Language Detector
Work out what language a piece of text is written in.
Shortest Word Finder
Find the shortest words in a text, filler included.
| Word | Letters | Syllables | Times used | Note |
|---|
Quick Tool Overview
The Shortest Word Finder ranks a text's shortest words with their counts and share of the whole. Function words are labelled, which separates grammatical scaffolding from short content words — and an unusually high scaffolding share is the signature of padded writing.
- What it does
- Finds and ranks the shortest words in a text
- You give it
- An article, passage or word list
- You get back
- Short words ranked, counted and classified
- Best for
- Word games and spotting padded writing
About the Shortest Word Finder
The shortest words in English are also the most common ones, which is what makes this list interesting rather than trivial. A text where the shortest words are unusually frequent is a text carrying a lot of grammatical scaffolding and not much content — the signature of writing that is longer than it needs to be.
This ranks the shortest words with their counts and shows what share of the text they make up. Function words are labelled, so you can see the difference between short content words and pure connective tissue. It is also the tool for word games: filtering to two- and three-letter words gives you exactly the list a Scrabble player wants out of a passage.
Key features of the Shortest Word Finder
Function words labelled
So the connective tissue is separated from the short words that carry meaning.
Length range filter
Two and three letters for a word game, up to five for text analysis.
Share of the text shown
Function words are normally 40 to 50 per cent; well above that suggests text worth tightening.
Single letters flagged
Only "a" and "I" are real one-letter words; anything else is usually an initial or a stray.
Explains Zipf's law
Why the shortest words are also the most common, which is what makes the list meaningful.
How to use the Shortest Word Finder
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1
Paste your text
An article, a passage or a word list.
-
2
Set the length range
Two- and three-letter words for a word game; anything up to five for analysis.
-
3
Read the ranked list
Shortest first, with counts and the share of the text they make up.
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4
Check the filler share
Function words are labelled, so the scaffolding is separated from the content.
Frequently asked questions
Zipf's law: the more often a word is used, the shorter it tends to become. Every language compresses its most frequent words, which is why "the", "of" and "and" are all short.
Between forty and fifty per cent of the words in ordinary English prose, though they carry much less of the meaning. A figure well above that suggests text that could be tightened considerably.
Yes. Filtering to two- and three-letter words gives exactly the list a Scrabble or crossword player wants from a passage, ranked and de-duplicated.
Yes, though only "a" and "I" are real words in English. Anything else of one letter is usually an initial or a stray character, and those are flagged separately.
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