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What is a paraphrasing tool?

This AI-powered paraphrasing tool lets you rewrite text in your own words. Use it to  paraphrase articles, essays, and other pieces of text. You can also use it to rephrase sentences and find synonyms for individual words. And the best part? It’s all 100% free!

What is paraphrasing?

Paraphrasing involves expressing someone else’s ideas or thoughts in your own words while maintaining the original meaning. Paraphrasing tools can help you quickly reword text by replacing certain words with synonyms or restructuring sentences. They can also make your text more concise, clear, and suitable for a specific audience. Paraphrasing is an essential skill in academic writing and professional communication. 

Why use this paraphrasing tool?

• Save time: Gone are the days when you had to reword sentences yourself; now you can rewrite an individual sentence or a complete text with one click.
• Improve your writing: Your writing will always be clear and easy to understand. Automatically ensure consistent language throughout. 
• Preserve original meaning: Paraphrase without fear of losing the point of your text.
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Features of the paraphrasing tool

Rephrase individual sentences

With the Scribbr Paraphrasing Tool, you can easily reformulate individual sentences.

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Paraphrase a whole text

Our paraphraser can also help with longer passages (up to 125 words per input). Upload your document or copy your text into the input field.

With one click, you can reformulate the entire text.

Find synonyms with ease

Simply click on any word to open the interactive thesaurus.

• Choose from a list of suggested synonyms
• Find the synonym with the most appropriate meaning
• Replace the word with a single click

Paraphrase in two ways

• Standard: Offers a compromise between modifying and preserving the meaning of the original text
• Fluency: Improves language and corrects grammatical mistakes

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Upload any Microsoft Word document, Google Doc, or PDF into the paraphrasing tool.

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After you’re done, you can easily download or copy your text to use somewhere else.

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The paraphrasing tool uses natural language processing to rewrite any text you give it. This way, you can paraphrase any text within seconds.

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Want to make sure your document is plagiarism-free? In addition to our paraphrasing tool, which will help you rephrase sentences, quotations, or paragraphs correctly, you can also use our anti-plagiarism software to make sure your document is unique and not plagiarized.

Scribbr’s anti-plagiarism software enables you to:

• Detect plagiarism more accurately than other tools
• Ensure that your paraphrased text is valid
• Highlight the sources that are most similar to your text

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How does this paraphrasing tool work?

1. put your text into the paraphraser, 2. select your method of paraphrasing, 3. select the quantity of synonyms you want, 4. edit your text where needed, who can use this paraphrasing tool.

Paraphrasing tools can help students to understand texts and improve the quality of their writing. 

Create original lesson plans, presentations, or other educational materials.

Researchers

Explain complex concepts or ideas to a wider audience. 

Journalists

Quickly and easily rephrase text to avoid repetitive language.

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By using a paraphrasing tool, you can quickly and easily rework existing content to create something new and unique.

Bloggers can rewrite existing content to make it their own.

Writers who need to rewrite content, such as adapting an article for a different context or writing content for a different audience.

A paraphrasing tool lets you quickly rewrite your original content for each medium, ensuring you reach the right audience on each platform.

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The Scribbr Paraphrasing Tool is the perfect assistant in a variety of contexts.

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Paraphrase sources smoothly in your thesis or research paper.

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Frequently asked questions

The act of putting someone else’s ideas or words into your own words is called paraphrasing, rephrasing, or rewording. Even though they are often used interchangeably, the terms can mean slightly different things:

Paraphrasing is restating someone else’s ideas or words in your own words while retaining their meaning. Paraphrasing changes sentence structure, word choice, and sentence length to convey the same meaning.

Rephrasing may involve more substantial changes to the original text, including changing the order of sentences or the overall structure of the text.

Rewording is changing individual words in a text without changing its meaning or structure, often using synonyms.

It can. One of the two methods of paraphrasing is called “Fluency.” This will improve the language and fix grammatical errors in the text you’re paraphrasing.

Paraphrasing and using a paraphrasing tool aren’t cheating. It’s a great tool for saving time and coming up with new ways to express yourself in writing.  However, always be sure to credit your sources. Avoid plagiarism.  

If you don’t properly cite text paraphrased from another source, you’re plagiarizing. If you use someone else’s text and paraphrase it, you need to credit the original source. You can do that by using citations. There are different styles, like APA, MLA, Harvard, and Chicago. Find more information about citing sources here.

The Paraphrasing Tool on our page is powered by the QuillBot service, which uses advanced language processing technology.

Both Scribbr and QuillBot are Learneo, Inc. services, ensuring that your inputs are processed in accordance with Learneo’s Privacy Policy.

For more, please read the QuillBot section of the Learneo Privacy Policy . Your use of our Paraphraser is subject to QuilBot Terms .

Paraphrasing without crediting the original author is a form of plagiarism , because you’re presenting someone else’s ideas as if they were your own.

However, paraphrasing is not plagiarism if you correctly cite the source . This means including an in-text citation and a full reference, formatted according to your required citation style .

As well as citing, make sure that any paraphrased text is completely rewritten in your own words.

Plagiarism means using someone else’s words or ideas and passing them off as your own. Paraphrasing means putting someone else’s ideas in your own words.

So when does paraphrasing count as plagiarism?

• Paraphrasing is plagiarism if you don’t properly credit the original author.
• Paraphrasing is plagiarism if your text is too close to the original wording (even if you cite the source). If you directly copy a sentence or phrase, you should quote it instead.
• Paraphrasing  is not plagiarism if you put the author’s ideas completely in your own words and properly cite the source .

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Elevate your writing with our free and ai-powered paraphraser. instantly correct or rephrase your sentences in different tones., paraphrasing tool, please rewrite my sentence, what is paraphrasing.

Paraphrasing is the art of rewriting text into other words. This includes using synonyms, restructuring phrases, and connecting ideas in different ways. A state-of-the-art paraphraser provides automatic and simple-to-use rephrasing of complete sentences.

Why Should I Paraphrase My Sentences?

By paraphrasing existing sentences, you can elevate your writing and achieve different goals as a writer. That’s why rephrasing is helpful in plenty of cases: rewriting citations, strengthening the message of your text, and rewording your ideas while improving style.

How Does Rephrasing Help Me Become a Better Writer?

This feature is highly customizable, meaning you’re in control. Choose from five different categories—general, formal, concise, fluent, or simple—to transform your writing to better suit the context and tone. Paraphrasing helps you by refining and perfecting your masterpieces.

Where Can I Use the Paraphrasing Tool?

Rephrasing is available wherever and whenever! All you need is a LanguageTool account and a stable internet connection to rewrite your sentences in almost all of LanguageTool's extensions. The feature is easily accessible for everyone that aims to improve their writing.

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What exactly does an online paraphraser do.

LanguageTool’s paraphrasing feature does so much more than just rewrite sentences. Not only does it check for stronger, more suitable word choice, but it also corrects your sentence as a whole to ensure high-quality writing. With its intuitive and user-friendly interface, everyone can leverage Artificial Intelligence to achieve the best results possible.

What Other Features Does LanguageTool’s Paraphraser Provide?

The best part of using A.I. to paraphrase your writing is that the suggested sentences come free of spelling, grammar, and punctuation errors. Want to also improve style? Simply go back to the general correction to view stylistic suggestions.

As multilingual as you

Make your text sound professional and avoid embarrassing style, punctuation, and grammar mistakes

It’s an online tool that rewrites texts in a new (stylistically different) way by using alternative wording and a rephrased sentence structure.

This function is recommended for all types of texts, including professional, academic, and creative writing. It’s available for all LanguageTool users, but unlimited paraphrasing is only available in Premium.

A paraphrasing tool can easily enhance your writing by improving the tone and style of your text. Moreover, it helps you avoid having to write direct citations by rewriting copy-and-pasted text.

Premium accounts offer even more useful and powerful features:

Only with Premium

Sentence correction of longer texts

Style guide for customizing individual rules

Team features for companies

More in-depth suggestions, especially for word choice and style

How Can I Effectively Use the Rephrasing Tool?

For basic users, the paraphrasing feature is limited to three times daily. If you need more rephrased sentences, you can upgrade to LanguageTool Premium to get access to unlimited paraphrasing in six languages and several English dialects. Remember: No personal data is stored (ever) and privacy guidelines are strictly followed (always).

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Home / Guides / Plagiarism Guide / How to Paraphrase

How to Paraphrase

When you’re writing a paper, it’s often helpful to bring in information from outside sources. That way, you can back up your claims or provide context.

Sometimes a source is too wordy and quoting it would break up the flow of your paper. In that case, it’s probably a good idea to paraphrase.

So what is paraphrasing? Paraphrasing is a technique that allows you to add information from another source to your paper but in your own words.

This strategy can also help if you’ve already used too many quotes in your paper. Wouldn’t want the reader to lose interest while you’re trying to make your point!

There’s a lot to think about when deciding how to paraphrase another writer. For example, even though you are not quoting the source, you still need to cite it.

In this guide, you’ll discover the best practices for how to paraphrase a source. You’ll also find step-by-step instructions, along with paraphrasing examples.

Guide Overview

Step 1: decide what you’ll paraphrase, step 2: rewrite in your own words, step 3: check the original, step 4: cite your source, how to paraphrase a source: key takeaways.

Unlike a summary, where you discuss an entire book or article, a paraphrase focuses on a specific statement made by the original source. That means you need to find the exact point the other writer made that you think will strengthen your paper.

Reread the original page or paragraph. What exactly did the writer say that your reader needs to know? Highlight the important text, so you can start thinking about how best to paraphrase it.

For example, let’s say you’re writing a persuasive paper arguing that cupcakes are the best dessert. The information below would be a great way to back that claim up:

Source A—When surveyed, 65% said they preferred cupcakes over cake. A majority of these people liked that cupcakes already come as individual servings. Plus, those who do not like icing found it easier to avoid on cupcakes rather than cake.

Nothing exists in a bubble. Is there anything else about the original source that your reader should keep in mind? This will influence how you paraphrase the source.

In the example above, Source A may have a reason to advocate for cupcakes over cake. The writer could own a cupcake store or be trying to sell a cupcake holder to their readers.

Include this useful context either before or after your paraphrasing, whichever feels the most appropriate. That way, your reader has a better idea of what the original source said and why they said it.

At this point, you have great information from a source that will make your paper more comprehensive. Now, it’s time to think about how to paraphrase it for your specific needs.

What purpose will this information serve in your paper? Sometimes, you only need the source to confirm a claim you made. In that case, your paraphrasing should be about a sentence in length.

Here’s an example of how to paraphrase in this short form, using Source A from the previous section:

Some studies show cupcakes to be even more popular than cakes. Source A found that 65% of people would rather dig into a cupcake than the other dessert.

Other times, you’ll want to include more detailed information that supports your paper. That means your paraphrasing will be longer than the example you saw above. Make sure to stay on topic, though, and only include the information you need.

Let’s see how to paraphrase the cupcake example in this longer style:

Source A found that many people prefer a treat that they can grab and go with, unlike a cake that needs to be cut. Plus, for people who find icing too sweet, they can simply scoop it off the top of a cupcake. These are key reasons why Source A discovered 65% of people like cupcakes better.

The most important part of paraphrasing is ensuring that it is done in your own words. Think about your personal writing style. Then, adapt the main points from the original source using your regular vocabulary and phrasing.

It may be intimidating at first to figure out how to paraphrase a source. Really, though, it comes down to writing the same way you would normally.

Plagiarism is the worst-case scenario for you as a writer. You’ll lose all credibility for this paper and any written before or after. Plus, you’d be stealing from another writer.

Compare your paraphrasing with the original source. Are any words identical, besides important proper nouns? Are there phrases that a reader would consider too similar?

If you said “yes” to either of these questions, then go back and change the wording. Try again to translate the original source’s message into your own words.

Here’s an example of how not to paraphrase:

Original source: Residents expressed concern that there are too many fun things to do in town. With so many activities and first-class restaurants, they worried they would never be able to focus on work.

Paraphrase: Numerous residents in town were concerned that the number of fun things to do would keep their focus off work .

In this example, the writer attempted to change the wording. However, phrases such as “fun things to do” and “focus off work” are either identical or nearly identical to the original source.

Let’s see a better example of how to paraphrase the source above:

Not everyone wants their city filled with recreational options. When Original Source asked residents for their thoughts, some people said these weekend and nighttime offerings were too much of a distraction.

This paraphrasing uses almost none of the words from the original source. The only exception is “residents,” which the paraphraser thought was necessary to include. It is okay to do this on occasion. However, use as few duplicate words as possible. That’s how you avoid plagiarism while paraphrasing.

