How to Check For Plagiarism in Google Docs to Save Time

If you hiss every time you have to copy content from Google Docs to paste into an external plagiarism tool, then you’ll love what you’re about to read.

Whether you write about popular topics or work with writers, It’s easy to commit the crime of plagiarism.

In fact, it can even be unintentional.

Regardless, plagiarized content can destroy your hard-earned reputation.

And that’s apart from the risk of getting your content removed from Google.

Of course, you can use a writing tool like Grammarly to check for plagiarism. But you’d have to copy your content from Google Docs and navigate to another tab to paste it into the Grammarly editor.

Think of the time you’ll lose if you have to follow that process for a few content pieces every day.

You’re probably asking, “How do you check for plagiarism in Google Docs?”

Read on to see how.

Google Docs plagiarism checker add-ons you can use

To check for plagiarism in Google Docs, you need to use the right tools.

Does Google have its own plagiarism checker?

Yes, in fact. 

Google offers originality reports if you subscribe to Google Workspace for Education Fundamentals.

But if you’re a marketer, this will likely not help you.

So, here are 4 external tools for plagiarism detection in Google Docs:

1. Plagium

Plagium is a plagiarism checker and AI detection tool. So, you can check right in your Google Docs whether a content piece was copied or written with ChatGPT. 

To install Plagium, navigate to the top left corner of your Google doc. 

Then click on Extensions, Add-ons, and Get add-ons.

Doing that will load a page of add-ons in the Google Workspace Marketplace.

Put “Plagium” in the search bar. From the search page, you can visit the Plagium page to install it.

Once you install it, you can now use Plagium to check plagiarism. 

How?

We’ll explore that later in this guide.

You need to keep in mind that Plagium only allows you to check a maximum of 5,000 characters (about 750 to 800 words) at a time.

And you have 24 checks per day.

Once you exhaust your free credits, you’ll have to buy more credits.

For instance, $20 can get you 275,000 characters (about 50,000 words).

You can also go for monthly plans.

A similar monthly plan goes for $25 and comes with 349,875 characters (about 60,000 words).

So, you can explore the free Plagium checks before going for the paid plans. 

2. ProWritingAid Plagiarism Checker

ProWritingAid is a popular grammar checker. 

In addition to grammar checking, the ProWritingAid Google Docs add-on lets you run plagiarism checks.

The add-on lets you access features such as:

• Grammar/Spelling
• Style score
• Thesaurus
• Overused words and phrases
• Plagiarism check

To use the ProWritingAid add-on, navigate to the Google Workspace Marketplace, as explained earlier.

Then search “ProWritingAid.”

Install the add-on, and you’re almost set.

To use the ProWritingAid plagiarism checker, you have to purchase checks.

• $10 buys 10 checks
• $40 buys 100 checks
• $120 buys 500 checks
• $200 buys 1,000 checks

Each plagiarism check allows you to scan up to 2,000 words.

But if you subscribe to the ProWritingAid Premium Plus plan, you get 60 plagiarism checks per year. 

3. Semrush SEO Writing Assistant

The SEO Writing Assistant is one of Semrush’s content marketing tools.

The tool helps you optimize your content in 4 main ways:

• Readability
• SEO
• Originality
• Tone of voice

These features aid in creating SEO content that’s helpful to your audience.

The originality feature checks your text against sources online to ensure your content is plagiarism-free.

So, in cases where your content match with other pages, you can rewrite it.

Browse to the Google Workspace Marketplace to download the Semrush SEO writing assistant.

The Google Docs plagiarism checker is available for only the Semrush Guru and Business plans.

The Guru plan includes 5 checks per month, while the Business plan includes 10 checks.

Semrush uses the Copyleaks engine to detect plagiarism in Google Docs.

4. PlagiarismSearch

PlagiarismSearch provides plagiarism features in Google Docs.

Apart from that, the tool provides services such as:

• Plagiarism check
• Paper analysis
• Spell check
• Readability check

To use PlagiarismSearch in Google Docs, navigate to the Google Workspace Marketplace to download it.

PlagiarismSearch offers free searches of up to 5 pages containing at most 300 words every day.

You also get a plagiarism check PDF report that analyzes your document per paragraph.

You can purchase more credits to perform more checks.

Its cheapest monthly plan, Light, goes for $19.95 and allows you to check up to 100,000 words per month.

Meanwhile, the cheapest annual plan, Standard, goes for $149.95 and allows you to check up to 3 million words per year.

You should try its free checks before committing to the paid plans.

How to check plagiarism in Google Docs

If you have the nagging feeling that you’ve seen a content piece before while wandering around the web, verify your feeling.

Your sense of deja vu may be right.

To start, you can install 2 or more add-ons from the previous section.

This will let you test them before picking one that works best for you.

Let’s see how they work.

How to use Plagium Google Docs plagiarism checker

To use Plagium, launch the add-on from “Extensions.” Click on “Plagiarism Checker” among the options.

If you’ve not marked a part of your page, Plagium will prompt you to do so. 

Then, it will analyze your text against other pages online.

You’ll find the settings when you click on the settings icon.

The only thing here is the highlight setting.

I think you should turn the highlights off unless you want Plagium to paint your text yellow.

Plagium allows you to check up to 5,000 characters (about 750 words) at once. 

So, check your content to verify it’s original.

How to use ProWritingAid Plagiarism Checker

Navigate to your Extensions to launch the ProWritingAid add-on.

Among the options, click “Improve Document.”

Doing this will launch the ProWritingAid interface in your Google Doc. 

On the interface, you’ll find many features to spice up your writing to meet your goals.

To check for plagiarism, click on “More Reports” at the top right corner of the interface.

Then, select “Plagiarism” in the drop-down. You can either check a selected part of your document or the whole document.

ProWritingAid will check your content against other pages online to analyze its originality.

How to use Semrush SEO Writing Assistant to check plagiarism

The first step is to launch the Semrush SEO Writing Assistant. Click on “Show.”

Doing this will launch the add-on on the right side of your document.

First, the add-on will require your target keyword for the content piece.

Then, it will automatically analyze your content according to readability, SEO, originality, and tone of voice.

So, you want to see pages with similar content to yours in the originality report. Then you can rewrite your content to make it plagiarism free.

Beyond that, you can improve your content for better search rankings and reader experience.

How to use PlagiarismSearch Google Docs add-on

To use the PlagiarismSearch add-on, navigate to your Extensions and select “Open” in the PlagiarismSearch.

You have to sign up or log in to use the add-on. 

Once you do that, you can check up to 5 pages of 300 words each.

When you launch the add-on in a Google Doc, it will analyze the text for plagiarism.

Then, you’ll see the results of pages with content that matches yours. There’s also the percentage match with each web page.

If you need to see the breakdown of the plagiarism analysis, download the PDF report.

In the PDF report, PlagiarismSearch breaks down your content into paragraphs and shows pages that match each paragraph.

In the example above, the paragraph has a popular Albert Einstein quote.

So, naturally, it will match many pages online.

With this report, you can easily pinpoint the parts of your content to rewrite.

Conclusion

Checking plagiarism in Google Docs can save you a lot of time if you have to review many documents regularly.

It also helps you verify that your content is original before you push it out to the world.

Before picking one of those Google Docs plagiarism checkers, download a few to test their performance.

Plagiarism can destroy the trust you’ve worked hard for over many years. But plagiarism checkers can prevent this serious issue.

Try these tools and let me know what you think.

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