The power of Grammarly: Usage stats and how it can impact your writing

Not everyone is a writer, and mistakes are easily made, which is why spelling and grammar typos are often found in written content. However, the cost of these small mistakes can be quite significant.

• In a survey by Linguix, they found that emails with grammar mistakes lead to a loss of 25% of potential leads (source)
• 68% of consumers say they would be less inclined to purchase from a brand with grammar or spelling mistakes in their messaging (source)
• 73% of consumers also said their perceptions of a brand would decline if they made grammatical mistakes in their messaging (source)

Comparing those stats with that 93% of individuals admit to making errors in work emails, it’s clear to see why avoiding these mistakes is important to a business. So, how can businesses do that? By using tools like spell check and Grammarly.

In this blog, we’ll look into Grammarly and the stats that can show the tool’s power. We’ll also discuss other tools similar to Grammarly and any benefits or disadvantages of using tools like this.

What is Grammarly?

To begin, we’ll briefly explain what exactly Grammarly is. Put simply, it’s an AI-powered tool that helps users improve their writing, by checking spelling, grammar and tone. The tool also works to identify complicated sentences and repetitive writing to help make it more concise and impactful.

Key features of Grammarly

The tool has a web and desktop app meaning users can use Grammarly across various websites and other tools, such as Microsoft Word, Google and even social media platforms.  In addition to identifying typos and spelling mistakes, the tool also enables users to set their desired goals for the content, choosing who their audience is, how formal they want to sound, and even the intent.  As users write, Grammarly can score their content based on the goals they have chosen. The tool also helps users write with generative AI and allows them to check for AI text and plagiarism.

Now we know more about how the tool works, let’s learn about the numbers behind the business.

Benefits of Grammarly

• Helps improve the user’s writing skills
• Real-time grammar and spell check in documents and apps
• Easy to use and quick to implement
• Can be used in the app, on desktop and as a browser extension
• Can adjust settings based on the different content being written

Drawbacks of Grammarly

• Some features are only available on the paid version
• Accuracy and style might not be as reliable as a human editor
• It lacks extra detail that other tools like Hemmingway provide, such as readability scores and reading time

Now we understand a bit more about the tool, let’s take a look at the numbers behind the business.

Stats about Grammarly as a company

Since launching in 2009 in Ukraine, Grammarly has evolved into a tool used across the world, here are some stats about the business and its growth journey.

• The company was founded by Max Lytvyn, Alex Shevchenko and Dymtro Lider in Ukraine.
• Over 1,000 employees work for Grammarly.
• In 2015 the company launched a freemium product and reached 1 million daily active users.
• The company’s headquarters are based in San Francisco and have offices in Kyiv, New York and Vancouver (source)
• In 2024, Grammarly’s revenue reached $251.8 million, a 40% increase on their 2023 revenue (source)
• The company has undergone a number of funding rounds, its first round in 2017 it raised $110 million. Then in 2019, it raised $90 million and most recently in 2021 it raised $200 million, taking its valuation to $13 billion (source)
• The company is so certain of its security that in 2018 it offered a bounty of $100,000 on HackerOne for the first hacker to be able to find a specific document within the company’s server (source)

Stats about Grammarly and its users

Grammarly has established itself as a key tool for individuals, schools and businesses, let’s look at who is using the platform in more detail. The popular AI writing tool can be described as just that, with the company sharing the following statistics about its users.

• 40 million people use Grammarly
• Over 50,000 organisations have implemented the tool
• 96% of the Fortune 500 make up those 50,000 businesses
• In 2018 the platform reached over 15 million daily active users
• Grammarly operates globally, in any country where there is internet access.
• After Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, Grammarly decided to stop operating there. Grammarly then decided to donate all of the money it made from the country since 2014 and donated it to Ukrainian humanitarian groups (source)
• Over 3,000 higher education institutions use Grammarly (source).
• 68% of Grammarly users state English as their first language (source).
• The majority of Grammarly users – 73% live in the U.S. (source).
• Grammarly’s free Chrome extension has been downloaded 10 million times (source).

