The short answer is to cut words that add no meaning, swap roundabout phrases for precise ones, and keep any qualifier that changes whether the claim is true. That is the whole idea behind the checklist below, which gives you the words to cut from writing during a self-edit, along with what to check before you touch each one. It is a set of things to search for and judge, so it isn't a ban list, and you can copy it straight into your editing notes.
The checklist to copy
Read each row as a search-and-judge prompt. Search your draft for the phrase in the first column, decide whether it adds meaning, and use the third column to check what you might lose if you cut it. This is a concise writing checklist you can use on a single paragraph or on a whole batch of drafts.
| Search for | Cut or rewrite when it adds no meaning | Keep or check before changing |
|---|---|---|
| Weak intensifiers: really, very, quite, extremely, totally, absolutely, definitely | Delete it: "very useful" becomes "useful." If the strength matters, pick a precise, supportable description. | Intensity can be meaningful. Don't turn an accurate, modest claim into an exaggerated one. |
| Conversational padding: actually, basically, kind of, sort of, for all intents and purposes | Test deleting it: "The guide basically explains the process" becomes "The guide explains the process." | "Actually" can mark a real correction, and "kind of" can honestly mark an approximation. |
| Stacked hedges: it seems that, it appears that, it is possible that, perhaps, may, probably | Remove the framing and keep the uncertainty: "It is possible that the change may help" becomes "The change may help." | Keep a fitting "may," "some," or "usually" if the evidence doesn't support certainty. |
| Slow openings: it is important to note that, it goes without saying that, there are, it is ... that | Start with the actor or the claim: "There are four factors that affect costs" becomes "Four factors affect costs." | An opening like this can be deliberate emphasis, and "there is" isn't automatically wrong. |
| Long purpose and condition phrases: in order to, for the purpose of, in the event that | "In order to" becomes "to," and "in the event that" becomes "if." | Confirm the shorter word expresses the same relationship. |
| Long cause and time phrases: due to the fact that, in light of the fact that, at this point in time, prior to | Often "because," "now," and "before." | Don't erase a real time boundary, and don't turn a background factor into a proven cause. |
| Redundant pairs and built-in meanings: each and every, whole entire, end result, future plans, anticipate in advance, completely finish | Choose one term: "each and every draft" becomes "every draft," and "anticipate in advance" becomes "anticipate." | Repetition can create emphasis or rhythm, so check whether both terms carry different information. |
| Vague category padding: particular type of, specific kind of, large in size, pink in color | "Any particular type of dessert" becomes "any dessert," and "pink in color" becomes "pink." | "Specific" or "particular" may point to a subset. Keep it when the subset matters. |
| Noun-heavy actions and weak verbs: conduct a review of, make a decision about, have an effect on, has the ability to | Put the action in a verb: "conduct a review of the draft" becomes "review the draft," and "has the ability to" becomes "can." | Name the real actor and action, and don't swap in a verb that claims something different. |
| Clause and preposition chains: which is, that is, who are, repeated of/in/for phrases | Compress when the meaning holds: "the report, which was released recently" becomes "the recently released report." | These can carry conditions, attribution, or scope, so check before you compress. |
| Passive constructions with a detour: was reviewed by, was written by | If the actor matters: "The draft was reviewed by the editor" becomes "The editor reviewed the draft." | Passive voice is grammatical, and it helps when the recipient matters more or the actor is unknown. |
| Clichés and throat-clearing: in this day and age, in the current climate, at the end of the day, in this article we will discuss | Delete the preface and say what is actually happening. | A familiar phrase can suit an informal voice if you choose it on purpose. |
| Obscure words where familiar ones work: utilize, commence, ascertain, implement | Often "use," "start," "find out," or "carry out." | A technical term may name a specific operation, so don't simplify away a needed distinction. |
| Needless negatives: not unlikely, not impossible, not unworthy | Say the positive claim directly when it means the same thing. | A negative can mean something different from its positive twin, so check the strength of the new claim. |
Delete, replace, or keep
Treat the words to cut from writing as search terms and never as a ban list. Every row in that table ends in one of three decisions, and having all three is what keeps the checklist safe to use on real drafts.
You delete a word when the sentence makes the same accurate claim without it. "The result is actually useful" works fine as "The result is useful." You replace a phrase when it's doing real work but taking too long about it, like turning "in the event that" into "if." You keep the word when cutting it would change the scope, the likelihood, the timing, the contrast, or the strength of a promise.
That third choice is the one people skip. A word like "may" can be the difference between a possibility you can support and a promise you can't. "Only" and "just" can also limit a claim, so read the sentence without them before you decide. It goes the other way too, because "always," "never," and "all" can overstate something, and they deserve a second look whenever you see them. Qualifiers can inflate a claim as easily as they soften it, and an unsupported "definitely" can't rescue a claim that has no evidence behind it. Cal State Chico's writing center makes a similar point in its handout on qualifiers, noting that limiting a claim can keep you from making an unsupported absolute, which matters a lot in marketing copy and predictions.
The University of North Carolina's writing center adds one more caution that's worth keeping next to the checklist. A shorter sentence that is less accurate is not an improvement, so the goal is never a lower word count on its own.
Find the claim beneath the padding
If a row in the table doesn't jump out at you, it helps to go at a sentence from the other direction. Mark its actor, its action, its object, and any limit that has to stay. Then look for what is standing in the way of those four things.