Even after multiple rounds of paraphrasing, you may still feel like your wording is too close to the original source. At that point, you should consider directly quoting the writer instead of including a paraphrased version. This protects both you and the original source.

Citing the source is an important part of how you paraphrase another writer. After all, you are taking their ideas and putting them in your paper.

Every citation style, from AP to MLA to Chicago, has a different way to give proper credit to a writer you’re paraphrasing. Your teacher should let you know in the instructions which style they prefer.

Find a handbook or a credible online source for the style your teacher requested. Then, follow the citation instructions to a T.

It’s best to do this a few days before the assignment is due. That way, if you have any questions about how to cite a paraphrased source, you can ask your teacher.

• Paraphrasing allows you to add information from another source into your paper but in your own words.
• Rewrite the information in a way that feels natural to the rest of your paper.
• Make sure there is no identical or close to identical wording.
• You must cite your source.

Published October 28, 2020.

By James Ardis. James is a writer who earned his MFA in Poetry from the University of Mississippi. He’s also taught English as a Second Language in South Korea, Thailand, and to refugees living in America.

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How to paraphrase (including examples)

Jessica Malnik

Paraphrasing has gotten a bad reputation due to its association with plagiarism . However, when used correctly, paraphrasing has the potential to elevate your writing and give you a better understanding of the research.

In this post, we’ll discuss what paraphrasing is, why we do it, and 6 steps to walk you through the process. We’ll also share what not to do with paraphrasing, along with some examples.

Paraphrasing definition and rules

Paraphrasing is simply a way of summarizing someone else’s content in your own words. When you paraphrase, you keep the meaning or intent of the original work without copying it word for word. However, paraphrasing can quickly become a form of plagiarism if done incorrectly. This is why it’s crucial to follow the rules of paraphrasing.

When borrowing the ideas from someone else’s content, there’s one important rule to follow: you must correctly cite your source. This can be done in a number of ways depending on the style guide you use. 

Source citing is different for MLA and APA formatting and style guides. You’ll need to familiarize yourself with the citation formats for whichever one you follow. However, in some cases, simply hyperlinking the source will be sufficient.

Why do we paraphrase?

There are a number of reasons that professional writers and students alike choose to paraphrase content. Here are just a few of the common reasons that a writer would choose to paraphrase instead of including a quote or summarization.

Process information better 

One benefit of paraphrasing is that it helps you process the author’s ideas. When you have to rewrite the material in your own words, it makes you really think about the context and how it fits into your piece. If you want to really understand the material you’re citing, try rewriting it. If you were to quote the same information, you would miss out on the benefit of analyzing the source material.

For example, if you are writing a research paper all about Shakespeare’s influence on modern-day literature, you don’t want to just use a ton of direct quotes, instead by paraphrasing original passages, it can help you comprehend and analyze the material better.  

Improve your credibility with readers

You can also improve your credibility by association with the sources you decide to paraphrase. 

When you rewrite the material, you create a connection between your content and the knowledge from the source. 

Your audience will have a better understanding of the direction of your piece if you’re paraphrasing a reputable source with established authority on the subject.

Present data in an interesting way

If you’re referencing a data-heavy webpage or study, then paraphrasing is an engaging way to present the information in your own writing style. 

This allows you to tell a story with the source material instead of simply citing numbers or graphs.

Show that you understand the source

Another reason for paraphrasing that’s particularly important in academic writing is to demonstrate that you’ve read and comprehended the source material. 

For example, if all of you are doing is copying and pasting the original words of a textbook, you aren’t really learning anything new. When you summarize the material in your own words, it helps you to understand the material faster.  

How to paraphrase in 6 steps

Paraphrasing is simple when you break it down into a series of steps. 

Here are the 6 steps you can use to paraphrase your sources:

1. Choose a reputable source

First, you need to pick a credible source to paraphrase. A credible source will likely have ideas and concepts that are worth repeating. Be sure to research the author’s name and publisher’s credentials and endorsements (if applicable).

You’ll also want to check the date of the publication as well to make sure it’s current enough to include in your writing.

2. Read and re-read the source material

You want to be sure that you understand the context and information in the original source before you can begin to rework it into your own words. Read through it as many times as you need so you’re sure that you grasp the meaning.

3. Take some notes 

Once you have an understanding of the passage, you’ll want to jot down your initial thoughts. 

What are the key concepts in the source material? 

What are the most interesting parts? 

For this part, it helps to break up the content into different sections. This step will give you a sort of mini-outline before you proceed with rephrasing the material.

4. Write a rough draft

Write your version of the content without looking at the original source material. This part is important. 

With the source hidden, you’ll be less likely to pull phrasing and structure from the original. You are welcome to reference your notes, though. This will help you write the content in your own words without leaning on the source but still hit the key points you want to cover.

5. Compare and revise

Once you have your initial draft written, you should look at it side by side with the original source. Adjust as needed to ensure your version is written in a way that’s unique to your voice. 

This is a good time to break out a thesaurus if you notice you have used too many of the same words as the original source.

6. Cite your source

Whether you use MLA, APA, Chicago, or another style guide, now is the time to give proper credit to the original author or source. When posting content online, you may only need to hyperlink to the original source.

Keep in mind that the paraphrased text will not change depending on the citation style that you follow. It will just change how it’s cited.

What you shouldn’t do when paraphrasing

Now that you understand the process of paraphrasing and can follow the steps, it’s important that you know what to avoid. When paraphrasing, here are a few things to keep in mind:

1. Do NOT write while you’re still researching

You might be tempted to start writing during the research phase. However, this sets you up to miss information or restate the copy too closely to the source material. Be sure to do your research first, take notes, and then start writing the piece.

2. Do NOT skip the citations

When you pull a small amount of information from a paraphrased source, you may think you don’t need to cite it. However, any idea or copy that’s taken from another source is considered plagiarism if you don’t give it credit, even if it is only a little bit of information.

Paraphrasing examples

Here are some examples to help you understand what paraphrasing looks like when done correctly and incorrectly

Excerpt from LinkedIn’s Official Blog:

“When reaching out to connect with someone, share a personalized message telling the person why you would like to connect. If it’s someone you haven’t been in touch with in a while, mention a detail to jog that person’s memory for how you met, reinforce a mutual interest and kickstart a conversation.”

Here’s another example. This one is from the U.S. Department of Education:

“ The U.S. Department of Education does not accredit educational institutions and/or programs. However, the Department provides oversight over the postsecondary accreditation system through its review of all federally-recognized accrediting agencies. The Department holds accrediting agencies accountable by ensuring that they enforce their accreditation standards effectively. ”

Here’s one more example to show you how to paraphrase using a quote from Mark Twain as the source material:

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So, throw off the bowlines, sail away from safe harbor, catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore, Dream, Discover.”

Paraphrasing can be a beneficial tool for any writer. It can give you credibility and a deeper understanding of the topic. However, to successfully use paraphrasing, you must be careful to properly cite your sources and effectively put the material into your own words each time.

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• Writing Tips

Paraphrasing a Source

• 3-minute read
• 19th April 2018

It can be tempting to quote sources at length when writing a college paper. After all, you’re told to reference your sources, and how better to do that than using the actual words you’ve read?

However, most of the time there’s a better option: paraphrasing. But what is paraphrasing? How do you paraphrase a source? And what are the advantages ? Let us explain.

Paraphrasing vs. Quoting

Paraphrasing and quoting are both ways of sharing someone else’s ideas in your own work. When you quote a source, you use the exact words of the person you’re quoting (enclosed in “quote marks”). But when paraphrasing you need to explain the other person’s ideas in your own words .

You might want to paraphrase a source in order to:

• Demonstrate your understanding of the subject matter
• Avoid using too many quotations in a document
• Explain a complicated idea (especially if the original text is hard to follow)
• Focus on one aspect of an idea that is relevant to your own work

In fact, the only time you truly need to quote a source instead of paraphrasing is when the exact wording is important (e.g., because you’re drawing on a key piece of terminology or interpreting the specific words used by an author). In most other cases, paraphrasing will work just as well or better.

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Remember, though, that you still need to cite a source if you paraphrase it. Even if you have rewritten something in your own words, you still need to show where your ideas come from .

5 Tips on Paraphrasing

Rewriting something in your own words can be tricky, but we have some tips:

• Read the original source carefully to make sure you fully understand it
• Consider whether you need to paraphrase the passage in full (i.e., with all the details contained in the original) or simply summarize it (i.e., picking out key details relevant to your work)
• Before you begin writing the paraphrased version, consider how you would explain the passage to a friend
• Write your paraphrased version and compare it to the original passage to make sure you haven’t missed any important information
• If you have used any exact phrases or key terminology from the original, enclose these in quotation marks and cite the relevant page numbers

If you do all of the above, you should be able to communicate your ideas clearly without having to quote your sources at length every time.

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• What is Paraphrasing? An Overview With Examples
• Learn English
• James Prior
• No Comments
• Updated February 23, 2024

What is paraphrasing? Or should I say what is the definition of paraphrasing? If you want to restate something using different words whilst retaining the same meaning, this is paraphrasing.

In this article, we cover what paraphrasing is, why it’s important, and when you should do it. Plus, some benefits and examples.

Table of Contents

Paraphrase Definition: What is Paraphrasing?

Paraphrasing is when you restate the information from a source using your own words while maintaining the original meaning. It involves expressing the ideas in a different way, often to clarify or simplify the content, without directly quoting the source.

When you paraphrase, you are not only borrowing, clarifying, or expanding on the information but also ensuring that you do all of these actions without plagiarizing the original content. It’s therefore definitely worth learning how to paraphrase if you want to improve your writing skills.

Why is Paraphrasing Important?

Paraphrasing is a valuable skill that allows you to convey information in your unique writing style while still giving credit to someone else’s ideas. It’s important for several reasons, and it serves various functions in both academic and professional writing.

Here are some key reasons why you should paraphrase:

• Paraphrasing allows you to present information from sources in your own words, reducing the risk of plagiarism. Proper in-text citation is still necessary, but paraphrasing demonstrates your understanding and interpretation of the material.
• When you paraphrase, you are required to comprehend the original content fully. You actively engage with the information, helping you better understand complex concepts and ideas. This process of restating the information in your own words showcases your understanding of the subject matter.
• By paraphrasing, you can clarify complex ideas or technical language and convey information in a clearer, shorter, and simpler form. This makes it more accessible to your audience and ensures they grasp the key points. This is particularly important when communicating with readers who may not be familiar with specialized terminology.
• Paraphrasing is valuable when synthesizing information from various sources. It enables you to blend ideas cohesively while maintaining a consistent writing style throughout your work.
• Paraphrasing allows you to inject your unique writing style and voice into the content. It helps you present information in a way that is more aligned with your personal expression and perspective.
• In certain situations where you need to meet specific length requirements for assignments or publications, paraphrasing allows you to convey information more concisely while still preserving the essential meaning.
• Paraphrasing helps maintain a smooth flow and cohesiveness in your writing. It allows you to integrate information seamlessly, avoiding abrupt shifts between your own ideas and those from external sources.
• Depending on your audience, you may need to adapt the language and level of technicality of the information you present. Paraphrasing allows you to tailor the content to suit the needs of your specific readership.

Incorporating paraphrasing into your writing not only showcases your understanding of the material but also enhances the overall quality and originality of your work.

When Should You Paraphrase?

Knowing when to paraphrase is an important skill, especially in academic writing and professional communication. Here are some situations in which you should consider paraphrasing:

• To Avoid Plagiarism:  Whenever you want to incorporate information from source material into your own work, but don’t want to use a direct quotation, paraphrasing is necessary to present the ideas in your own words while still acknowledging the original source.
• To Express Understanding:  Paraphrasing demonstrates your understanding of a topic by rephrasing the information in a way that shows you have processed and comprehended the material.
• To Simplify Complex Information:  If you encounter complex or technical language that may be difficult for your audience to understand, paraphrasing can help you clarify and simplify the information to make it more accessible and digestible.
• To Integrate Multiple Sources:  When synthesizing information from multiple sources, paraphrasing allows you to blend the ideas cohesively while maintaining your own voice and perspective.
• To Maintain Consistency in Writing Style:  In academic writing or professional writing, paraphrasing can help you maintain a consistent writing style throughout your work. This helps to ensure that all sections flow smoothly and are coherent.
• To Meet Specific Requirements:  Some assignments or publications may have specific requirements. This could relate to the number of words or concern the use of direct quotations. In such cases, paraphrasing allows you to meet these requirements while still incorporating relevant information from your sources.

What Are the Benefits of Paraphrasing?