Stats about Grammarly’s impact on writing

We’ve found that there are a lot of people using Grammarly and how those users have played a part in the growth of the business’s success, but what impact does Grammarly have on its users? Let’s take a look:

• 72% of Grammarly users use the tool at least once a week (source).
• 63% of students who use Grammarly find the tool useful and 72% said it has improved their writing skills (source).
• When comparing Grammarly with spell check in Microsoft Word, it was found to have an accuracy rating of 88%. In that, 88% of errors identified were actually errors. It has also been found that only 17% of errors in content weren’t flagged (source).
• A survey of students found that 93% believed Grammarly had saved them time on writing (source).
• A global BPO stated that by using Grammarly they improved customer satisfaction by 17% (source).
• Career search engine Indeed has reported that by using Grammarly they have improved communication by 72% and saved users an average of 43 minutes per day (source).
• With the tool using AI, there have been some instances where educational content that used the tool has been flagged as AI-generated. Leading to educational providers struggling to develop rules about the fair usage.
• The company has a Trust Radius score of 9.2 out of 10, with 346 reviews and ratings, including comments such as ‘You’d be losing a lot if you don’t use Grammarly’ and ‘Grammarly is my primary go-to tool!’ (source)

Competitors of Grammarly

There are a range of tools to Grammarly that offer similar features, with the most common being a spell-check feature within document programs such as Google Docs and Microsoft Word. Now these don’t offer the full functionality that Grammarly does, but other tools out there do. Let’s take a look at some of those:

ProWritingAid

This is a tool described as helping ‘writers bring their stories to life’. Similar to Grammarly ProWritingAid works across multiple platforms and apps, and offers a free and paid version, which determines the features users get access to. Features include a grammar checker, the ability to paraphrase and a critique report. It’s not just features that are similar to Grammarly but also the pricing structure too.

QuillBot

Another AI-powered tool, QuillBot is designed to help users improve their writing by enabling them to rephrase sentences whilst still retaining their meaning. Similar to Grammarly it also has the ability to check grammar and for plagiarism. Other features it has are a citation generator which can be handy for referencing work, a translator and an AI detector. An advantage of QuillBot is that a lot of the features are available for free, but there is a limit on how many words you can edit. Their premium plan removes these limitations and at a lower cost than similar tools.

Ginger

Functioning as an AI-powered writing assistant, the main feature of Ginger is a grammar and spelling checker. However, it also offers users the ability to rephrase sentences and translate them into multiple languages. Similar to Grammarly it offers desktop and app versions for users to use. Users can trial the software for free and then will be prompted to subscribe to Ginger Premium which starts with packages as low as $9.99 and even $4.99 for team members.

Hemmingway Editor

Hemmingway is a writing and editing tool that helps users improve their writing and make it more impactful. Unlike some of the other tools, it focuses more on the readability of the content and colour-coded feedback so users can understand what they need to do to improve their work. Whilst Hemmingway is a great tool for improving your writing it’s a bit more advanced than just a spelling and grammar checker. So we’d advise that you may want to use Hemmingway alongside a simpler program for everyday use.

Slick Write

Slick Write is a free application that allows users to easily check their writing for grammar and spelling mistakes. Users can choose how they’d like to critique their work by selecting which features the tool should analyse. Users can also get a summary of key stats for their writing, which includes such things as word count, reading time, readability index etc. With the tool being free and offering an easy-to-follow demo, this could be a great alternative to Grammarly for users to begin with.

Those are just a few competitors of Grammarly, and there are many more out there. Remember, whichever tool you choose, we also recommend having your writing reviewed by a friend or a colleague, who may be able to give other suggestions and feedback to improve your writing.

Conclusion

So typos and spelling mistakes can be costly, which is why writers should be reviewing their work before publishing. Tools like Grammarly can help with this and it’s obvious that the tool has become popular due to its functionality and performance for users. However, there are other tools available, which also come with their own benefits and disadvantages.

When choosing a tool for you and your business, you should carry out your own research, trying the tools to see which best suits your needs and ways of working. It’s also important to not forget that whilst these tools are extremely useful, they shouldn’t fully replace that of a human editor who can understand more context and purpose of writing than potential AI tools can.

Deeper insights

Want to learn more about how to create engaging and high-performing content?

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