Unneeded Words

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A pair of red scissors on the left, the words Unneeded Words to its right. The word Unneeded is crossed out by a red line.

Wordiness. It’s a sneaky problem in our writing that needlessly increases word count and document length. Are you guilty of making your sentences longer than they need to be?

Check out Grammarly’s helpful list of “Words and Phrases You No Longer Need” to find out!
Friends Don't Let Friends Use Filler Words
  1. At all times
    Watch out for flabby phrases at all times.
  2. Each and every
    Look for filler words in your writing each and every day daily.
  3. As of yet, as yet
    We don’t know as of yet whether we’ll succeed.
  4. Totally, completely, absolutely, literally, actually
    Without filler words, your writing will be totally fabulous.
  5. Basically, essentially
    These words basically don’t add value. They’re essentially useless.
  6. In order
    Eliminate excess verbiage in order to clean up your writing.
  7. Very, really, quite, rather, extremely
    These very common words are really not useful. They’re rather dull.
  8. Simply
    Simply     Don’t use this word often.
  9. Pretty
    It’s a pretty good idea to use this one sparingly, too.
  10. Just
    If your sentence works without it, you just don’t need this word.
  11. That
    This is a word that you should only use when you need it for clarity.
  12. Up, down
    We don’t care whether you stand up or sit down to write, just write cleanly!
  13. In the process of
    We’re in the process of learning to remove wordiness.
  14. As a matter of fact
    As a matter of fact,     Your skills have improved.
  15. All of
    All of     Your readers will enjoy reading cleaner copy.
  16. As being
    You’ll be known as being a proficient writer!
  17. Being that
    Being that Because you’re the best writer in your class, you’re sure to get good grades.
  18. During the course of
    During the course of the writing lesson, we learned some new tricks!
  19. For all intents and purposes, For the most part
    For all intents and purposes,     Our writing has improved.
  20. At this point in time
    You don’t need to use filler words at this point in time now.
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