Rewriting information in a clearer, shorter, and simpler form is called paraphrasing, so one of the benefits of paraphrasing is already clear! However, it can also be a useful exercise for other reasons, which are outlined below:

Avoiding Plagiarism

One of the main benefits of paraphrasing is mastering the ability to present information from external sources in a way that is entirely your own. By restructuring the content and expressing it using your words, you create a distinct piece of writing that reflects your comprehension and interpretation of the original material. This not only showcases your academic or professional integrity but also safeguards against unintentional plagiarism.

Paraphrasing is a fundamental skill in academic and professional settings, where originality and proper attribution are highly valued. This is especially true when it comes to writing research papers, where you’ll often need to reference someone else’s ideas with appropriate citations.

When you paraphrase effectively, you communicate to your audience that you respect the intellectual property of others while contributing your unique insights. This ethical approach to information usage enhances your credibility as a writer or researcher and reinforces the integrity of your work.

Enhancing Understanding

When you engage in paraphrasing, you actively participate in the material you are working with. You are forced to consider the ideas presented in the source material. You need to discern the essential concepts, identify key phrases, and decide how best to convey the message in a way that resonates with you.

This active engagement not only aids in understanding the content but also encourages critical thinking as you evaluate and interpret the information from your own standpoint.

By expressing someone else’s ideas in your own words, you deepen your understanding of the content. This process requires you to dissect the original text, grasp its nuances, and then reconstruct it using your language and perspective. In this way, you go beyond mere memorization and truly internalize the information, fostering a more profound comprehension of the subject matter.

Tailoring Information for Your Audience

Paraphrasing empowers you to adapt the language and complexity of the information to suit the needs and understanding of your audience. As you rephrase the content, you have the flexibility to adjust the level of technicality, simplify complex terminology, or tailor the tone to make the information more accessible to your specific readership.

Consider your audience’s background, knowledge level, and interests. Paraphrasing allows you to bridge the gap between the original content and the understanding of your intended audience.

Whether you are communicating with experts in a particular field or a general audience, the ability to paraphrase ensures that the information is conveyed in a way that resonates with and is comprehensible to your readers. This skill not only facilitates effective communication but also demonstrates your awareness of the diverse needs of your audience.

Improves Writing Skills

Paraphrasing helps in the development and refinement of your writing skills. When you actively engage in the process of rephrasing someone else’s ideas, you hone your ability to express concepts in a clear, concise, and coherent manner.

This practice refines your language proficiency, encouraging you to explore different types of sentence structure, experiment with vocabulary, and ultimately develop a more sophisticated and nuanced writing style.

As you paraphrase, you gain a heightened awareness of grammar, syntax, and word choice. This translates into improved writing, helping you construct well-articulated sentences and paragraphs. Moreover, paraphrasing allows you to experiment with different writing tones and adapt your style to suit the context or purpose of your writing, fostering versatility and adaptability in your expression.

Saves Time and Energy

Paraphrasing can significantly reduce the time and energy spent on the writing process. Rather than grappling with the challenge of integrating lengthy direct quotations or struggling to find the perfect synonym, paraphrasing allows you to distill and convey information in a more streamlined way.

This becomes particularly advantageous when faced with strict deadlines. By mastering paraphrasing, you empower yourself to produce well-crafted, original content in a shorter timeframe, allowing you to meet deadlines without compromising the quality of your work.

Examples of Paraphrasing

Here are some examples of paraphrasing:

• Original:  “The advancements in technology have revolutionized the way we communicate with each other.”
• Paraphrased:  “Technological progress has transformed how we interact and communicate with one another.”
• Original:  “Deforestation poses a significant threat to global ecosystems and biodiversity.”
• Paraphrased:  “The impact of deforestation represents a substantial danger to ecosystems and the diversity of life on a global scale.”
• Original:  “Effective time management is essential for achieving productivity in both professional and personal spheres.”
• Paraphrased:  “Efficient management of time is crucial for attaining productivity in both professional and personal aspects of life.”
• Original:  “The restaurant offers a diverse selection of culinary choices, ranging from traditional dishes to modern fusion cuisine.”
• Paraphrased:  “The restaurant provides a variety of food options, including both traditional and modern fusion dishes.”
• Original:  “The novel explores the complexities of human relationships in a rapidly changing society.”
• Paraphrased:  “The book delves into the challenges of human connections in a fast-changing world.”
• Original:  “Regular exercise is crucial for maintaining optimal physical health and preventing various health issues.”
• Paraphrased:  “Exercising regularly is important for keeping your body healthy and avoiding health problems.”

In these examples, you can observe the use of different wording, sentence structure, and synonyms while preserving the core meaning of the original sentences. This is the essence of paraphrasing.

What Are the Differences Between Paraphrasing, Quoting, and Summarizing?

So, we’ve established that successful paraphrasing is a way of rewriting someone else’s words whilst retaining their meaning and still giving credit to the original author’s ideas. But how is this different from quoting and summarizing?

While paraphrasing, quoting, and summarizing are all ways of incorporating information from source material into your own writing, there are key differences between them:

Paraphrasing

• Definition:  Paraphrasing involves rephrasing someone else’s ideas or information in your own words while retaining the original meaning.
• Usage:  You use paraphrasing when you want to present the information in a way that suits your writing style or when you need to clarify complex ideas.
• Example:  Original: “The study found a significant correlation between sleep deprivation and decreased cognitive performance.” Paraphrased: “The research indicated a notable link between lack of sleep and a decline in cognitive function.”
• Definition:  Quoting involves directly using the exact words from a source and enclosing them in quotation marks.
• Usage:  You use quoting when the original wording is essential, either because of its precision or uniqueness, or when you want to highlight a specific phrase or concept.
• Example:  Original: “The author argues, ‘In the absence of clear guidelines, individual judgment becomes paramount in decision-making.'”

The use of quotation marks is vital when quoting.

Summarizing

• Definition:  Summarizing involves condensing the main ideas of a source or original passage in your own words, focusing on the most crucial points.
• Usage:  You use summarizing when you need to provide a concise overview of a longer piece of text or when you want to capture the key points without including all the details.
• Example:  Original: A lengthy article discussing various factors influencing climate change. Summary: “The article outlines key factors contributing to climate change, including human activities and natural processes.”

In summary, paraphrasing is about expressing someone else’s ideas in your own words, quoting involves directly using the original words, and summarizing is about condensing the main points of a source.

Each technique serves different purposes in writing and should be used based on your specific goals and the nature of the information you are incorporating. If you want to level up your writing skills you need to be able to do all three of these.

Conclusion (In Our Own Words)

Paraphrasing is a valuable skill with numerous benefits. It helps you understand complex ideas, refine your writing style, and demonstrate ethical information use. It also allows you to tailor information for different audiences and can save time in academic and professional writing.

So, if you want to incorporate information from external sources into your writing in a way that is clear, concise, and respectful of the original author’s work, it’s worth mastering the art of paraphrasing.

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Quoting and Paraphrasing

Download this Handout PDF

College writing often involves integrating information from published sources into your own writing in order to add credibility and authority–this process is essential to research and the production of new knowledge.

However, when building on the work of others, you need to be careful not to plagiarize : “to steal and pass off (the ideas and words of another) as one’s own” or to “present as new and original an idea or product derived from an existing source.”1 The University of Wisconsin–Madison takes this act of “intellectual burglary” very seriously and considers it to be a breach of academic integrity . Penalties are severe.

These materials will help you avoid plagiarism by teaching you how to properly integrate information from published sources into your own writing.

1. Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, 10th ed. (Springfield, MA: Merriam-Webster, 1993), 888.

How to avoid plagiarism

When using sources in your papers, you can avoid plagiarism by knowing what must be documented.

Specific words and phrases

If you use an author’s specific word or words, you must place those words within quotation marks and you must credit the source.

Information and Ideas

Even if you use your own words, if you obtained the information or ideas you are presenting from a source, you must document the source.

Information : If a piece of information isn’t common knowledge (see below), you need to provide a source.

Ideas : An author’s ideas may include not only points made and conclusions drawn, but, for instance, a specific method or theory, the arrangement of material, or a list of steps in a process or characteristics of a medical condition. If a source provided any of these, you need to acknowledge the source.

Common Knowledge?

You do not need to cite a source for material considered common knowledge:

General common knowledge is factual information considered to be in the public domain, such as birth and death dates of well-known figures, and generally accepted dates of military, political, literary, and other historical events. In general, factual information contained in multiple standard reference works can usually be considered to be in the public domain.

Field-specific common knowledge is “common” only within a particular field or specialty. It may include facts, theories, or methods that are familiar to readers within that discipline. For instance, you may not need to cite a reference to Piaget’s developmental stages in a paper for an education class or give a source for your description of a commonly used method in a biology report—but you must be sure that this information is so widely known within that field that it will be shared by your readers.

If in doubt, be cautious and cite the source. And in the case of both general and field-specific common knowledge, if you use the exact words of the reference source, you must use quotation marks and credit the source.

Paraphrasing vs. Quoting — Explanation

Should i paraphrase or quote.

In general, use direct quotations only if you have a good reason. Most of your paper should be in your own words. Also, it’s often conventional to quote more extensively from sources when you’re writing a humanities paper, and to summarize from sources when you’re writing in the social or natural sciences–but there are always exceptions.

In a literary analysis paper , for example, you”ll want to quote from the literary text rather than summarize, because part of your task in this kind of paper is to analyze the specific words and phrases an author uses.

In research papers , you should quote from a source

• to show that an authority supports your point
• to present a position or argument to critique or comment on
• to include especially moving or historically significant language
• to present a particularly well-stated passage whose meaning would be lost or changed if paraphrased or summarized

You should summarize or paraphrase when

• what you want from the source is the idea expressed, and not the specific language used to express it
• you can express in fewer words what the key point of a source is

How to paraphrase a source

General advice.

• When reading a passage, try first to understand it as a whole, rather than pausing to write down specific ideas or phrases.
• Be selective. Unless your assignment is to do a formal or “literal” paraphrase, you usually don?t need to paraphrase an entire passage; instead, choose and summarize the material that helps you make a point in your paper.
• Think of what “your own words” would be if you were telling someone who’s unfamiliar with your subject (your mother, your brother, a friend) what the original source said.
• Remember that you can use direct quotations of phrases from the original within your paraphrase, and that you don’t need to change or put quotation marks around shared language.

Methods of Paraphrasing

• Look away from the source then write. Read the text you want to paraphrase several times until you feel that you understand it and can use your own words to restate it to someone else. Then, look away from the original and rewrite the text in your own words.
• Take notes. Take abbreviated notes; set the notes aside; then paraphrase from the notes a day or so later, or when you draft.

If you find that you can’t do A or B, this may mean that you don’t understand the passage completely or that you need to use a more structured process until you have more experience in paraphrasing.

The method below is not only a way to create a paraphrase but also a way to understand a difficult text.

Paraphrasing difficult texts

Consider the following passage from Love and Toil (a book on motherhood in London from 1870 to 1918), in which the author, Ellen Ross, puts forth one of her major arguments:

• Love and Toil maintains that family survival was the mother’s main charge among the large majority of London?s population who were poor or working class; the emotional and intellectual nurture of her child or children and even their actual comfort were forced into the background. To mother was to work for and organize household subsistence. (p. 9)

Children of the poor at the turn of the century received little if any emotional or intellectual nurturing from their mothers, whose main charge was family survival. Working for and organizing household subsistence were what defined mothering. Next to this, even the children’s basic comfort was forced into the background (Ross, 1995).

According to Ross (1993), poor children at the turn of the century received little mothering in our sense of the term. Mothering was defined by economic status, and among the poor, a mother’s foremost responsibility was not to stimulate her children’s minds or foster their emotional growth but to provide food and shelter to meet the basic requirements for physical survival. Given the magnitude of this task, children were deprived of even the “actual comfort” (p. 9) we expect mothers to provide today.

You may need to go through this process several times to create a satisfactory paraphrase.

Successful vs. unsuccessful paraphrases

Paraphrasing is often defined as putting a passage from an author into “your own words.” But what are your own words? How different must your paraphrase be from the original?

The paragraphs below provide an example by showing a passage as it appears in the source, two paraphrases that follow the source too closely, and a legitimate paraphrase.

The student’s intention was to incorporate the material in the original passage into a section of a paper on the concept of “experts” that compared the functions of experts and nonexperts in several professions.

