Microsoft Word, for years now, has been the golden standard when it comes to the writing editor. Although Mac users may have known Pages as their go-to editor, those two programs weren’t even comparable.

Word is a much more complicated program with an amazing array of possibilities. But yet - with the influence of online editors, the usual Microsoft Editor we know and love got themself some competition – and not only in the case of being a grammar checker. 

Microsoft Office found itself in a conundrum, with attacks from Google Workspace and independent apps like Grammarly. In this article, we’re going to set this once and for all: Which is the better writing app - Microsoft Word or Grammarly?

If you’ve ever wanted to correct some grammar mistakes in your article, you have probably heard about Grammarly. It’s the single best app for grammar checking on the market, with a free version available as a Chrome extension or just an online version. 

Not only spelling mistakes and grammar errors will get corrected, but you also get a Grammarly editor that will help you out with the document’s readability with Grammarly Premium. 

It will also check out if you may have infringed on any copyrights, so if you have a paper to write - remember to put it in this editor. It has gained many positive reviews and feedback recently, so you know it’s up to the task.

This round is probably the most important one for many of you, as it’s all about what those apps can do. Whether you need a reliable editor that will allow you not only to write but create tables, charts, add graphics to the file, etc., or maybe you’re more interested in some fundamental writing elements - you will surely find something for yourself. So, without further ado, let’s see what these programs have to offer.

Grammarly is a strict editor that will check your spelling and grammar errors or writing style. It also has some more advanced tools that go beyond the basic grammar, but those come with the Premium version.

Find Your Audience

Grammarly will let you set the goal of the audience you want to target. What does it mean? Well, depending on the structure of your text, you can set what kind of audience you are targeting. By doing so, you will have different sentence structure underlined. 

For example, you can pick Academic, Business, Casual, and many more, which will influence how Grammarly will correct it. It’s handy when you switch between writing a Lifestyle article or an email to a professor.

Spell Checker

After picking your target, go ahead and check the spelling errors! Whether it’s a DOC/TXT file or just a plain wall of text, it will correct grammar, basic spelling, and punctuation. Everything you’ll put in Grammarly will get divided into four categories - Correctness, Clarity, Engagement, and Delivery. Every single one will be displayed on a different screen with mistakes underlined in red, blue, or green, depending on your mistake type.

Set Your Goals!

You will not only receive the correction of the grammatical mistakes in real time but also a detailed analysis of what you did wrong and how you can improve. With that, you can not only get the correct version of the file you’re sending out but also learn grammar and punctuation and set goals for yourself not to make so many grammatical errors anymore.

Not Only English?

You may wonder about the grammar checking tool in Grammarly, as there are so many different versions of the English language. Well, as you may have presumed, the creators of Grammarly took that into account and created a spelling check for different versions of English. Currently, you can switch between British, American, Canadian, and Australian English. If you want, you can add new ones to your vocabulary as well.

Plagiarism Detector

It’s not all about spelling corrections; it’s all about advanced features. In this case, with Premium, you gain the ability to check your article/paper if it is just a tad similar to something on the World Wide Web. That way, you can be sure that none of your writings can ever be attacked for copyright infringement. At least not the direct one. It’s a great proofreading service and plagiarism checker, for sure.

Additional Features

Of course, Grammarly comes with many, many more features that are rather basic and simple, so we’re not going to go in-depth with it. Even serious writers use Grammarly, so you know that something is going on. Long story short, you can get your standard word count, reading time, unique and rare word score, and overall readability. As the grammar checkers go - this one is the top of the top.

So, now that we know what to expect from Grammarly, let’s find out what the Word is all about. Or at least - let’s find out what we probably already know about Word as it has been for years one of the most popular editors ever created.

Microsoft Editor

Microsoft Word’s Add-on that is its alternative to Grammarly is called Microsoft Editor. What can it do? Well, it checks your spelling, grammar, and refinements. Both Grammarly and Microsoft Editor are well-crafted tools for some basic checking and editing. 

When comparing these two, you need to remember that Microsoft Editor does not go as far into the structure of the article as Grammarly goes. It will help you with the basic features of grammar, but anything more profound is too deep for it. 

