How to Write an Epic Essay Within a Specific Word Count?

In this competitive academic environment, word count matters a lot more than you think! Whether an admission letter or an essay, you have to stay within a specific word limit. Plus, you need to write within the defined word count.

Therefore, sticking to a particular word count while writing your paper is the only key factor in honing your writing skills. However, managing words in an essay is not a piece of cake! Many students struggle to trim chunks of text until their essay perfectly matches the exact word count. Moreover, maintaining proper flow in the essay gives them a headache.

If you are one of those learners who get stuck with managing an essay’s word count, worry not! This guide will help you exactly keep your essay’s words.

Here you go!

Six Steps For Your Essay’s Word Count!

Craft a top-quality thesis statement

A thesis statement describes and explains your stance in the paper. Within 1-2 sentences, you have to respond to an essay’s prompt.

With a well-written thesis statement, you can back up your essay impressively.

Outline your paper

It’s time to outline your essay. This step will help you to cover all the dimensions of your narrative. Furthermore, it will also assist you in determining each paragraph’s length.

In order to write a well-structured outline, you have to jot down all the crucial points of your thesis. Each of them will help you write a paragraph.

Focus on the topic

You need to stay within the topic to reach a particular word count. Sticking to your outline firmly will help you to keep track of everything.

It would be best to match every single paragraph to outline and thesis statement. Also, make sure that you are not dragging any point. Finally, to achieve excellence in paper and increase its readability, you need to remove all the anecdotes that make your essay longer.

Target your thesis statement and explain it professionally.

Use a reliable word counter to keep track of your essay’s words

In this technological era, you can easily track word count as you write your paper. Yes, you have heard right!

Benefitting from an online word counter keeps you on the right track. Most importantly, it helps you with an excellent essay.

Using a letter counter makes it ten times easier for you to stay within an essay’s word count. Additionally, it also assists you in shaping a solid essay structure. For example, after crafting an introduction, you can check its length.

The same is the case with the essay’s body and conclusion. Plus, leveraging from a letter or word counter allows you to include crucial details only. Thus, it sharpens your writing skills.

In a nutshell, it assists you in meeting the paper’s word limit.

Proofread your paper

When you write your first draft, you might add multiple jargon and unnecessary words without even realizing it.

Most importantly, avoid leaving your paper until the second. Otherwise, you will lose time proofreading it and removing the additional terms.

It would be best to read it aloud!

On the contrary, you can also ask your friends or colleagues to proofread your essay.

Place relevant images in the text

Once you have proofread the essay, it’s time to add the relevant pictures and lists to the paper. This will help your reader directly catch the text’s central idea without being overwhelmed.

Why do essays come with a restricted word count?

Following are the reasons that academic essays have a word count:

To enhance writing skills

Remember, your professor wants to test your understanding of the subject and writing skills. Academic papers communicate your knowledge concisely.

The paper’s restricted word count allows you to state your point clearly and hone your writing skills.

To know what to expect

Word count specifies the class scale of the individuals. For example, there is a major difference between 1500 words compared to 15000. With the help of word count, readers know what to expect.

Meeting word count is a vital part of the academic field.

How to increase an essay’s word count?

What if your written essay does not tailor to the exact words?

Panic not!

All you need to do is go back to your paper and highlight all those areas that could be furnished by adding chunks of text. For example:

Supporting information to explain your stance
Using fewer pieces of evidence and quotations for your points
Targeting any area from the essay’s question that you have forgotten to add

How to reduce an essay’s word count?

What if your written paper does not reach the exact word count?

Follow these steps:

Trim chunks of texts

Focus on the word count as you write content. If you have exceeded the limit, do not be overwhelmed. You still have the option to trim your essay.

If you remove all the additional chunks of texts, you will have a professionally written paper.

Avoid redundancy

Unfortunately, many students, including brilliant ones, add redundant words in their papers.

Redundant words lower down your text’s readability. Words like “large in size,” “small in size,” “past history,” need to be removed from your sentences.

Remove the words that have nothing to convey

While writing, you may encounter words that do not add meaning to your sentences. You can remove them. For example, words like “really,” “actually,” and “very,” can be trimmed.

Use single words to replace weighty phrases

Experts say more with fewer words. So try to find the places where you can be more concise with the words.

For example, you can replace the phrase “by the same time” with “similarly.”

Avoid repetition

Avoid repeating the same points in your essay. If you practice this skill, you will observe fruitful results in your writing. Mark a specific area and state your points there.

If you find a sentence and even a chunk of the paragraph is repeated, simply remove it.