The Passage as It Appears in the Source

Critical care nurses function in a hierarchy of roles. In this open heart surgery unit, the nurse manager hires and fires the nursing personnel. The nurse manager does not directly care for patients but follows the progress of unusual or long-term patients. On each shift a nurse assumes the role of resource nurse. This person oversees the hour-by-hour functioning of the unit as a whole, such as considering expected admissions and discharges of patients, ascertaining that beds are available for patients in the operating room, and covering sick calls. Resource nurses also take a patient assignment. They are the most experienced of all the staff nurses. The nurse clinician has a separate job description and provides for quality of care by orienting new staff, developing unit policies, and providing direct support where needed, such as assisting in emergency situations. The clinical nurse specialist in this unit is mostly involved with formal teaching in orienting new staff. The nurse manager, nurse clinician, and clinical nurse specialist are the designated experts. They do not take patient assignments. The resource nurse is seen as both a caregiver and a resource to other caregivers. . . . Staff nurses have a hierarchy of seniority. . . . Staff nurses are assigned to patients to provide all their nursing care. (Chase, 1995, p. 156)

Word-for-Word Plagiarism

Critical care nurses have a hierarchy of roles. The nurse manager hires and fires nurses. S/he does not directly care for patients but does follow unusual or long-term cases. On each shift a resource nurse attends to the functioning of the unit as a whole, such as making sure beds are available in the operating room , and also has a patient assignment . The nurse clinician orients new staff, develops policies, and provides support where needed . The clinical nurse specialist also orients new staff, mostly by formal teaching. The nurse manager, nurse clinician, and clinical nurse specialist , as the designated experts, do not take patient assignments . The resource nurse is not only a caregiver but a resource to the other caregivers . Within the staff nurses there is also a hierarchy of seniority . Their job is to give assigned patients all their nursing care .

Why this is plagiarism

Notice that the writer has not only “borrowed” Chase’s material (the results of her research) with no acknowledgment, but has also largely maintained the author’s method of expression and sentence structure. The phrases in red are directly copied from the source or changed only slightly in form.

Even if the student-writer had acknowledged Chase as the source of the content, the language of the passage would be considered plagiarized because no quotation marks indicate the phrases that come directly from Chase. And if quotation marks did appear around all these phrases, this paragraph would be so cluttered that it would be unreadable.

A Patchwork Paraphrase

Chase (1995) describes how nurses in a critical care unit function in a hierarchy that places designated experts at the top and the least senior staff nurses at the bottom. The experts — the nurse manager, nurse clinician, and clinical nurse specialist — are not involved directly in patient care. The staff nurses, in contrast, are assigned to patients and provide all their nursing care . Within the staff nurses is a hierarchy of seniority in which the most senior can become resource nurses: they are assigned a patient but also serve as a resource to other caregivers. The experts have administrative and teaching tasks such as selecting and orienting new staff, developing unit policies , and giving hands-on support where needed.

This paraphrase is a patchwork composed of pieces in the original author’s language (in red) and pieces in the student-writer’s words, all rearranged into a new pattern, but with none of the borrowed pieces in quotation marks. Thus, even though the writer acknowledges the source of the material, the underlined phrases are falsely presented as the student’s own.

A Legitimate Paraphrase

In her study of the roles of nurses in a critical care unit, Chase (1995) also found a hierarchy that distinguished the roles of experts and others. Just as the educational experts described above do not directly teach students, the experts in this unit do not directly attend to patients. That is the role of the staff nurses, who, like teachers, have their own “hierarchy of seniority” (p. 156). The roles of the experts include employing unit nurses and overseeing the care of special patients (nurse manager), teaching and otherwise integrating new personnel into the unit (clinical nurse specialist and nurse clinician), and policy-making (nurse clinician). In an intermediate position in the hierarchy is the resource nurse, a staff nurse with more experience than the others, who assumes direct care of patients as the other staff nurses do, but also takes on tasks to ensure the smooth operation of the entire facility.

Why this is a good paraphrase

The writer has documented Chase’s material and specific language (by direct reference to the author and by quotation marks around language taken directly from the source). Notice too that the writer has modified Chase’s language and structure and has added material to fit the new context and purpose — to present the distinctive functions of experts and nonexperts in several professions.

Shared Language

Perhaps you’ve noticed that a number of phrases from the original passage appear in the legitimate paraphrase: critical care, staff nurses, nurse manager, clinical nurse specialist, nurse clinician, resource nurse.

If all these phrases were in red, the paraphrase would look much like the “patchwork” example. The difference is that the phrases in the legitimate paraphrase are all precise, economical, and conventional designations that are part of the shared language within the nursing discipline (in the too-close paraphrases, they’re red only when used within a longer borrowed phrase).

In every discipline and in certain genres (such as the empirical research report), some phrases are so specialized or conventional that you can’t paraphrase them except by wordy and awkward circumlocutions that would be less familiar (and thus less readable) to the audience.

When you repeat such phrases, you’re not stealing the unique phrasing of an individual writer but using a common vocabulary shared by a community of scholars.

Some Examples of Shared Language You Don’t Need to Put in Quotation Marks

• Conventional designations: e.g., physician’s assistant, chronic low-back pain
• Preferred bias-free language: e.g., persons with disabilities
• Technical terms and phrases of a discipline or genre : e.g., reduplication, cognitive domain, material culture, sexual harassment

Chase, S. K. (1995). The social context of critical care clinical judgment. Heart and Lung, 24, 154-162.

How to Quote a Source

Introducing a quotation.

One of your jobs as a writer is to guide your reader through your text. Don’t simply drop quotations into your paper and leave it to the reader to make connections.

Integrating a quotation into your text usually involves two elements:

• A signal that a quotation is coming–generally the author’s name and/or a reference to the work
• An assertion that indicates the relationship of the quotation to your text

Often both the signal and the assertion appear in a single introductory statement, as in the example below. Notice how a transitional phrase also serves to connect the quotation smoothly to the introductory statement.

Ross (1993), in her study of poor and working-class mothers in London from 1870-1918 [signal], makes it clear that economic status to a large extent determined the meaning of motherhood [assertion]. Among this population [connection], “To mother was to work for and organize household subsistence” (p. 9).

The signal can also come after the assertion, again with a connecting word or phrase:

Illness was rarely a routine matter in the nineteenth century [assertion]. As [connection] Ross observes [signal], “Maternal thinking about children’s health revolved around the possibility of a child’s maiming or death” (p. 166).

Formatting Quotations

Short direct prose.

Incorporate short direct prose quotations into the text of your paper and enclose them in double quotation marks:

According to Jonathan Clarke, “Professional diplomats often say that trying to think diplomatically about foreign policy is a waste of time.”

Longer prose quotations

Begin longer quotations (for instance, in the APA system, 40 words or more) on a new line and indent the entire quotation (i.e., put in block form), with no quotation marks at beginning or end, as in the quoted passage from our Successful vs. Unsucessful Paraphrases page.

Rules about the minimum length of block quotations, how many spaces to indent, and whether to single- or double-space extended quotations vary with different documentation systems; check the guidelines for the system you’re using.

Quotation of Up to 3 Lines of Poetry

Quotations of up to 3 lines of poetry should be integrated into your sentence. For example:

In Julius Caesar, Antony begins his famous speech with “Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your ears; / I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him” (III.ii.75-76).

Notice that a slash (/) with a space on either side is used to separate lines.

Quotation of More than 3 Lines of Poetry

More than 3 lines of poetry should be indented. As with any extended (indented) quotation, do not use quotation marks unless you need to indicate a quotation within your quotation.

Punctuating with Quotation Marks

Parenthetical citations.

With short quotations, place citations outside of closing quotation marks, followed by sentence punctuation (period, question mark, comma, semi-colon, colon):

Menand (2002) characterizes language as “a social weapon” (p. 115).

With block quotations, check the guidelines for the documentation system you are using.

Commas and periods

Place inside closing quotation marks when no parenthetical citation follows:

Hertzberg (2002) notes that “treating the Constitution as imperfect is not new,” but because of Dahl’s credentials, his “apostasy merits attention” (p. 85).

Semicolons and colons

Place outside of closing quotation marks (or after a parenthetical citation).

Question marks and exclamation points

Place inside closing quotation marks if the quotation is a question/exclamation:

Menand (2001) acknowledges that H. W. Fowler’s Modern English Usage is “a classic of the language,” but he asks, “Is it a dead classic?” (p. 114).

[Note that a period still follows the closing parenthesis.]

Place outside of closing quotation marks if the entire sentence containing the quotation is a question or exclamation:

How many students actually read the guide to find out what is meant by “academic misconduct”?

Quotation within a quotation

Use single quotation marks for the embedded quotation:

According to Hertzberg (2002), Dahl gives the U. S. Constitution “bad marks in ‘democratic fairness’ and ‘encouraging consensus'” (p. 90).

[The phrases “democratic fairness” and “encouraging consensus” are already in quotation marks in Dahl’s sentence.]

Indicating Changes in Quotations

Quoting only a portion of the whole.

Use ellipsis points (. . .) to indicate an omission within a quotation–but not at the beginning or end unless it’s not obvious that you’re quoting only a portion of the whole.

Adding Clarification, Comment, or Correction

Within quotations, use square brackets [ ] (not parentheses) to add your own clarification, comment, or correction.

Use [sic] (meaning “so” or “thus”) to indicate that a mistake is in the source you’re quoting and is not your own.

Additional information

Information on summarizing and paraphrasing sources.

American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.). (2000). Retrieved January 7, 2002, from http://www.bartleby.com/61/ Bazerman, C. (1995). The informed writer: Using sources in the disciplines (5th ed). Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Leki, I. (1995). Academic writing: Exploring processes and strategies (2nd ed.) New York: St. Martin?s Press, pp. 185-211.

Leki describes the basic method presented in C, pp. 4-5.

Spatt, B. (1999). Writing from sources (5th ed.) New York: St. Martin?s Press, pp. 98-119; 364-371.

Information about specific documentation systems

The Writing Center has handouts explaining how to use many of the standard documentation systems. You may look at our general Web page on Documentation Systems, or you may check out any of the following specific Web pages.

If you’re not sure which documentation system to use, ask the course instructor who assigned your paper.

• American Psychological Assoicaion (APA)
• Modern Language Association (MLA)
• Chicago/Turabian (A Footnote or Endnote System)
• American Political Science Association (APSA)
• Council of Science Editors (CBE)
• Numbered References

You may also consult the following guides:

• American Medical Association, Manual for Authors and Editors
• Council of Science Editors, CBE style Manual
• The Chicago Manual of Style
• MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers
• Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association

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Some benefits are mentioned below that make Paraphraser the best:

Quality Content

The rephrase tool generates more readable, engaging, and grammatically error-free content without ruining the quality of the content after paraphrasing.

It replaces proper synonyms, rephrases like real humans, and paraphrases better than professional writers.

Plagiarism-free output

Our Paraphrasing tool helps you to  avoid duplication of content . Paraphraser.io is useful to increase productivity as it quickly and easily generates multiple versions of the same text.

As compared to other tools, Paraphraser provides the fastest results by keeping the best quality. It can provide large text results within a few seconds.

Easy to use

Sentence rephraser by Paraphraser is easy to use and has a user-friendly interface. Do you have any suggestions to improve our interface? Please let us know . 

We provide Fluency & Standard mode with 600 words limit free of cost. You can rephrase unlimited text without any daily limit. You can increase the word limit to 1500, by upgrading to pro .

Paraphrasing APIs

Colleges and universities can integrate our rephraser using our paraphrasing APIs .

Customer support

We take care of our users. In case you have any questions or need assistance, You can contact us via chat or open a ticket on our  support page . 

How to paraphrase online?

To paraphrase online using our rewording tool, follow these simple steps:

• Type the text in the input box or upload a file. 
• Click on the submit button and let this paraphrasing tool do the rest of the work. 😊

Paraphrasing tool users

Our tool can be used in a number of ways, so it is up to you to decide how you want to use it. 

We are always here for any alterations or paraphrasing you may need. Our Paraphrasing tool is commonly used by the following people:

If you are a student and looking for an accurate and best solution for paraphrasing, we are here for you. 

Our online paraphrase generator gives different ideas for assignment writing and thesis writing. You can make your assignments plagiarism-free and more readable. Use our rephrasing tool, Get good grades, and Thank us later 😉.

Teachers: 

If you are a teacher, we know your feelings. For a teacher, a paraphrasing tool is not less than a life-savour, as they have to prepare notes, reports, quizzes, and helpful study material on a regular basis.  

• With our tool, teachers can create study notes that are easier to understand.
• Our professional paraphrasing tool helps teachers save time by automatically rephrasing the text. 
• Teachers can also use our rewording tool to create quiz questions that are more challenging and varied.

Researchers:

By rephrasing technical terms researchers can avoid plagiarism and summarize key points in their research papers. You can paraphrase the main ideas of a source to better understand the information. 

A sentence changer can be helpful when writing a review or synthesis of the literature.