The usual culprits are an opening that delays the actor ("it is important to note that"), an action buried inside a noun ("the review of"), or a long trail of prepositional phrases ("the process of the review of the draft"). Purdue's writing lab has a method for this called the Paramedic Method, which walks you through circling the prepositions and forms of "is," finding where the action lives, turning it into a simple verb, putting the doer in the subject position, and cutting slow openings and redundancies. It's a useful diagnostic for each sentence in a paragraph, though it doesn't mean every preposition or every "is" has to go.
The question to keep asking is what the reader would no longer know if the phrase disappeared. If the honest answer is nothing, cut it. If the answer is a probability, an audience, a condition, a timing, or an exception, keep that information even if the sentence gets a few words longer. Reading the result out loud helps, and UNC's guidance is clear that repetition for rhythm and purposeful passive voice are both fine.
Which rows to work on first
You'll get the most out of the phrases to remove from blog posts that delay the claim, repeat the meaning, or hide who did what. Those are the slow openings, the redundant pairs, and the noun-heavy actions, and fixing them tends to change a paragraph more than swapping out one adjective does.
Federal writing guidance backs the same instinct. The Federal Plain Language Guidelines, issued in March 2011 and revised in May 2011, include a section called "Omit unnecessary words," with examples about excess modifiers, redundancy, and repeated ideas. It is editorial guidance rather than a measured result, so it won't tell you how much a blog post improves.
A good order for a self-edit looks like this.
- Start with slow openings and cliché prefaces, since they delay the point of the sentence.
- Move on to duplicate meanings and long connectors like "in order to" and "due to the fact that."
- Then pull actions out of nouns and name the actor when it matters.
- Only after that, deal with the filler words to avoid, such as intensifiers and conversational padding.
- Finish with one separate pass that restores any uncertainty or limit your cuts accidentally removed.
That last pass is worth its own step because it's easy to strip out a "may" or a "some" while moving fast.
A worked before-and-after paragraph
Here is a short paragraph written to show the method. It isn't a quote from anyone and it isn't a measured case study, so treat it as an illustration.
Before:
In order to reduce the amount of time that editors spend reviewing blog drafts, our team should conduct a review of each draft before publication. In the event that a claim is not supported by a source, it is possible that the claim may need to be removed. At this point in time, the final review of the draft is carried out by the editor.
Going sentence by sentence, the edit marks look like this. "In order to" becomes "to." "The amount of time that editors spend reviewing" becomes "editors' review time." "Conduct a review of" becomes "review." "In the event that" becomes "if." "Is not supported by a source" becomes "lacks a supporting source." "It is possible that ... may" keeps the "may" and drops the duplicate possibility framing. "At this point in time" becomes "for now." And "is carried out by the editor" becomes "the editor conducts."
After:
To reduce editors' review time, our team should review each draft before publication. If a claim lacks a supporting source, it may need to be removed. For now, the editor conducts the final review.
Now check the meaning, since that's the part that makes this different from a plain find-and-delete. The revision keeps the proposed team review and the timing before publication. It keeps the condition about source support, and it keeps the fact that removal is a possibility and not a certainty, because "may" stayed. It also keeps the editor's current responsibility for the final review. It doesn't add a rule that every unsupported claim must be removed, and it doesn't hand the removal to the editor.
The before-and-after routine
If you want how to write tighter content as a repeatable habit, this is the routine to follow on any paragraph.
- Save the original paragraph somewhere you can get back to it.
- Underline its factual commitments, its conditions, and its uncertainties.
- Run the checklist one sentence at a time, looking first for slow openings and duplicate meaning, and then for actor and action rewrites.
- Compare the two versions for changes in claims, scope, attribution, and tone.
- Keep the version that says the same defensible thing more directly.
A lower word count alone doesn't make an edit better.
Adapting the checklist for your team
If you review drafts from several writers, this concise writing checklist works best as a shared reference and not a rulebook that gets enforced word by word. A few changes make it fit your team.
Add your own rows. Most teams have two or three pet phrases that show up in every draft, and adding those filler words to avoid to the first column makes the list feel like yours. Add a note in the third column about your brand voice, too. A casual voice may keep "kind of" or "in this day and age" on purpose, and an editor who knows that won't strip them out by reflex.
Watch for tone as well. Microsoft's style guidance suggests removing words that add no substance while avoiding a tone that feels abrupt or unfriendly, and the National Institutes of Health describes plain language as accurate and grammatically correct, not "dumbed down." Both are good reminders that the goal is clear prose your reader can trust, not the smallest possible number of characters.
Finally, agree on who owns the last pass. When two editors both cut, the qualifiers tend to go missing, so it helps if one person does the final read specifically for scope and uncertainty.
How to know it's working
There isn't a good universal number to aim for here. The research behind this piece didn't turn up a defensible target for how many filler words is too many, how much shorter a paragraph should get, or any lift in conversions, rankings, or AI citations that comes from cutting words. So judge the edit by the reading, not by a count.
A few signs are worth watching for. Your editors spend less time on line-level cleanup because drafts arrive with fewer slow openings to begin with. Claims in the finished piece still match what your sources support. And when you read a paragraph out loud, you can find the actor and the action in every sentence without hunting for them.
Some drafts will come from an AI tool, and the same checklist applies. The guide on when to edit or rewrite a draft can help you decide what to do with one, and the piece on how to make AI writing sound human covers the editing side. Generic phrasing is also why AI content sounds the same across competitors, and the signals of human writing show what readers notice.
If you're reviewing drafts at volume, it helps to keep your brand voice written down as structured context so drafts start closer to how you want them to sound. That's what Deep IQ does inside DeepSmith, and you can start a free trial to see how it shapes a draft. The checklist above still does the sentence-level work, and it will work on any draft, whoever or whatever wrote it.
