ProWritingAid

Where Grammarly fixes your sentences, ProWritingAid interrogates your style. Its 25-plus reports slice a manuscript every way a developmental editor might: sentence-length variety, pacing dips, overused words, sticky sentences, echoes, readability by paragraph. No competitor offers anything close to this diagnostic depth, and the newer AI layer builds on it intelligently — Chapter Critique reads like first-pass editorial notes, the Virtual Beta Reader simulates how readers might react, and Marketability Analysis gives querying authors a sober pre-submission reality check. The Scrivener integration remains the best in the business, which matters because that's where novels actually live. The catches are clear-cut. It's English-only, full stop. The 500-word free tier is a taste, not a tool. The sheer volume of reports can paralyze newcomers — the skill is learning which five reports matter for your draft and ignoring the rest. And if you're eyeing the $399 lifetime license, note the 3-day refund window and do your evaluating during a trial. For fiction writers serious about self-editing before spending on a human editor, ProWritingAid is the strongest analysis tool available and easily earns a recommendation.