Copywriters:

To make your copywriting more creative, our word rephraser is a very handy tool . 

Generating your content for advertising, public relations, and media is very easy using word changer, because the choice of the words matters. 

Using our tool, copywriters can 

Craft compelling and persuasive messages to sell products, services, or ideas.

Work with creative teams, including art directors and designers, to ensure that the writing is visually appealing and effective.

Create copy for a wide range of media, including print, digital, and social media.

Bloggers: 

Write more engaging and killer quality content using our free paraphrasing tool. Different word choices and sentence structures make blog content appealing to blog readers.

Every Blogger should use a rephrasing tool to

Avoid Plagiarism : Our free tool creates original content to avoid plagiarism by changing the words and sentences. 

Improve readability : make blog content readable for all types of users.

Save time : we can save your time and effort by automating the process of rephrasing. For large projects with tight deadlines, our paraphraser tool is super helpful. 

Create best-performing content for your social media posts, emails, advertisements, and article submissions with our online paraphrase tool. 

Marketers can cut down the writing cost using our free tool.

Get Multiple versions of the content for A/B Testing, for example, email subject lines or social media posts, to test which ones are most effective.

Paraphrase text in a way that is easier to understand for their audience.

Webmasters:

Display the best tag lines and descriptions for your website with our advanced paraphrase tool. Writing the best quality content attracts readers and is also good for SEO purposes. We had six different modes; you can choose the most suitable mode for your e-commerce, landing page or a saas website.

Paraphraser.io helps you rephrase text easily and quickly

Our paraphrasing tool online lets you paraphrase text in one go. You can use this free tool to paraphrase your sentences, paragraphs, articles, and even long blogs with advanced AI technology. It further provides several useful features that help you customize the rephrased text to fit your content needs.

How Does This Paraphrasing Tool Work?

It is an AI-based paraphraser developed with state-of-the-art technology. It rewrites articles, rewords sentences, and paraphrases the text. It also works as a reworder and rewriter for lessness chances of plagiarism.

Paraphrase Anywhere

Our free paraphrasing tool can be used online across all devices, including Android & IOS.

Multiple Languages

WHAT DO YOU WANT TO KNOW

Some of The Most Frequently Asked Questions

Is using a paraphrasing tool is illegal?

No, using a paraphrasing tool is not illegal if used correctly. In academic writing, if you use a word rephraser to create content then it must be correctly cited. Using paraphrased content as original work could be considered academic misconduct.

Can you get in trouble for using a paraphrasing tool?

Sentence rephraser developed using advanced AI algorithms to paraphrase content like a human. You can use our different modes to check which rephrase model is the best fit for you. Pro Tips: Cite the sources to avoid any trouble.

Is using a paraphrasing tool count as plagiarism?

No, Using a paraphrase online tool does not count as plagiarism. As mentioned above, our tool provides plagiarism-free content while keeping the original meaning of the context.   Our text paraphraser helps users to rephrase text and avoid plagiarism. The content generated by our tool is completely unique.

Can I use a paraphrasing tool for legal writing?

• Check plagiarism: Double-check the rephrased text for plagiarism.
• Cite Sources: Cite any sources used, even if you used a paraphraser tool to rephrase a text.

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Purdue Online Writing Lab Purdue OWL® College of Liberal Arts

Paraphrase: Write It in Your Own Words

Welcome to the Purdue OWL

This page is brought to you by the OWL at Purdue University. When printing this page, you must include the entire legal notice.

Copyright ©1995-2018 by The Writing Lab & The OWL at Purdue and Purdue University. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, reproduced, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed without permission. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our terms and conditions of fair use.

Paraphrasing is one way to use a text in your own writing without directly quoting source material. Anytime you are taking information from a source that is not your own, you need to specify where you got that information.

A paraphrase is...

• Your own rendition of essential information and ideas expressed by someone else, presented in a new form.
• One legitimate way (when accompanied by accurate documentation) to borrow from a source.
• A more detailed restatement than a summary, which focuses concisely on a single main idea.

Paraphrasing is a valuable skill because...

• It is better than quoting information from an undistinguished passage.
• It helps you control the temptation to quote too much.
• The mental process required for successful paraphrasing helps you to grasp the full meaning of the original.

6 Steps to Effective Paraphrasing

• Reread the original passage until you understand its full meaning.
• Set the original aside, and write your paraphrase on a note card.
• Jot down a few words below your paraphrase to remind you later how you envision using this material. At the top of the note card, write a key word or phrase to indicate the subject of your paraphrase.
• Check your rendition with the original to make sure that your version accurately expresses all the essential information in a new form.
• Use quotation marks to identify any unique term or phraseology you have borrowed exactly from the source.
• Record the source (including the page) on your note card so that you can credit it easily if you decide to incorporate the material into your paper.

Some examples to compare

Note that the examples in this section use MLA style for in-text citation.

The original passage:

Students frequently overuse direct quotation in taking notes, and as a result they overuse quotations in the final [research] paper. Probably only about 10% of your final manuscript should appear as directly quoted matter. Therefore, you should strive to limit the amount of exact transcribing of source materials while taking notes. Lester, James D. Writing Research Papers . 2nd ed., 1976, pp. 46-47.

A legitimate paraphrase:

In research papers, students often quote excessively, failing to keep quoted material down to a desirable level. Since the problem usually originates during note taking, it is essential to minimize the material recorded verbatim (Lester 46-47).

An acceptable summary:

Students should take just a few notes in direct quotation from sources to help minimize the amount of quoted material in a research paper (Lester 46-47).

A plagiarized version:

Students often use too many direct quotations when they take notes, resulting in too many of them in the final research paper. In fact, probably only about 10% of the final copy should consist of directly quoted material. So it is important to limit the amount of source material copied while taking notes.

A note about plagiarism: This example has been classed as plagiarism, in part, because of its failure to deploy any citation. Plagiarism is a serious offense in the academic world. However, we acknowledge that plagiarism is a difficult term to define; that its definition may be contextually sensitive; and that not all instances of plagiarism are created equal—that is, there are varying “degrees of egregiousness” for different cases of plagiarism.

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Paraphrase Online

Paraphrase online is a free online paraphrasing tool used to change words and rephrase sentences.

How to Use our Paraphrasing Tool?

It is very easy to paraphrase online with our paraphrasing tool. To rephrase, follow the steps below.

• Type/paste the text into the input box or upload a file (.doc, .docx, .pdf, .txt) from local storage.
• Select the required paraphrasing mode and click on the "Paraphrase" button.
• The paraphrased text will be displayed on the right box. You can also change the modes for different outputs.
• You can also copy and download the paraphrased text by clicking on the output buttons.

Free Paraphrasing Tool

Our paraphrasing tool (paraphraser) helps students, writers, and bloggers to avoid plagiarism. This rewording tool uses advanced AI algorithms to change sentence structure, synonymize the text and make other similar changes. 

This word changer has a built-in paraphrase generator that helps in rephrasing any paragraph accurately.

What is Paraphrasing?

Paraphrasing is one way to use a text in your own writing without directly quoting source material ( according to Purdue University ). It is the process of rewording and rearranging sentence structure while keeping the original meaning of the context.

Features of Paraphrase Online

Paraphrase Online offers numerous features such as paraphrasing essays, assignments, and rewording articles. Our paraphrase tool works as the best sentence rephraser and word changer.

Upload Files

You can use this feature to upload files directly from your device and skip the copy-paste or typing step. Our tool supports Doc, Docx, PDF & .txt file formats.

Free and Secure

Our word paraphraser is 100% free and completely secure to use for all kinds of rephrasing paragraphs and sentences to avoid plagiarism.

Rephrase Accurately

Our rephrase tool is based on advanced AI algorithms that can rephrase more accurately than humans and makes text grammatically correct and plagiarism free.

Ease to use

Paraphrase Online has a user-friendly interface and simple navigation that makes our paraphrase generator the most easy to use paraphrasing tool online.

Plagiarism Free Content

Content paraphrased by our sentence rephraser will be 100% plagiarism-free. Our paraphrasing tool helps you rephrase any text in seconds to avoid plagiarism issues.

Speed & Customization

Our paraphraser can rephrase any text within seconds and provides quick results. Paraphrase Online also allows you to customize the output to suit your needs, e.g: choosing the specific words to be replaced.

05 Different Paraphrasing Modes

Our paraphrasing tool offers five different paraphrasing modes/styles that you can choose from as per your need and requirement. Here is a brief profile of each mode:

Word Changer

The Word Changer mode is designed to replace the words in the text with suitable synonyms. This mode focuses on changing words and does not make other types of alterations.

Sentence Rephraser

The Sentence Rephraser mode is made to rephrase sentences as a whole by making changes to the words as well as the phrases.

The Academic mode of our paraphrasing tool makes your text more formal and suitable for academic uses.

The Creative mode makes smart and extensive changes to the text to make it look different from the original version. This mode is best for avoiding plagiarism, improving readability, and enhancing engagement.

The Shorten mode rephrases text while also making it shorter than the original input. This mode is best for creating a paraphrased + summarized output for your existing text.

Why Our Paraphrase Tool?

Our paraphrase tool is the best rewording tool that helps you to write content in your own words. This paraphrase generator changes words and phrases quickly and accurately.

Supported Languages

ES , ID , BR

Users of Paraphrase Online

This paraphraser is widely used by:

Students can use this paraphrasing tool to paraphrase their assignments and research papers. Our tool can help students:

Avoid plagiarism : It helps students to make their work plagiarism-free.

Make assignments more readable : Our tool also makes content more readable and free of grammar errors. And if English is not their first language then this tool is no less than a best friend.

• Save time : Generate assignments and essays by quickly paraphrasing the existing content.

Creating class notes and study material on the same topic is a very tough task for teachers. Hey teachers! You can thank us for this awesome rewording tool. You can:

• Paraphrase any notes within seconds while keeping its original meaning;
• Make study notes easy to understand for your class students; 
• Generate new assignment ideas by rephrasing the same topics.

Webmasters/Bloggers

Bloggers have to post on a regular basis, and mostly on similar topics. They can create unique content for their blogs without spending a lot of time by just rewording existing blogs.

SEO Specialists

SEO specialists can use our AI-based paraphrasing tool to create unique content for their websites. SEO experts must use our tool because:

• The final result of our tool is also optimized for search engines; 
• It adjusts multiple keywords by rephrasing text

Content Writers

Content writers play the most creative part in a website. Our rephrase tool helps them to come up with new ideas using existing content. Content writers can also use our paraphrase tool to rephrase their write-ups to avoid plagiarism.

Copywriters

Make your next advertising campaign line catchy and engaging using our paraphrasing tool. Create messages that will sell products, services, or ideas. Paraphrase Online makes your writing visually appealing and effective.

Media Marketers

Best marketing lines matter in digital marketing. Our paraphrase tool provides different versions of the same lines that can be used for A/B testing. Even a simple choice of different words can generate more leads.

Researchers

Researchers can use our shorten mode to summarize and paraphrase their research papers. It makes it easy for them to change their literature reviews.

Business Professionals

Rewording emails, reports, or other business documents is very common for business professionals. Our reword tool could be very helpful in rewording texts for better clarity.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is using an online paraphrasing tool illegal.

No, using an online paraphrasing tool is not illegal. If you want to paraphrase someone else’s content, be sure to cite the source to avoid plagiarism.

Why is paraphrasing important?

Paraphrasing is important as it lets you avoid plagiarism and make your content more easily understandable. Paraphrasing is often done to improve clarity in a piece of text.

Which paraphrasing tool is best for university students?

The paraphrasing tool by Paraphrase Online is an excellent choice for university students. It is free and provides accurate results.

How can I use paraphrase tool for research paper?

You can easily use our paraphrase tool for improving the quality of your research papers and for getting new/better ideas for them. Using Paraphrase Online is easy and simple. You just have to enter your text, choose a mode, and then click on the button.

What are the benefits of paraphrasing in communication?

Paraphrasing can help make communication easier and more clear. You can paraphrase your mails and messages to make them more readable, natural, and better-flowing.

Paraphrasing in communication examples:

• You can paraphrase your work emails to make sure that the recipient easily understands them.
• You can paraphrase your letters and memos to make them clear and understandable for the office people.
• You can also paraphrase simple text messages to avoid having to repeat or explain yourself afterward.

Best Paraphrasing Tool – Free & Premium Versions (Compared)

Table of Contents

Choosing the best paraphrasing tool for academic writing can be challenging, especially when many of these tools’ unique features are hidden behind a paywall. As a researcher, you want a tool that delivers more than stiff, monotonous outputs. The frustration of dealing with often contextually inappropriate results can make you question the decision to use an AI paraphrasing tool in the first place. To save you time and effort, we’ve meticulously tested the eight best paraphrasing tools, Paperpal, QuillBot, Wordtune, Paraphraser.io, and more, to determine which one truly stands out for research purposes. Here are our findings. 

