Clarity in writing means the ability to write in a way that is easy to understand. It therefore enables you to make your point without ambiguity. Clarity is particularly important when you are writing for non-native speakers. These readers may be confused by convoluted sentences, long words or slang phrases. However, writing clearly is better for any audience because your meaning will be more obvious.

Writing clearly is a skill like any other: it can be developed but it needs practice. This page provides some ideas to help you increase the clarity of your writing. You may also find it helpful to look at our pages on Coherence and Conciseness, because these concepts also help to improve the clarity of your writing.

Understanding Clarity

It is almost ironic to be providing a definition of clarity, because the word means ‘clear and easily understood’.

Writing that shows clarity, or clear writing, is therefore easy to read and understand.

To write clearly, you will need to choose your words carefully and deliberately, and put them together appropriately, using the correct spelling, grammar and punctuation.

Tips for Writing Clearly

1. Be familiar with grammatical rules

Grammar exists for a reason. It provides conventions that help to structure sentences in a way that readers will understand.

Clarity therefore requires a strong understanding of the rules of grammar. You need to understand when and why they are needed—and also when you can break the rules.

Our pages on Introduction to Grammar and Improving Your Grammar provide more information.

2. Choose the word that most closely matches your intended meaning

In English, words can have two possible meanings:

• The denotative meaning (or denotation) is the ‘dictionary definition’ or literal meaning of the word; and

• The connotative meaning (or connotation) is the emotional meaning of the word: the weight that it carries because of the way that it has previously been used, or its connections to another term or idea.

When choosing a word, you need to consider both meanings to ensure that you pick the right word.

For example, ‘concise’, ‘brief’ and ‘terse’ all have the same denotative meaning: short. However, ‘terse’ implies that communication is cut short, rather than simply being short. If you want to convey that someone is being brief in their communications because they are offended, ‘terse’ would be the right choice. If you want to say that someone keeps their communications short as a preference, then ‘concise’ would work better.

3. Choose simple words

The rule here is straightforward: always choose the simplest word to convey your meaning.

Long words do not make you sound more educated. If anything, they may expose gaps in your understanding, especially if you use the wrong one. Instead, go for the shortest, simplest word available.

For example, use ‘dog’ not ‘canine’, ‘car’ not ‘automobile’ and ‘go’, not ‘proceed’.

Above all, be certain that you understand the meaning of the word you have chosen. If you are in any doubt, choose another word.

4. Replace vague words and phrases with more precise ones

Seek out precise words and terms to replace vague ones. If there is any potential ambiguity in your word choice, find a better (clearer, less ambiguous) word to use. Try to replace any imprecise words with more specific ones. For example, can you replace ‘some’ or ‘lots’ with numbers?

Sometimes this process may expose some ambiguity in your thinking. If so, you will need to resolve that before you can move on.

5. Shorten your sentences

One important way to improve the clarity of your writing is to make it more concise.

The first aspect is shortening your sentences. Start from a rule of thumb that any sentence that is longer than one line could be shorter. Ideally, each sentence should express a single idea. It is also a good idea to remove any redundant words, starting with modifiers (usually adjectives and adverbs) and qualifiers (words that amplify modifiers, like really, generally and completely).

Focus on making sure that every word is absolutely necessary to your meaning.

Our page on Conciseness in Writing has some ideas for ways that you can reduce the length of your writing.

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6. Remove non-restrictive clauses from your sentences

Removing non-restrictive clauses is a special case of the rule about shortening your sentences.

The definition of a non-restrictive clause is that it is non-essential. It can be removed from the sentence without altering its meaning.

Rewriting your sentences to remove non-restrictive clauses will always make your writing clearer.

(For a quick summary of clauses, subordinate clauses and non-restrictive clauses, see box below.)

7. Remove ambiguity by using nouns after words like this, that, those and these.

Words like this, that, those and these are a common cause of ambiguity in writing.
Consider just how often you hear someone say, ‘Can I use this?’, and you have to look up and say, ‘Use what?’
 Always add a noun after these words.

8. Check your pronoun use

Pronouns are a major cause of ambiguity. They are especially likely to be an issue when you are drafting and redrafting, because you may move sentences around. They are particularly problematic when you have a sentence or section about two people or things that take the same pronoun (see box).

9. Work on your punctuation

Punctuation is the system of signs and symbols that tells your reader how a sentence should be read.

Punctuation is crucial to the meaning of a sentence. The wrong punctuation can even change the meaning (see box)

It is worth taking time to improve your punctuation to ensure that your meaning is clear. Our page on Punctuation provides a useful introduction to the use of each of the main elements of punctuation.

10 Use headings

Headings help to break up your text.

They make it easier to see when you have moved onto a new idea. This is particularly important when writing for an online audience (and for more about this, see our page Know Your Medium).

It may also be helpful to use bullet points or numbered lists. These also break up the text, but make it clear that ideas are connected.

11. Watch out for common grammatical errors

There are two grammatical errors that are particularly likely to cause ambiguity:

• Dangling participles are where there is a missing noun: a participle in a sentence has no obvious subject.

  For example: If found out, the consequences could be severe.

  The real subject is the consequences—but they cannot be found out. The implied subject is the person who has done something wrong, and may be discovered. However, that person is not mentioned at all. A better version would be:

  If found out, they could face severe consequences.

• Incorrect modifying clauses are where a modifying clause does not apply to the right subject.

  For example: Jumping on the trampoline, the dog surprised the girl and made her fall off.

  As currently drafted, it looks like the dog is doing the jumping: unusual, but not impossible. However, it is the girl who fell off, suggesting that she was on the trampoline. Who, therefore, was doing the jumping?

  A better version would be:

  As the girl was jumping on the trampoline, a dog surprised her, and she fell off.

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A Final Thought

The clarity of your writing also depends on your audience.

Some audiences will be more comfortable with more technical terms. For others, you will need to use simpler language, or provide more explanation. Always be mindful of who will be reading your text—and not just the primary audience, but also those who may come across it later.

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