Although, keep in mind that it’s available in more than 20 languages, so it’s a much greater tool than Grammarly when it comes to the scope.

Additional Features

We really can’t compare those two on any other basis, as they are not even close when it comes to the scope of what they can do. Word can allow you to create rather complicated files with pictures, graphs, tables, and many, many more. 

Word users are used to this program and can do some fantastic things with it. This includes the possibility to change the way the text looks, move paragraphs, create headlines etc., put some clip-arts, add watermarks, and just overall - create a very advanced system of links between this and other Office products. 

That said, it’s something completely different, and we cannot add those other features to comparison if we’re going to be honest. It’s not apples vs. oranges. It’s more like apples vs. what kind of eyeshadow to get.

It depends on what you need. If you need a very complicated word processor - Microsoft Word is for you. With all the premium features - you really can’t go wrong with it. 

On the other hand, if you need to find something more on the word structure, and writing development side - you will surely go with Grammarly. Even with the basic version, you really can’t find anything even similar when it comes to the depth of your writing analysis. So - it’s for sure a great program to be used.

This one is really complicated as there are a lot of factors to be taken into account. Both programs have their free versions and those more on the expensive site. Both have desktop apps and online versions. What is the best option to choose? Let’s find out.

The free version of Grammarly is pretty good, with plug-ins you can use on many web-browsers, etc. It can be added to your Google Doc and much other free software, so you can get a pretty good combo. You can even add it to Word.

When it comes to the Premium version, things get tricky. Grammarly Premium is quite pricey, with 30$ per month for a single user or 144$ for an annual subscription. There are business and Premium options on both of them. And that’s only for the Grammarly; no other office apps included.

It really is not wise to get a single Office product. It’s more affordable to get it all in the complete package. So - Microsoft Office it is. Here are the costs:

• Microsoft 365 Business Basic for 6 dollars per month/per user,
• Standard for $12.50 per month/per user 
• Business Premium for $22 dollars per month/per user. 
• Microsoft 365 Family on the other hand costs $99.99 per year and is recommended for up to 6 people.

If you’re running a business then or you have a few kids that need those programs - it all adds up in the end. Luckily, there are cheaper solutions. Thanks to online retailers such us Royal Cd Keys, you can get Microsoft Office CD Key for a really good price.

You get not only Word, though, but a multiple platforms available packet of office apps, cloud storage, and a personal dictionary to suit all of your needs. When comparing the cost-effective option - you gain access to much more for much less with Microsoft Office. You get PowerPoint, Excel, OneDrive, Note, and a lot more! And even the Grammarly keyboard will probably not be enough to convince us otherwise.

Microsoft Office is just an overall more universal program. Grammarly offers a lot of additional features strictly for writing purposes. Still, when it comes to the sole writing elements, the Microsoft product just does not have a competition here—especially because you gain a lot of Grammarly features with just a basic version that you can add to your Office subscription. Clearly, the winner here is Microsoft.

As always in these kinds of battles, the verdict can be only one. It really depends on what you need. Although, in the case of this versus, I think we can more or less say that Microsoft Word is just the better program to use after all. It has a lot of features that you will just not see in Grammarly. 

It’s bigger, more advanced, and just an overall joy to use, even with the Grammarly extension you can add to it. Grammarly is an amazing product that everyone should use in their writing as it improves what you can do with your grammar and spelling, not only in the case of a single article but overall writing. 

However, it is just too expensive for an everyday user. Microsoft is a giant company that can set its own standards for what is affordable and can gauge or lower prices as they wish. And you can see it happening here. 

Grammarly is a much smaller company that really cannot compete with giants that need only more users, not more money after all. Even though it’s a bit of a loser in this competition, we cannot express enough how good of an extension it is, and you should definitely give it a chance. And if you have a spare 100 bucks - it’s not a bad investment after all.

We hope that we have made it a little easier for you to decide which program to use. We understand that it is not that simple to get on top of all these new programs that are coming up day after day. 

There are many fantastic things to choose from Google Docs, Microsoft Editor, and now Grammarly. In this article, once again, we wanted to show you that all of them are great to use and it’s just a shame that they didn’t merge into one amazing program. It would be so much easier to choose!