Readability check

Run a readability audit on a blog post draft or other multi-paragraph prose. Use when the user asks to check readability ("check readability", "readability pass", "is this readable"), or proactively after a substantial draft is complete — as a second pass after the blog-drafting skill's critical read, not during active drafting.

For short strings — page titles, meta descriptions, schema description fields, FAQ answers, profile bios, repo taglines — use the metadata-check skill. Flesch scoring and the ten-category rubric below don't fit a 5–30 word string and will mislead.

For whether a post earns a ranking — search intent fit, keyphrase placement, E-E-A-T, internal linking — chain into the content-seo skill after this audit. Readability is a prerequisite for ranking, not a substitute.

Audience calibration

Always assume the reader reads English as a second language. That's the default, not a fallback.

In technical posts, the technical sections can use domain terms the audience expects — but any non-technical paragraph (introduction, context, conclusion, transitions, examples, analogies) must be readable by a non-technical L2 reader. Setup and motivation paragraphs carry the post for readers who don't know the domain yet; they're where you lose people.

Conversational beats formal. Posts that address the reader directly ("you", "your") and occasionally ask them a question hold L2 readers far better than impersonal prose. Flag long stretches of detached, third-person register in non-technical sections.

How readers actually read

Readers scan before they commit. They look at the headings, the first paragraph, and the first sentence of each paragraph, and decide from those alone whether to read on. Search engines and AI systems weight the same elements when working out what a text is about. That's why the audit leans hard on those three places: a post whose headings and first sentences carry the argument works for scanners, full readers, and machines at once.