Paperpal, a comprehensive AI academic writing assistant, leverages 22+ years of Scientific, Technical, and Medical (STM) expertise to provide in-depth academic writing, language editing, and submission readiness support for students, researchers, medical professionals, and academics. 

Paperpal’s Paraphrasing – Features and How It Works?  

Paperpal Rewrite   

• Paraphrase: Add variety and avoid repetition in your writing with precise paraphrasing support for academic text.  
• Trim or reduce word count: Highlight a sentence or paragraph to get a concise version of the text and meet your required word count limit.  
• Rewrite for an Academic Tone: Get suggestions for making your text sound formal and academic in native English.  
• Synonyms: Look up contextually relevant synonyms and use them in your text to add variety to your writing.   

What do users love about Paperpal?    

• All-in-one academic writing toolkit: Apart from being the best paraphrasing tool for research, Paperpal offers 3x language suggestions for academic writing compared to other AI writing tools. It also provides secure, generative AI writing assistance with pre-built templates, AI text suggestions, plagiarism detection, and submission readiness checks.   
• Excellent word reduction capabilities: Paperpal Trim reduces word count by up to 25% without sacrificing meaning, so you need not worry about word limits.   

What can Paperpal improve?    

• Paraphrasing available only in English: While Paperpal has accurate translation capabilities, its paraphrasing is limited to text in English.   
• Cross-platform support: While Paperpal is currently limited to MS Word and Web, it is in the process of integrating with Overleaf and Chrome, which will significantly enhance its functionality and accessibility for users in the future.

QuillBot is recognized as one of the best paraphrasing tools for research. What makes QuillBot one of the most used AI paraphrasing tools is its pre-defined and custom modes, freeze words, and synonym slider functionalities, discussed below. QuillBot supports paraphrasing in 20 languages and further customization. Let’s explore the benefits and limitations of this free paraphrasing tool.    

QuillBot Paraphraser: Features and How it Works?   

• Pre-defined and Custom Modes for Paraphrasing: QuillBot offers eight pre-defined paraphrasing modes and also provides custom modes like ‘Witty’ and ‘Optimistic’, where writers can get creative with their words.    
• Synonym Slider and Freeze Words: Premium users can access QuillBot’s Synonym Slider and control the level of word substitutions, from minimal changes to maximum creativity. Users can also “freeze” important words to prevent them from being altered during paraphrasing. 

What do users love about QuillBot Paraphraser?     

• All-in-one paraphrasing tool: It is an excellent tool for finding unique synonyms and making writing non-repetitive while aligning it to the tone of communication preferred by the target audience.    
• Direct access without signing in: The free version does not require signing up, which boosts user interaction with the tool.    

What can QuillBot improve?    

• Limited access: With QuillBot’s free version, users can only paraphrase 125 words and access two pre-defined modes of paraphrasing. Synonym Slider: The free version is available only with the premium version.    
• Synonym Slider and Freeze Words: The premium version offers unique features to customize the level of word replacements. The free version does not have this feature, which may result in spun content, potentially leading to misinterpretation and altering the intended meaning. 
• Weird paraphrasing suggestions: Sometimes, the tool doesn’t understand the meaning of the sentences and suggests weird, out-of-context synonyms. This is a big NO-NO if you’re considering QuillBot as a paraphrasing tool for research.   

Looking for the best paraphrasing tool for research? Choose Paperpal for 2x more suggestions than QuillBot .

Wordtune is often considered the best AI paraphrasing tool by content creators because of its contextual understanding, sentence-level customization, and tone adjustments. Wordtune actually stands by its claim of enhancing writing quality, engagement, and tone while retaining the original meaning of text. However, is it the best paraphrasing tool for research? Let’s find out.   

Wordtune Rewrite – Features and How it Works?    

• Rewrite Options: Wordtune users can choose from various options, such as ‘Formal’, ‘Casual’, ‘Shorten’, and ‘Expand’, to rephrase sentences and retain meaning.  
• Thesaurus: Users can highlight words to receive synonyms and alternative phrases, adding variety and depth to their writing.  

What do users love about Wordtune?    

• Contextual Understanding: Wordtune understands the context of the text and suggests relevant and coherent rewrites. If you’re a content creator or a marketing professional, this feature adapts your writing style and suggests rewrites based on the target audience.   
• Real-Time Assistance: Wordtune offers suggestions as users type or paste their text into the editor. This immediacy boosts writing flow.   

What can Wordtune improve?    

• Individual Sentence Focus: While sentence-level focus is essential if you’re working on landing page copies, ads, etc., it doesn’t really work if you want to rephrase larger chunks of text, like essays, theses, research papers, etc.    
• English paraphrasing only: Wordtune currently supports paraphrasing only in the English language, which limits its usability for those writing in multiple languages. 

Discover why Paperpal outperforms Wordtune as the best paraphrasing tool for academic writing.    

Paraphraser.io

This Natural Language Processing (NLP) based paraphrasing tool helps writers rewrite content. Content tone options include Fluent and Standard. If you subscribe to the paid program, you can access the Creative Tone.    

Paraphraser.io – Features and How It Works?   

• Fluency: Enhances text clarity by changing some words here and there and readable by removing unnecessary fluff words.    
• Standard: Improves the overall content tone by changing only the elements it feels are necessary. It uses better/alternative terms to convey the idea better.    
• Creative (Premium Feature): Makes your writing more creative.    
• Smart (Premium Feature): Rephrases sentences to make text sound expert-written    

What do users love about Paraphraser.io?      

• Intuitive UI, No Jargon: Paraphraser.io doesn’t require complex workstreams or prompting and includes all the necessary functions, making it the best paraphrasing tool for day-to-day tasks.    
• Word Limit for Free Version: The 600-word limit suffices for short paraphrasing requirements like emails, general text, copies, etc. Many users also consider paraphraser.io a great alternative to QuillBot due to the word limit offered in the free plan.     

What can Paraphraser.io improve?     

• Accessibility: Paraphraser.io is only available on the web, which means users must open the website whenever they want to use it.    
• Doesn’t work with long text: Using Paraphraser.io for long-form content requires extensive human intervention to review and manually rephrase chunks of text suggested, often out of context, by the tool.   
• Unreliable output: Paraphraser.io often produces grammatically incorrect sentences, and the Word changer function suggests irrelevant and out-of-context words, which defeats the purpose of a paraphrasing tool. 

Say goodbye to tedious and time-consuming academic paraphrasing. Paraphrase with Paperpal

  Word AI is a text rewriter that aims to humanize AI-generated content and bypass AI content detectors. As one of the best paraphrasing tools in the market, Word AI can restructure sentences, enrich the text, reword your text for a better description, and much more. Here’s what this paraphrasing tool can do.   

WordAI – Features and How it Works?    

• Complete Sentence Restructuring – Rewrites text from scratch while optimizing for uniqueness and readability.  
• Text Enrichment – Understands the meaning behind your sentences and adds LSI keywords for unique and SEO-enhanced outputs.  
• Describe ideas differently- Prevents duplicate content and provides copy alternatives to help you beat writer’s block.  
• Improves clarity with Split sentences – Refines wordy content into clear and concise rewrites to communicate better. Takes long run-on sentences and splits them naturally so they are short, clear, and compelling.  

What do users love about WordAI?    

• Makes intelligent spin versions: WordAI can understand the context of the input text and produce intelligently rephrased versions that are just as effective as manually rewriting articles. It also offers various options and settings to customize the spun content.  
• Accessibility: WordAI extends its functionality to support multiple use cases with API integration, bulk rewrite integration, and article forge integration.   

What can WordAI improve?    

• Pricing – WordAI only offers a 3-day trial, and its monthly and annual plans are pricey compared to some of the best paraphrasing tools on the market.  
• Produces inaccurate rewrites for technical content – WordAI isn’t an excellent paraphrasing tool for research, and it sometimes provides meaningless sentences for academic and technical writing purposes. 

Spin Rewriter

  Spin Rewriter leverages Emulated Natural Language (ENL) Semantic Rewriting technology and large language models (LLMs) to extract the meaning of your articles and rewrite them as human-quality.  

Spin Rewriter – Features and How it Works?     

• Bulk article rewriting: Spin Rewriter allows users to efficiently rewrite multiple articles simultaneously, enabling the instant creation of large quantities of unique content.   
• Mass Export: Generate up to 1,000 unique versions of an original article at once, simplifying the process of filling multiple blogs, satellite websites, or an entire PBN with diverse content.   
• Paragraph creation: This AI paraphrasing tool autonomously extracts meaning and generates entirely new paragraphs, effectively concealing the original article.    

What do users love about Spin Rewriter?    

• Lifetime Pricing Plan: Spin Rewriter’s lifetime plan makes it the best paraphrasing tool. For $497, you can get lifetime access to this article rewriter tool with all its features except for a few premium ones.   
• Accessibility: Access everything this AI paraphrasing tool offers from your WordPress dashboard. You can also automate content updates, like repurposing an old blog post to rank better for SEO.    
• Article Suggestions: Spin Rewriter automatically fetches relevant seed articles based on your website’s dynamics.   

What can Spin Rewriter improve?     

• Dependence on Original Content: Spin Rewriter’s effectiveness largely depends on the quality of the original content being spun. Poorly written articles will likely result in subpar rewrites.   
• No built-in grammar checker: Spin Rewriter lacks an integrated grammar or plagiarism checker for reviewing the spun text. This means users must find an alternative proofreading tool for editing, which can be inconvenient. 

Stop using generic paraphrasing tools for research. Paraphrase with Paperpal

Jasper AI is one of the best paraphrasing tools for creators and marketing teams. It uses advanced Natural Language Processing (NLP) to rephrase your content automatically. According to Jasper, the AI paraphrasing tool not only rephrases your text but enhances the output without plagiarism, regardless of input text quality.   

Jasper AI – Features and How Does It Work?   

Sentence Rewriting:   

• Instantly transforms sentences with precision, creativity, and flair.  
• Generates new variations of sentences in line with a specific purpose.  
• It uses AI and contextual synonyms to create sentences with the same meaning in a different tone, shorter length, or another readability level.  
• It provides templates, such as Sentence Expander, Content Improver, and Explain It to a Child, to expand, rephrase, or simplify sentences.  

Paragraph Rewriting:   

• Rearrange words or sentences in a paragraph to improve readability and structure ideas more clearly.  
• Uses GPT-3 and GPT-4 AI technology to scan data and understand how humans write.  
• You can rephrase paragraphs multiple times by altering word choices, sentence length, or tone while retaining the original meaning.  
• It provides templates to simplify writing for better communication, repurpose content for different platforms, optimize for SEO, and overcome writer’s block.  

Paraphrasing:    

• Produces original content without plagiarism  
• Improves upon the content you input  
• Allows you to quickly refresh old content or repurpose it for different distribution channels  
• Integrates with Brand Voice to tailor content to your tone and style  
• Generates content in 30+ languages  
• Optimizes content for SEO with keyword suggestions and readability improvements  
• Provides templates like Content Improver and Explain It to a Child to rephrase content for different audiences  

What do users love about Jasper AI?   

• High-Quality Output: It leverages advanced NLP to produce grammatically correct and meaningful rephrased content, ensuring originality and quality.  
• Customization Options: Users can adjust the level of paraphrasing to achieve specific results.   
• Error Detection: The tool also identifies and corrects grammar, spelling, and punctuation errors, enhancing the overall quality of the content.  
• Language Versatility: Jasper can generate content in over 30 languages, making it accessible to a diverse user base.  

What can Jasper AI improve?   

• Length Limitations: The tool may struggle with longer pieces of content like essays, thesis, and other academic formats, which may not make it the best paraphrasing tool for research.    
• Cost Considerations: Jasper AI can be relatively expensive, even for individual users.   
• Learning Curve: New users might find the tool challenging to navigate initially, requiring some time to become proficient. 

Hypotenuse AI

Hypotenuse is a powerful AI paraphrasing tool geared toward e-commerce and social media content creation. It focuses on creating SEO-focused, accurate, on-brand product descriptions, articles, social media copies, and 20+ content types.  

Hypotenuse AI – Features and How it Works?  

