Product Review

The Definitive Guide to Grammarly for Word

It’s true.

Microsoft Word has its own built-in grammar editor.

For some authors, writing on a word document is everything — especially if they’ve been writing with MS word for long.

But here’s the thing:

It’s not always good. And it lacks many basic native features (like plagiarism) that most professional writers or editors can’t live without.

We’re a content marketing agency that has clients paying us tens of thousands each month. If our writers ever plagiarized something on their behalf – we’d BOTH be in a huge amount of trouble.

If you happen to be bad with grammar rules or tend to overuse passive voice, well, Microsoft Word won’t help you either.

If you need to write an article or edit a document with a few grammar mistakes, it’s all good. But what if you need a professional proofreading or grammar checker?

So while it might be one of the most popular writing apps on the market today, that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s the best.

Not straight out of the box, anyway.

That’s why there’s Grammarly for Word. It plugs these gaps to help shore up your writing style across all Microsoft Office apps (including Outlook).

And fortunately, it’s also simple to use. Here’s a quick guide to get you started within the next five minutes or less.

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Our Verdict

Grammarly and Microsoft Word should be BFFs. It’s true that Word has its own spell checker, it’s also true that it isn’t as well-rounded as Grammarly’s, going above and beyond to check not only advanced grammar and phrasing, but also plagiarism.

Grammarly Best All-Around

$11.66 /mo – before discount
PROS
  • 86% out of 86% accuracy
  • 16+ billion database
  • 150k+ word limit
  • 5 devlice limit
  • Includes plagiarism
  • 1-hour response
CONS
  • Only supports English
  • Expensive without our link

Grammarly Premium Walkthrough Video

Getting Started with Grammarly for Word

Login to your Grammarly account and head over to “Apps” in the left-hand sidebar. (Get a free account here if you don’t already have one.)

Under there, you’ll should the Microsoft Office add-on…  

Except if you’re on a Mac, like the image above. You may go for Google docs or Quip, instead.

Unfortunately, the Microsoft Office app is only available on Windows devices at this time.

Windows users will find the free download there, though. So install like any other software.

Once installed, you’ll be able to open any Microsoft Office product. For example, open up Outlook and start typing out an email like usual.

You’ll find the Grammarly icon over to the right-hand side. Click on it and it’ll instantly proofread your email, pointing out common misspellings or misplaced punctuation.

The Grammarly Office ribbon will also offer up a slew of features to check, like grammar checking, sentence structure or style, too. So not only will your emails be accurate, but recipients might actually look forward to reading them as well.

Here’s how to use Grammarly for Word to check longer passages of text.

How to Use Grammarly App for Word’s Editor to Check Grammar Mistakes

Installing Grammarly in Word will add a new option on the far right-hand side. Look for it in between “Help” and the search feature. You can also click on the “Open Grammarly” option a little further out to the right.

The grammar checking options will be off by default. So after opening Grammarly on Word, you can click on each individual attribute to fire it up and start proofing your content.

If you suck at grammar like me, you’ll quickly notice the issues pile up. They’ll be highlighted throughout the text, and clicking on them will open up each specific issue.

My favorite part is that they’ll even recommend a few potential solutions for each issue, so all you have to do is click on the best one. No thinking required!

It’ll also give you a quick background about the problem, helping you actually learn the root cause so you can remember this issue the next time (and slowly but surely cut down on the number of errors you make).

Grammar’s not the only thing it’ll catch, though. Grammarly for Word goes into A LOT more detail. Here are some of the other reporting features it’ll uncover.

Grammarly for Word Reports

Each Grammarly Word report is called a “check.” I don’t know why, exactly. That’s just how you find them:

The Vocabulary enhancement one will flag all overused or cliched words. This is especially helpful for also finding those favorite sayings you use over and over and over again. Thankfully,  they’ll recommend a few alternatives.

The Style check is a little more nuanced. For example, they’ll flag common writing mistakes and spelling errors like slang right out of the box. Here’s an example where they didn’t like the word “ain’t.”

But slang or jargon isn’t always wrong. So this is where you can update your personal dictionary or adjust the settings to determine how strict each check should be.

Next up is the Sentence structure check, which checks… you guessed it: sentence structure!

This one does not like sentence fragments:

Punctuation is fairly common, highlighting hiccups like placing a period outside of quotations.

This is also where your language setting comes into play, as there might be slight discrepancies between American and British English… besides the fact that British English is wrong. 😉

It sounds subtle. But just like the experts from our MasterClass review can attest, it’s the details that make all the difference!

Contextual spelling is another one of those ‘it depends’ kind of questions. For example, if you’re purposefully writing something informally, you might want to keep improper words, odd spelling, and other little interesting tidbits.

So Grammarly will flag all of these issues. But you’re able to hit “Add to Dictionary” button on each if you want to let Grammarly know not to mark it in the future.

Grammarly for Word also comes with a default content type. You can toggle between different versions to change what they’re grading (or how severe their grading is).

How to Check Plagiarism on Word with Grammarly

Microsoft Word’s built-in grammar feature is OK. But it completely lacks any plagiarism check.

That’s where this Grammarly integration pays for itself several times over.

The Plagiarism check is on the far right side.

Click it, and your text will start highlighting seconds later.

The Grammarly window on the right will show you the source for each flagged section, along with different recommendations for how to properly cite the material (if you’re still intent on using it as-is).

It’ll also flag the total number of plagiarized issues. The only downside here is that you don’t get an aggregate percentage score if you’re trying to compare several documents or keep a simple-to-remember benchmark to grade against.

You can get access to that stuff if you login back on the web app version of Grammarly, though.

How to Uninstall Grammarly on Word

If you want to uninstall Grammarly, no problem!

Just follow these five simple steps:

  1. Go into Settings
  2. Look for Apps
  3. Click on “Apps & features”
  4. Find Grammarly for Microsoft Office Suite
  5. Click “Uninstall”

It couldn’t be easier!

Conclusion

Microsoft Office comes with a spelling and punctuation checker.

But it’s kinda pedestrian if we’re being honest.

Plus, there is no built-in plagiarism checker of any kind.

So chances are, you’re going to need to take whatever Word doc you’re working on and still run it through at least one or two other tools.

Thankfully, Grammarly for Word alleviates this problem.

It adds a lot of your favorite functionality, like plagiarism but also style or contextual spelling checks, directly into the Word interface so you never have to navigate away.

Create a Grammarly account. Simply type or edit as usual. Click on the Grammarly icon when you need it.

Then hit “Save” and get on with the rest of your day.

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