In the modern digital age, writers have the freedom to access a broad range of technology to improve the writing process. These tools help to increase productivity and sometimes boost creativity. With such a wealth of utilities available today, it can be challenging to decide which are the best apps for writers in 2023.
In this article, we’ll explore some of these apps for writers across different categories. We’ll cover those for organisations aiming at productivity, teams working on collaborations, individuals who want to improve on grammar and spelling, and much more.
Writing Apps for Organization and Productivity
The top apps for writers aren’t only created with individuals in mind. Some organisations also need them to improve productivity in the office or at home. Here are a few that will help you gain better focus.
Scrivener
Scrivener is one of the best apps for writers where you might want to organise your work and documents better. You can break the projects into smaller parts, which you can then move around and rearrange as you need.
There are several templates available, which means you don’t need to start from scratch. You’ll find character sheets, timelines, research notes, and more, to help you plan and structure your work. The only catch is that you need to pay to access all the top tools.
Ulysses
Ulysses is one of the best apps for writers where you want an interface with no distractions. It’s mainly available for iOS and Mac devices. As with Scrivener, Ulysses lets you quickly organise your work, but now you can do so with categories.
Once you have an account, you’ll be able to access your work from the cloud by syncing the files. That means you can quickly pick up your work again when away from home. However, it’s not a free option.
Bear
Bear is one of the best apps for writers like you who want a minimalistic appearance and interface so you can focus on your writing tasks. There are plenty of formatting options, such as lists, headings, quotes, and even a tagging system.
These tags let you quickly organise your content visually and plan your work better. You can add categories to various ideas and notes to find them later again with ease. While Bear is free, you’ll have to upgrade to Pro if you want more extensive features.
Writing Apps for Collaboration
We have several business partners and clients we work with, delivering content for them online. They work with us on these documents, making sure it’s exactly what they need. If you find yourself in the same situation, here are some of the best apps for writers to collaborate.
Google Docs
There are very few writers and content agencies that don’t know about Google Docs. As a matter of fact, we wrote this article on G.Docs, as doing a long article on WordPress has become challenging. The best part is that you can quickly share your document with an editor or team member if you want them to check it before sending it to a client.
You can also download your document in various formats, which is ideal for book authors. There’s PDF, MS Word, epub, and so much more! Even working with a book editor is possible, as they can make suggestions on your document instead of simply changing the content.
Dropbox Paper
If you’re not too keen on using Google products, you can check out Dropbox Paper. After you create documents, you can quickly share them with your team or other writers. With many templates available for different projects, it will also save you time so you don’t start from scratch.
Some of the tools available include calendars, project timelines, to-do tasks, and so on. With these features available, everyone will know when writing projects are due and how much time is left.
Best Apps for Writers Focusing on Grammar and Style
While many writers feel they never make mistakes, this is often far from the truth. Even if you check a document several times, there are usually a few grammar and spelling issues you may have missed.
Here are some apps that can help writers with grammar and style.
Grammarly
If you want one of the top writing apps to make sure you don’t make mistakes, get Grammarly. We have a paid account that we use for our writing, as we love the suggestions it provides. You can set the localisation of the language you’re writing in to make sure you meet the expectations of your target audience.
Grammarly is best not only for book authors but for content writers, too. Many clients specify different requirements for website articles, such as perspective, tone of voice, audience, etc. With this app, you can set all of these requirements and just focus on writing.
While there is a free version, we recommend paying for an annual account, as it has way more features.
Hemingway Editor
Here’s another one of the best apps for writers that our partners usually ask us to use. While it does help with spelling, the focus is more on style. You’ll see how it shows you which sentences are too long or in the passive voice. For some reason, everyone believes the active voice is better.
When you click on highlighter words, Hemingway Editor will provide you with better alternatives. There’s a readability score telling you how challenging it will be for your audience to read your work. All of this and more and available for free in browsers, but you can pay for more features in the full version.
Writing Apps for Inspiration and Creativity
You may find plenty of times when you need inspiration and creativity, especially when you need to brainstorm ideas. While there are many available online, we have two that we feel are the best apps for writers: Evernote and OneNote.
Evernote
Evernote lets you quickly capture, plan and organise your ideas and content in one place. You can place your notes in one area, which is even possible with voice recording. If you have the right technology, you can use your hand to write, and it will recognise the words.
Once you’ve placed all your thoughts on the board, you can move them around or organise them into categories. You can use Evernote for free or pay for the Premium features.
OneNote
As the author of several fantasy and horror books, I can personally recommend OneNote as one of the best apps for writers. Available on a browser or as a desktop app, it forms part of the Microsoft 365 suite of tools. You can make tabs for each of your books, and in there, you can split them into pages.
You have no restrictions on how much you can move vertically or horizontally on the pages. There are quick text boxes, but you can also add images and other objects. It’s one of the top apps I enjoy using for planning every aspect of my novels.
AI Assistance for Writers
Let’s make it clear from the start: we are not recommending using AI tools to write content for you. While they can help you develop outlines and ideas, it’s not suitable for producing online content. Search engines will penalise websites that use AI content.
However, what we do recommend you try using are AI-detection tools. Even if you wrote an article completely, sometimes, the detection tools will inform you that there’s a chance it was written by AI. Don’t feel offended; it isn’t accusing you of cheating.
What it actually means is that your writing may be robotic or predictable. Many of us content creators have been trained to write a specific way for clients, and so has AI. Due to that, you might be doing your job so well that your work looks as good as AI work.
Therefore, you need something to warn you if your work looks too robotic, and you need to consider changing it. Here are two of the best apps for writers for AI detection.
GPT-2 Output Detector
If you’re looking for a completely free option for AI Detection, try GPT-2 Output Detector. It works in your browser, and you only need to copy and paste the content. A bar at the bottom will tell you how much of it looks like AI or human content.
You can play around with it by removing paragraphs to see how much of a difference it makes. That usually helps you determine which section looks the most like the work of AI. We personally use this app for one of our clients as a preference.
Originality.AI
If you want some more advanced features, you’re going to, unfortunately, have to pay for them. Originality.AI has been called one of the top AI-detection tools on the market. Not only can it tell you how much of the content appears to be AI, it will also check for any plagiarism issues.
Having an account is entirely free. However, you need to buy credits which you then use to scan your content for any AI text. From there, you can work around the work until Originality tells you it looks more human.
Content at Scale AI
The final AI assistant for writers is Content at Scale AI. At the moment, the company is busy developing an AI system that can create content for you that is undetectable by detectors. However, it’s in the Beta phase.
In terms of AI detection, the tool is free to use on your browser. It gives you three metrics: Predicability, Probability, and Pattern. There’s also an overall score showing you how much the content looks like AI work. At least you have a better idea of what the issue is.
Final Thoughts on the Best Apps for Writers
As we mentioned, there are tons of apps online that can help you with different aspects of writing. We’ll try to create niche-specific posts for tools that target various types of writing, such as novels, songs, screenwriting, gamewriting, and others.
For now, we hope this list has helped you in some way. You can also check out our services, where we provide writing and editing for different types of markets. May you have a blessed day!