• Article Spinning: Generates multiple rewrites of an original piece to submit to article directories.  
• Tone Selection: Hypotenuse AI provides up to 4 pre-set tones for customizing your content and allows you to describe your tone.   
• Improve: Suggest alternative word choices, sentence structures, and phrasing to make content more engaging and professional.  
• Simplify: Provides simplified alternatives to cut the fluff and convey your message clearly.  
• Shorten: Offers concise alternatives, making content more direct.  
• Expand: Add more information, examples, or explanations.  
• Rephrase: Diversifies writing style to avoid repetitive language and offers fresh perspectives.  

What do users love about Hypotenuse AI?    

Ultimate writing tool for e-commerce businesses: Businesses with multiple third-party product listings find Hypotenuse useful because it efficiently writes and paraphrases compelling product descriptions.   

What can Hypotenuse AI improve?    

AI-generated outputs: The content rephrased or generated by Hypotenuse AI doesn’t fully capture the “human voice” and lacks flow, which means text needs to be further edited manually. 

Why is it important to choose the best paraphrasing tool for research?  

Research and academia demand precision, originality, and efficiency. While paraphrasing is an essential aspect of academic writing, the process can be time-consuming and fraught with potential pitfalls if you do not choose the right paraphrasing tool for research.    

A well-chosen academic paraphrasing tool is more than just a language rephrase; it’s an AI research assistant. It must adeptly handle the nuances of academic language, preserving technical terms and ensuring semantic integrity. Moreover, the ability to seamlessly integrate proofreading, plagiarism checks, and citation features within a single platform is indispensable. This integrated approach accelerates the research process and significantly enhances the quality of the final output.  

Research integrity is paramount in academia. Investing time in selecting the best paraphrasing tool for research can significantly impact the efficiency, accuracy, and credibility of one’s research endeavours. 

Effortlessly rewrite academic text with Paperpal. Sign Up Now for FREE.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. which is the best paraphrasing tool for researchers  .

The best paraphrasing tool for researchers often depends on specific needs, such as contextual understanding and accuracy in retaining the meaning of words. While many paraphrasing tools excel in rephrasing grammatically correct sentences, they often change scientific and technical terms to generic words, which is unsuitable in the academic context.   

Paperpal suggests accurate technical terms to enhance the academic text and ensure that the same scientific sentence context is retained. Unlike other paraphrasing tools, Paperpal doesn’t replace your entire text in one go. Instead, it suggests rephrased sentences and asks you to edit and review each section before adding it to your document. Try Paperpal for free and see the difference.   

2. How do you choose the best paraphrasing tool for research?  

Paraphrasing text in research and academia doesn’t end up rephrasing and using it directly. You need to proofread it, check for plagiarism, search for the right source, and cite it if it was taken from a different source. Here’s our guide to choosing the best paraphrasing tool for research.   

• Custom Paraphrasing Tool for Research: To avoid manually editing and proofreading paraphrased academic text, go for a paraphrasing tool tailored to academic writing    
• Technical Term Preservation: Ensure the tool accurately preserves the original meaning and doesn’t replace technical terms, such as patient-first language, equations, tables, etc., with generic words.   
• In-built academic proofreading: Before using paraphrased text directly, you must proofread and edit it to suit your tone and the journal guidelines. Using a paraphrasing tool for research with built-in academic proofreading saves time and effort.   
• Plagiarism and Citation features: Paraphrasing can often be misunderstood as plagiarized text, especially if you’re paraphrasing someone else’s text without citing it. Paraphrasing tools like Paperpal offer an in-built search and cite feature along with plagiarism checks to avoid accidental plagiarism and properly reference your work. 

3. Can I use a paraphrasing tool in research?  

Yes, you can use a paraphrasing tool in research. However, you need to ensure that the paraphrased text is not plagiarised and adequately cited if the original text has been picked up from another source. If you’re paraphrasing text written by you, ensure that the meaning, technical terms, and consistency in the presentation of tables, figures, and equation labels are retained in the output.    

4. What are the benefits of using a paraphrasing tool?  

Using a custom paraphrasing tool for research offers several benefits: 

• Time Efficiency: Speeds up the process of rewriting content, allowing more time for actual research and analysis. 
• Improved Readability: This enhances the readability and flow of your writing, making it more accessible to a wider audience. 
• Language Proficiency: Assists non-native English speakers in refining their academic writing to meet higher linguistic standards. 
• Focus on Core Research: Allows researchers to focus on the core aspects of their work rather than spending excessive time on writing and rephrasing. 

By leveraging the right paraphrasing tool , researchers can enhance the quality and efficiency of their academic writing. We hope this list helps you make the right decision! 

Paperpal is a comprehensive AI writing toolkit that helps students and researchers achieve 2x the writing in half the time. It leverages 21+ years of STM experience and insights from millions of research articles to provide in-depth academic writing, language editing, and submission readiness support to help you write better, faster.

Get accurate academic translations, rewriting support, grammar checks, vocabulary suggestions, and generative AI assistance that delivers human precision at machine speed.  Try for free or  upgrade to Paperpal Prime  starting at US$19 a month  to access premium features, including consistency, plagiarism, and 30+ submission readiness checks to help you succeed.

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Related Reads:

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• How to Paraphrase Research Papers Effectively
• Grammarly Review – Is Grammarly Worth it? [2024 Update]

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Using Information Ethically

• What is Academic Integrity?
• What is Plagiarism?
• Strategies for Avoiding Plagiarism
• Recognizing Academic Misconduct
• Citing Sources
• Quoting, Paraphrasing, and Summarizing Strategies
• What is AI?
• Using AI Ethically
• Students-Test Your Knowledge

Overview of Quoting, Paraphrasing & Summarizing

Quoting, paraphrasing and summarizing are all common techniques used in academic writing. This section will discuss each of these techniques and how to incorporate them effectively into your writing to help avoid academic misconduct, such as plagiarism. 

What are the differences between quoting, paraphrasing, and summarizing and when should you use each technique in your writing?

This video provides more information on these techniques, along with examples.

When to Quote, Paraphrase, or Summarize

Deciding when to quote, paraphrase, or summarize is ultimately up to you as a writer.  However, good academic writing generally uses a combination of the three. Review the following examples to see which situations might be best for each writing technique. 

Paraphrasing Tutorial

Paraphrasing is when you use your own words to describe the words and ideas of others. Learning to paraphrase successfully is an important component in academic writing. This paraphrasing tutorial will take you through scenarios that will demonstrate good paraphrasing techniques. 

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Is it original? An editor’s guide to identifying plagiarism

If you’re reading this, it happened again. Right now, an editor may be about to issue an apology or a stern rebuttal. Someone’s reputation and body of work is being scrutinized. And a gaggle of self-appointed fact-checkers may be plugging sentence after sentence into Google for any traces of dishonesty. If you’re reading this, a journalist has been accused of what Poynter’s Roy Peter Clark calls “the unoriginal sin”: plagiarism.

Plagiarism is a serious charge. If true, it has the potential to upend a career and mar a journalist’s reputation for life. And yet, in today’s world of aggregated news, plagiarism is an imprecise word that stands for a spectrum of offenses related to unoriginal work. And its severity varies dramatically depending on a variety of circumstances.

See also: Welcome to post-plagiarism America

So before you jump on Twitter to excoriate or defend the media’s latest alleged idea thief, take a minute to go over the following checklist to determine for yourself whether the charges are true. Also, you can cut out or take a screenshot of our plagiarism flowchart for editors .

• Is some of the language in the article unoriginal? Is the central idea of the story unoriginal? In his 2007 dissertation on plagiarism in newspapers, Norman Lewis put forth the following definition of plagiarism: “Using someone else’s words or original ideas without attribution.” This definition, he says, focuses on the act of plagiarism itself and disregards questions of intent. Whether or not the journalist meant to plagiarize is a question best reserved for determining the severity of the crime, not for establishing whether it happened.
• Did the author fail to set off unoriginal language or ideas with quotation marks? Attribution is the opposite of plagiarism, Lewis says, and the clearest indicator of attribution is quotation marks, followed by a citation. The National Summit to Fight Plagiarism and Fabrication put it this way : “Principled professionals credit the work of others, treating others as they would like to be treated themselves.”
• Does the author fail to attribute the work in some other way, such as a paraphrase with credit? Without proper credit, a paraphrase can be used to conceal plagiarism. As Lewis writes, “treating paraphrasing as a plagiarism panacea ignores the fact that a person who cribs from someone else’s work is still cribbing, even if he or she is adept at rewording.”
• Did the author lift more than seven words verbatim from another source? For editors and readers trying to evaluate cases of plagiarism, the 7- to 10-word threshold is a useful guideline, said Kelly McBride, Poynter’s vice president of academic programs. The basic idea is that it’s hard to incidentally replicate seven consecutive words that appear in another author’s work. This is not an absolute rule, however — both McBride and Lewis acknowledge that there’s no easy equation to determine what constitutes plagiarism.

If you answered ‘yes’ to all the questions above, then the accusations being hurled around on Twitter are at least partially right; there’s a legitimate case of unoriginal work masquerading as fresh content. But before you call it plagiarism, remember that there might be a more nuanced word for what’s being discussed. Plagiarism.org lists 10 types of thievery , each with their own degrees of severity, and iThenticate, a plagiarism detection service, lists five additional kinds of lifting in its summary on plagiarism in research.

Here’s a sampling of some unoriginal writing you might run into:

• Self-plagiarism: The outing of Jonah Lehrer, one of the most prominent self-plagiarizers in recent memory, touched off a vigorous debate about whether writers who recycle their own work without acknowledging its unoriginality are guilty of plagiarism or some lesser charge. Poynter vice president and senior scholar Roy Peter Clark , along with New York Times standards editor Phil Corbett says “self-plagiarism” should be called something else; writing before the Lehrer incident, Lewis said self-plagiarism was “less an ethical infraction than a potential violation of ownership rights.” McBride likened Lehrer’s duplicitous duplications to a boyfriend who “recycles the same seemingly spontaneous romantic moments on a succession of dates.” Reuters media critic Jack Shafer argues that you can’t steal from yourself.
• Patchwriting: If the author didn’t copy verbatim, he or she may be guilty of intellectual dishonesty — even if they credit the source. Journalists who craft paraphrases that mirror their source material with the exception of a few jumbled-up words are perpetrators of “patchwriting,” which McBride defines as “relying too heavily on the vocabulary and syntax of the source material.” Clark argues that this is a lesser charge than plagiarism if a writer credits their source. McBride has called it “just as dishonest” as plagiarism.
• Excessive aggregation: Rewriting an entire article, even with proper credit (or an obligatory h/t), is a form of appropriation. Plagiarism.org lists aggregation without original ideas as one of the least severe forms of plagiarism because it does not deceive readers about the source of the information. A sure way to avoid excessive aggregation is to transform the original work by adding value to it, McBride said.
• Idea theft: Relying too heavily on another journalist’s original story ideas and concepts is “quite common in journalism and not intellectually honest,” McBride said. This can occur when a reporter sets out to “match” a story by interviewing the same sources without acknowledging the news was first reported elsewhere.

Still unsure whether something was plagiarized? We made a flowchart to help you decide. Click on the image below for a PDF you can cut out and keep nearby for the next time you come across suspicious copy.

(Benjamin Mullin)

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Basic Principles of Citation

APA Style uses the author–date citation system , in which a brief in-text citation directs readers to a full reference list entry. The in-text citation appears within the body of the paper (or in a table, figure, footnote, or appendix) and briefly identifies the cited work by its author and date of publication. This enables readers to locate the corresponding entry in the alphabetical reference list at the end of the paper.

Each work cited must appear in the reference list, and each work in the reference list must be cited in the text (or in a table, figure, footnote, or appendix).

Both paraphrases and quotations require citations.

The following are guidelines to follow when writing in-text citations:

• Ensure that the spelling of author names and the publication dates in reference list entries match those in the corresponding in-text citations.
• Cite only works that you have read and ideas that you have incorporated into your writing. The works you cite may provide key background information, support or dispute your thesis, or offer critical definitions and data.
• Readers may find a long string of citations difficult to understand, especially if they are using assistive technology such as a screen reader; therefore, include only those citations needed to support your immediate point.
• Cite primary sources when possible, and cite secondary sources sparingly.
• Cite sources to document all facts and figures that you mention that are not common knowledge.
• To cite a specific part of a source , provide an author–date citation for the work plus information about the specific part.
• Even when sources cannot be retrieved (e.g., because they are personal communications ), still credit them in the text (however, avoid using online sources that are no longer recoverable).

