Editing and proofreading: what to know

What the job involves, what changes the price, and what to ask a pro.

What editing and proofreading is

An editor reviews your text for clarity, structure, grammar, spelling and consistency. The level of editing is agreed before work starts, from light cleanup to deeper changes, and people hire one before they send a document that others will judge.

Signs you need it

  • You wrote a document for a client, employer or school and are not sure it reads clearly.
  • Your draft repeats points, jumps between ideas or has sections in an odd order.
  • Readers have pointed out errors, unclear sentences or inconsistent terms in your text.
  • You have a deadline for a document and nobody on your team can review it.
  • Your text has mixed spellings, names or formatting from several rounds of writing.
  • You are not sure whether your message reads the way you intend.

What the pro does

  • Agrees the editing level in advance, such as light cleanup, structural edits or line edits, with examples of what each level changes.
  • Reads the full document once for structure, argument and whether each section does its job.
  • Works through the text line by line for grammar, spelling, punctuation and word choice.
  • Checks names, dates, figures, headings and defined terms for consistency across the whole document.
  • Marks changes with tracked edits and comments, or returns a clean copy with a list of the main changes.

What changes the price

Every job is different, so we do not publish prices. These are the things that move the quote up or down.

  • Length of the document and how dense the writing is.
  • Level of editing: cleanup only, structural work, or a full line edit.
  • Whether the editor must rewrite sentences or only mark them.
  • Technical or specialist content that needs careful reading.
  • Number of rounds, such as a first edit and a check after your changes.
  • Format complexity, such as tables, footnotes, images or tracked changes in a shared file.
  • Deadline for the return.

What a written quote should spell out

  • The editing level and what it does and does not cover.
  • The file format of the returned copy, such as tracked changes, a clean copy or both.
  • The number of review rounds included after your changes.
  • The turnaround date for the first pass and for the final pass.
  • How the editor handles questions about meaning, and whether they change your argument or only flag it.

Questions to ask before you hire

  • What level of editing do you suggest for my document, and what would each level change?
  • Will you use tracked changes, comments or a clean copy, and can you return both?
  • Do you follow the spelling rules I specify, such as British or American spelling?
  • Will you change my meaning, or only flag places where the meaning is unclear?
  • Can you check citations and cross references, or only the sentences around them?
  • Do you work in my file format, such as a Word document or a shared online document?

Red flags

  • Rewrites large sections without asking what you meant.
  • Returns text with no tracked changes or notes, so you cannot see what changed.
  • Offers to check text without reading the full document first.
  • Promises that the document will be error free.
  • Asks you to pay before showing a sample of the work.

What you can do yourself

You can run spell check, read the document out loud to catch awkward sentences, and check that headings and defined terms match. Hire an editor when the document is going to a client, a publisher, a school or an employer, when you need a second reader for structure, or when you have read it so many times that you no longer see the errors.

Licenses and permits

Editing and proofreading are not commonly licensed, so a license is usually not required for this work. Check with your state or local licensing agency about general business rules, and ask the editor for samples and references from work like yours as proof of skill.

Editing and proofreading questions

What is the difference between editing and proofreading?

Editing covers clarity, structure and flow, and can involve rewriting. Proofreading checks the finished text for spelling, grammar and formatting errors without changing your content. Many documents need editing first and proofreading last.

Will the editor rewrite my document?

Usually not. Most editors mark changes for you to accept or reject. Ask before work starts which approach they use and whether they change the wording or only suggest changes.

What should I send the editor?

Send the latest version with your own changes already made, and remove any tracked changes you no longer need. Tell the editor about any names, terms or spellings that are unusual on purpose.

Pro reviewers

Pros who offer editing and proofreading remotely can improve this guide, like Wikipedia. We check every edit before it goes live. Every approved edit is credited in the edit history and on the pro's profile.

Edit history

How guide reviews work

How it works

  1. 1. Describe the job

    Pick the service, add your ZIP and a sentence about what is going on.

  2. 2. Pick the pros you want

    See screened pros who serve your ZIP and choose who you want to hear from.

  3. 3. They reach out

    They contact you the way you chose: phone, email or in-app messages.

More writing, editing and translation guides

Find a pro near you

Find a pro

About this guide

Request editing and proofreading