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Passive voice checker
Paste your text and see every passive construction highlighted, with a passive-sentence count, a percentage, and a rewrite prompt for each. It runs entirely in your browser. Free, no signup.
Runs in your browser. Your text is never uploaded or stored.
7 passive constructions highlighted below. Review each one; some passive voice is correct.
In context
The report was generated by the system overnight. Once the file has been uploaded, a confirmation email is sent to the account owner. The user was notified that the changes were saved. To reset it, click Reset and enter the code that was shown on screen. Several accounts got locked after five failed attempts.
Each match, and how to fix it
- was generatedName the actor: who generated it? Put that subject first.
- been uploadedName the actor: who uploaded it? Put that subject first.
- is sentName the actor: who sent it? Put that subject first.
- was notifiedName the actor: who notified it? Put that subject first.
- were savedName the actor: who saved it? Put that subject first.
- was shownName the actor: who shown it? Put that subject first.
- got locked(get-passive)Name the actor: who locked it? Put that subject first.
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When to use it
When passive voice is fine, and when it is not
Procedures need active voice
Steps a reader has to follow should name the actor and the action: “Click Save,” not “The changes are saved.” Passive voice hides who does what, which is exactly what a procedure cannot afford.
System descriptions can warrant passive
When the actor is the system, unknown, or beside the point, passive is often the clearer choice: “The token is refreshed every hour” is fine when no human refreshes it. Do not rewrite it just to satisfy a counter.
Emphasis can justify it
Passive voice legitimately moves the important thing to the front of the sentence: “Your account was locked after five failed attempts” keeps the reader's account in focus. Use it on purpose, not by habit.
A number, not a verdict
There is no correct passive percentage. Reference and conceptual writing carries more passive than a step-by-step guide, and that is normal. Read the highlighted sentences and decide each one; do not chase a target figure.
Reference
What passive voice is, and why it matters in documentation
Passive voice is a sentence construction where the thing acted upon becomes the subject, and the actor is demoted or dropped. “The user uploads the file” is active; “the file is uploaded by the user” is passive; “the file is uploaded” is passive with the actor removed entirely. The grammatical signature is a form of “to be” plus a past participle, which is what this checker looks for.
In documentation the stakes are practical, not stylistic. A procedure exists to tell a reader what to do, in order. Passive voice hides the doer, so “the changes are saved” leaves the reader wondering whether they must save, whether the system saves, or whether it already happened. Rewriting it as “click Save” removes the ambiguity. This is why style guides for technical writing push active voice in instructions.
Passive voice is not a defect everywhere. When the actor is the system, is unknown, or does not matter, the passive is often the clearer choice: “the token is refreshed every hour” needs no human subject, and inventing one would be worse. Reference material and conceptual explanations carry more passive than step-by-step guides, and that is expected. The goal is deliberate voice, not a zero on a counter.
The checker reports a passive-sentence count and a percentage so you can see the shape of a document at a glance, then highlights each construction in context with a prompt to name the actor. Work through the highlights and ask, for each one, whether the actor belongs in the sentence. Where it does, put it first. Where it genuinely does not, leave the passive alone.
Keeping voice consistent across a growing set of documents is harder than fixing one page. The same warning, prerequisite, or definition tends to get re-typed in every topic that needs it, and each copy drifts in a different direction. Writing that content once as a reusable component, then correcting the voice in one place, is how the fix stays fixed everywhere it appears, which is the model Topicary uses.
Consistent voice is easier when a fact lives in one place
Rewriting the same passive warning across ten topics is how voice drifts. In Topicary you write a warning, a prerequisite, or a definition once as a reusable component; fix the voice there and every topic that uses it updates at once.
Questions
About passive voice
How does the checker decide something is passive?
It looks for a form of the verb “to be” (is, are, was, were, be, been, being) or a get-passive (“got promoted”) followed by a past participle. It carries a list of common irregular participles (written, given, sent, built, and so on) and matches regular “-ed” forms, so it catches constructions a simple word search would miss.
Why did it skip “is interested” or “was tired”?
Those are adjectival, not passive: nobody “interested” you. The checker keeps a small exclusion list of words that look like participles but almost never form a true passive, because a false alarm wastes more of your time than a missed one. It favors precision over recall on purpose.
Is a lower passive percentage always better?
No. Some passive voice is correct, especially in system descriptions where the actor is the software or is unknown. The percentage is a prompt to review, not a score to minimize. Read each highlighted sentence and decide.
Do you store the text I paste?
No. The check runs entirely in your browser. Your text never leaves your device and nothing is saved.