Basic principles of citation are covered in the seventh edition APA Style manuals in the Publication Manual Sections 8.1 to 8.36 and the Concise Guide Sections 8.1 to 8.34

Related handouts

• In-Text Citation Checklist (PDF, 227KB)
• Six Steps to Proper Citation (PDF, 112KB)

From the APA Style blog

How to cite your own translations

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The “outdated sources” myth

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• How to Paraphrase | Step-by-Step Guide & Examples

How to Paraphrase | Step-by-Step Guide & Examples

Published on 8 April 2022 by Courtney Gahan and Jack Caulfield. Revised on 15 May 2023.

Paraphrasing means putting someone else’s ideas into your own words. Paraphrasing a source involves changing the wording while preserving the original meaning.

Paraphrasing is an alternative to  quoting (copying someone’s exact words and putting them in quotation marks ). In academic writing, it’s usually better to paraphrase instead of quoting. It shows that you have understood the source, reads more smoothly, and keeps your own voice front and center.

Every time you paraphrase, it’s important to cite the source . Also take care not to use wording that is too similar to the original. Otherwise, you could be at risk of committing plagiarism .

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Table of contents

How to paraphrase in five easy steps, how to paraphrase correctly, examples of paraphrasing, how to cite a paraphrase, paraphrasing vs quoting, paraphrasing vs summarising, avoiding plagiarism when you paraphrase, frequently asked questions about paraphrasing.

If you’re struggling to get to grips with the process of paraphrasing, check out our easy step-by-step guide in the video below.

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Putting an idea into your own words can be easier said than done. Let’s say you want to paraphrase the text below, about population decline in a particular species of sea snails.

Incorrect paraphrasing

You might make a first attempt to paraphrase it by swapping out a few words for  synonyms .

Like other sea creatures inhabiting the vicinity of highly populated coasts, horse conchs have lost substantial territory to advancement and contamination , including preferred breeding grounds along mud flats and seagrass beds. Their Gulf home is also heating up due to global warming , which scientists think further puts pressure on the creatures , predicated upon the harmful effects extra warmth has on other large mollusks (Barnett, 2022).

This attempt at paraphrasing doesn’t change the sentence structure or order of information, only some of the word choices. And the synonyms chosen are poor:

• ‘Advancement and contamination’ doesn’t really convey the same meaning as ‘development and pollution’.
• Sometimes the changes make the tone less academic: ‘home’ for ‘habitat’ and ‘sea creatures’ for ‘marine animals’.
• Adding phrases like ‘inhabiting the vicinity of’ and ‘puts pressure on’ makes the text needlessly long-winded.
• Global warming is related to climate change, but they don’t mean exactly the same thing.

Because of this, the text reads awkwardly, is longer than it needs to be, and remains too close to the original phrasing. This means you risk being accused of plagiarism .

Correct paraphrasing

Let’s look at a more effective way of paraphrasing the same text.

Here, we’ve:

• Only included the information that’s relevant to our argument (note that the paraphrase is shorter than the original)
• Retained key terms like ‘development and pollution’, since changing them could alter the meaning
• Structured sentences in our own way instead of copying the structure of the original
• Started from a different point, presenting information in a different order

Because of this, we’re able to clearly convey the relevant information from the source without sticking too close to the original phrasing.

Explore the tabs below to see examples of paraphrasing in action.

• Journal article
• Newspaper article
• Magazine article

Once you have your perfectly paraphrased text, you need to ensure you credit the original author. You’ll always paraphrase sources in the same way, but you’ll have to use a different type of in-text citation depending on what citation style you follow.

Generate accurate citations with Scribbr

It’s a good idea to paraphrase instead of quoting in most cases because:

• Paraphrasing shows that you fully understand the meaning of a text
• Your own voice remains dominant throughout your paper
• Quotes reduce the readability of your text

But that doesn’t mean you should never quote. Quotes are appropriate when:

• Giving a precise definition
• Saying something about the author’s language or style (e.g., in a literary analysis paper)
• Providing evidence in support of an argument
• Critiquing or analysing a specific claim

A paraphrase puts a specific passage into your own words. It’s typically a similar length to the original text, or slightly shorter.

When you boil a longer piece of writing down to the key points, so that the result is a lot shorter than the original, this is called summarising .

Paraphrasing and quoting are important tools for presenting specific information from sources. But if the information you want to include is more general (e.g., the overarching argument of a whole article), summarising is more appropriate.

When paraphrasing, you have to be careful to avoid accidental plagiarism .

Students frequently use paraphrasing tools , which can be especially helpful for non-native speakers who might have trouble with academic writing. While these can be useful for a little extra inspiration, use them sparingly while maintaining academic integrity.

This can happen if the paraphrase is too similar to the original quote, with phrases or whole sentences that are identical (and should therefore be in quotation marks). It can also happen if you fail to properly cite the source.

To make sure you’ve properly paraphrased and cited all your sources, you could elect to run a plagiarism check before submitting your paper.

To paraphrase effectively, don’t just take the original sentence and swap out some of the words for synonyms. Instead, try:

• Reformulating the sentence (e.g., change active to passive , or start from a different point)
• Combining information from multiple sentences into one
• Leaving out information from the original that isn’t relevant to your point
• Using synonyms where they don’t distort the meaning

The main point is to ensure you don’t just copy the structure of the original text, but instead reformulate the idea in your own words.

Paraphrasing without crediting the original author is a form of plagiarism , because you’re presenting someone else’s ideas as if they were your own.

However, paraphrasing is not plagiarism if you correctly reference the source . This means including an in-text referencing and a full reference , formatted according to your required citation style (e.g., Harvard , Vancouver ).

As well as referencing your source, make sure that any paraphrased text is completely rewritten in your own words.

Plagiarism means using someone else’s words or ideas and passing them off as your own. Paraphrasing means putting someone else’s ideas into your own words.

So when does paraphrasing count as plagiarism?

• Paraphrasing is plagiarism if you don’t properly credit the original author.
• Paraphrasing is plagiarism if your text is too close to the original wording (even if you cite the source). If you directly copy a sentence or phrase, you should quote it instead.
• Paraphrasing  is not plagiarism if you put the author’s ideas completely into your own words and properly reference the source .

To present information from other sources in academic writing , it’s best to paraphrase in most cases. This shows that you’ve understood the ideas you’re discussing and incorporates them into your text smoothly.

It’s appropriate to quote when:

• Changing the phrasing would distort the meaning of the original text
• You want to discuss the author’s language choices (e.g., in literary analysis )
• You’re presenting a precise definition
• You’re looking in depth at a specific claim

Cite this Scribbr article

If you want to cite this source, you can copy and paste the citation or click the ‘Cite this Scribbr article’ button to automatically add the citation to our free Reference Generator.

Gahan, C. & Caulfield, J. (2023, May 15). How to Paraphrase | Step-by-Step Guide & Examples. Scribbr. Retrieved 5 August 2024, from https://www.scribbr.co.uk/working-sources/paraphrasing/

Is this article helpful?

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Other students also liked, harvard in-text citation | a complete guide & examples, how to avoid plagiarism | tips on citing sources, apa referencing (7th ed.) quick guide | in-text citations & references.

OpenAI says it’s taking a ‘deliberate approach’ to releasing tools that can detect writing from ChatGPT

OpenAI has built a tool that could potentially catch students who cheat by asking ChatGPT to write their assignments — but according to The Wall Street Journal , the company is debating whether to actually release it.

In a statement provided to TechCrunch, an OpenAI spokesperson confirmed that the company is researching the text watermarking method described in the Journal’s story, but said it’s taking a “deliberate approach” due to “the complexities involved and its likely impact on the broader ecosystem beyond OpenAI.”

“The text watermarking method we’re developing is technically promising, but has important risks we’re weighing while we research alternatives, including susceptibility to circumvention by bad actors and the potential to disproportionately impact groups like non-English speakers,” the spokesperson said.

This would be a different approach from most previous efforts to detect AI-generated text, which have been largely ineffective . Even OpenAI itself shut down its previous AI text detector last year due to its “low rate of accuracy.”

With text watermarking, OpenAI would focus solely on detecting writing from ChatGPT, not from other companies’ models. It would do so by making small changes to how ChatGPT selects words, essentially creating an invisible watermark in the writing that could later be detected by a separate tool.

Following the publication of the Journal’s story, OpenAI also updated a May blog post about its research around detecting AI-generated content. The update says text watermarking has proven “highly accurate and even effective against localized tampering, such as paraphrasing,” but has proven “less robust against globalized tampering; like using translation systems, rewording with another generative model, or asking the model to insert a special character in between every word and then deleting that character.”

As a result, OpenAI writes that this method is “trivial to circumvention by bad actors.” OpenAI’s update also echoes the spokesperson’s point about non-English speakers, writing that text watermarking could “stigmatize use of AI as a useful writing tool for non-native English speakers.”

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One Extraordinary (Olympic) Photo: Vadim Ghirda captures the sunset framed by the Arc de Triomphe

The setting sun, framed by the Arc de Triomphe, illuminates the Champs-Élysées during the 2024 Summer Olympics, Friday, Aug. 2, 2024, in Paris, France. (AP Photo/Vadim Ghirda)

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PARIS (AP) — Vadim Ghirda takes a closer look at his AP photo of the sunset framed by the Arc de Triomphe.

Why this photo?

All photographs are unique but this one has an extra element of “uniqueness” attached to it: There are only a few days in a year when the sunset is framed by one of the famous landmarks of Paris, the Arc de Triomphe. This year it happens during the Olympic Games. It’s a small but worthy piece in the huge puzzle of photographs produced by all of my AP colleagues, which, in the end, will paint the BIG picture of an historic event, taking place against the backdrop of iconic sites in Paris.

HOW I MADE THIS PHOTO

I tried to make the photo on Aug. 1 but was out of luck. It was a cloudy evening. Trying, however, is the first step to achieve anything – I met an enthusiast photographer sporting an old classic film camera, a “veteran” of this sunset picture, who said he tries to shoot it every year. I learned that next day the position of the sun will actually be better. He also pointed out a better position for taking it. I arrived more than 2 hours before the sunset on Aug. 2, thinking I will have time to move around and find the perfect place to shoot. Dozens of enthusiast photographers with tripods, tourists or locals with mobile phones were already crowding the “perfect spot” arguing with police officers, who were trying to move them away, concerned for their safety as traffic was quite busy at that time. I barely found a space to squeeze in the center of the Champs Elysees and wait.

I am not a fan of technical details, I’ll just say this was shot on a long lens, to achieve that compressed perspective that would focus the attention on the sunset, yet capture the bustling Champs Elysees avenue below. The ideal moment was extremely brief, to the extent where, with all the pushing around for the ideal angle going on, I was not sure I got it.

Why this photo works

The simple answer is: It’s in Paris and includes worldwide known landmarks and a rare occurrence sunset during the Olympics. But that’s not why it works for me. I see a symbol in almost everything around me. (It’s exhausting). Capturing this was, to paraphrase Elton John, a way to not let the sun go down on the world. Photography is a time stopper – who doesn’t want this superpower? I am happy I had the opportunity to stop yet another fascinating moment.

For more extraordinary AP photography, click here . For AP’s full coverage of the 2024 Paris Olympics, click here .

By the Book

Deborah Harkness Has Never Read Jane Austen. Really.

‘By admitting that, I fear I will be drummed out of the Novelists’ Corps,’ she says. ‘The Black Bird Oracle,’ the latest in her best-selling ‘All Souls’ series, is just out.

Credit... Rebecca Clarke

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What books are on your night stand?

I’m working my way through a delicious pile of historical nonfiction titles: “Shakespeare’s Book,” by Chris Laoutaris; “All That She Carried,” by Tiya Miles; and “Secret Voices,” a wonderful collection of excerpts from women’s diaries, edited by Sarah Gristwood. The passages are arranged by date, and I read that day’s entries each night. It’s fascinating to read about someone’s day centuries ago.

Describe your ideal reading experience.

In the morning, in Duke Humfrey’s Library in Oxford, with a 16th-century manuscript in front of me, deciphering each word.

What books are you embarrassed not to have read yet?

I’ve not read a single word of Jane Austen. By admitting that, I fear I will be drummed out of the Novelists’ Corps.

Do you count any books as guilty pleasures?

Books are never guilty pleasures. You should never, ever feel guilty about reading something — not even the cereal box.

How did your reading life change as you were recovering from cancer?

I couldn’t escape into fictional worlds as I’d hoped, but was surprisingly drawn to biographies and diaries, which I found inspiring and comforting, especially World War II diaries. If people survived the Blitz in London, surely I could survive cancer.

Did illness have an influence on the story you wanted to tell in the new book?

Absolutely. Ironically, I’ve been writing for years about fictional characters with genetic mutations. Once doctors diagnosed me as having the BRCA gene mutation and the ovarian cancer that in my case goes with it, I wanted to dive back into family history in “The Black Bird Oracle.”

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