Shorten text
Shortening compresses a passage while keeping what it needs to say. It is the most reliable thing the paragraph assistant does, because deciding what to remove is easier than deciding what to invent.
See Write and revise a paragraph in the visual editor for the dialog.
How to run it
- Put the passage in the editor.
- Select Write with AI.
- Choose Rewrite current content with other words.
- Set Word Count to the target length.
- Prompt with what must survive.
- Estimate, confirm, review.
The result replaces the editor content. Keep a copy of the original if the passage is important.
The word count does the work
Unlike expansion, shortening responds well to the number alone. Setting a target of 120 words on a 300-word passage produces a genuine compression.
Useful targets:
- Two-thirds — removes padding, keeps everything of substance.
- Half — forces real choices; expect one supporting point to go.
- A third or less — becomes a summary rather than a shorter version of the passage.
Know which of the three you want before you set the number.
Say what must survive
The risk in shortening is losing something load-bearing. Protect it explicitly:
| Priority | Prompt |
|---|---|
| Facts above all | Keep every figure, date and product name; cut the commentary |
| One key message | Preserve the point about delivery times; compress everything else |
| Structure | Keep it as three short paragraphs, one per point |
| Legal wording | Do not alter the wording of the guarantee sentence |
| Calls to action | Keep the call to action exactly as written |
Where shortening pays off most
Introductions. Generated openings almost always contain two sentences of throat-clearing before the first real statement.
Meta descriptions and excerpts. A hard length constraint with a clear message is the ideal case for this tool.
Section endings. Generated sections tend to close with a summary of themselves. Compressing an ending usually means deleting it.
Long-form drafts. After generating an article, shortening the weakest two or three sections improves the whole piece more than expanding the good ones.
Home page copy. Where every extra sentence pushes the important one below the fold.
What to check afterwards
Qualifiers. Compression eats hedges. "Usually ships within three days" becoming "ships within three days" converts an accurate description into a promise. This is the most common and most consequential shortening error.
Conditions. "For orders over €50" and "in mainland Spain" are exactly the kind of clause a compressor treats as removable.
Negations. A dropped "not" reverses a sentence and reads perfectly well.
The point itself. Occasionally the compression keeps the supporting detail and loses the conclusion.
Read the shortened version against the original specifically for these four, in that order.
Shortening versus cutting by hand
For a paragraph, manual editing is often faster and always free. The tool earns its cost when:
- the passage is long enough that manual compression is tedious;
- you want a genuinely different structure, not just fewer words;
- you need several alternatives at a target length to choose between;
- the text is not yours and you have no strong view about what to keep.
When not to shorten
- Anything with approved wording: legal notices, warranties, safety and compliance text.
- Structured content where each element has a required field or format.
- A passage that is already tight. Compressing good writing produces telegraphic writing.
- Content that is short because it is incomplete. That needs expanding or rethinking, not compressing.
Iterating
If the first attempt cut the wrong thing, do not shorten the shortened version — that compounds the loss. Restore the original and run again with a prompt that protects what disappeared.