Writing, emails & letters
Writing or editing documents, texts and emails is the most common thing UK adults use generative AI for, named by 58.4% of users in the government's public attitudes survey. The tools here sit inside a keyboard, browser or phone and fix or reword text where it is typed, rather than in a separate chatbot. Several of the best-known ones had a rough 2026, with Grammarly and SwiftKey users complaining that AI-first redesigns made basic corrections worse.
Updated monthly.
Kenning's picks
Ranked by Kenning score out of 25. Tools scoring 12 or less are marked not recommended.
Apple Writing Tools (Write with Siri)
Apple's writing help costs nothing on a supported device and works in most apps where text can be typed, processing on the phone or on Apple's servers without storing the text. In iOS 27 (September 2026) Apple swapped the old Proofread and Rewrite buttons for a 'Write with Siri' box, and user reviews is full of people who can't find the tools or miss the old version. It needs an iPhone 15 Pro or newer and up to 8GB of free space.
Best for iPhone and Mac owners who want a quick proofread of an email without installing anything
QuillBot
QuillBot is best at rewording a clumsy sentence, and its grammar checker is free and less pushy than Grammarly's. The paid plan costs £99.99 a year in the App Store, or £19.99 on a monthly plan. Students should know that reworded text still gets flagged by AI detectors, and user reviews is full of people who found that out after submitting.
Best for Rewording awkward sentences and quick free grammar checks
Wispr Flow
Wispr Flow removes the ums, fixes punctuation and handles mid-sentence corrections, so dictated emails need far less tidying than with built-in phone dictation. It runs only in the cloud, the free plan stops at 1,000 words a week on a phone, and Pro is £15 a month. Wispr raised $280 million in August 2026, while some paying users in user reviews say quality slipped this summer.
Best for People who hate typing long messages on a small keyboard
Grammarly
Grammarly catches typos and missing commas reliably, and the free plan does that part without paying. PCMag gave it 4 out of 5 in January 2026 but found its AI writing bland and, in one test, it invented books a scholar never wrote. Long-time users in user reviews say 2026 updates made the suggestions worse, and Trustpilot reviews keep returning to unexpected renewals.
Best for Catching typos in emails, forms and messages without copying text into another app
Proton Mail (Proton Scribe)
Proton Mail is a well-made private inbox with a usable free plan, good organisation tools and apps for every main platform. Proton Scribe is the compromise. It can draft, proofread and change the length or tone of an email without training on it, but it is not in the iPhone or Android apps, and recent users call its output generic. Its local mode is unusually private but needs a capable computer. Lumo is Proton's separate private AI chat app, not a Mail feature.
Best for People moving away from Gmail who want private email and occasional AI help on a computer
Microsoft SwiftKey
SwiftKey is free with no paid tier, and its Copilot button can rewrite a message in four tones once a Microsoft account is signed in. Reviewers still rate its swipe typing and clipboard highly. Long-time users in user reviews say predictions and autocorrect have got worse since 2025, and Android Authority found the AI extras easy to switch off and not much use.
Best for Android or iPhone users who want tone rewrites inside the keyboard at no cost
More tools
Canyon
Job-hunting helper that writes CVs and cover letters, tracks applications and runs mock interviews.
Fixkey
Mac app that fixes typos, rewrites and translates text, or types up speech, in any app with one shortcut.
Gboard
Google's free keyboard with voice typing and translation; AI writing is a small part of it.
Gmail (with Gemini)
Google's email app now summarises long threads, drafts replies and answers questions about old emails using Gemini.
Google AI Edge Eloquent
A free iPhone dictation app from Google that turns rambling speech into clean text, working offline on the phone.
Hemingway Editor
Highlights long sentences and passive voice to make writing easier to read.
HyperWrite
A writing assistant and Chrome extension that drafts text with sources and can carry out simple browser tasks.
LanguageTool
Multilingual grammar and style checker; its browser extension became Premium-only in 2026.
Olovka
An AI essay writer that drafts essays with citations and helps students plan and edit them.
Originality.ai
Checks whether a piece of text was likely written by AI, and flags copied passages.
ProWritingAid
Detailed style reports for novelists and long-form writers, built by a London company.
Spiral
A writing assistant that studies samples of a person's own writing, then drafts posts, emails and essays in that style.
Strut
An AI writing workspace that turns rough notes into essays, reports and book drafts
Sudowrite
AI help for fiction writers, covering brainstorming, drafting and describing scenes.
Superhuman Mail
Fast email app with AI drafting, now sold inside Superhuman's Business plan.
Superwhisper
Dictation app that can run offline on Apple Silicon Macs, a more private rival to Wispr Flow.
TypeAI
AI keyboard that writes and rewrites messages inside any app.
Willow
A dictation app that turns speech into clean written text inside any app on a phone or computer.
Wordtune
Rewrites sentences in different tones, with a phone keyboard; from AI21 Labs.