{"id":3700,"date":"2016-07-12T00:00:51","date_gmt":"2016-07-12T07:00:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/?p=3700"},"modified":"2016-08-15T16:12:11","modified_gmt":"2016-08-15T23:12:11","slug":"toefl-tuesday-can-toefl-essay-long","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/toefl-tuesday-can-toefl-essay-long\/","title":{"rendered":"TOEFL Tuesday: Can a TOEFL Essay Be Too Long?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>How much is too much? Everybody knows that writing an essay that\u2019s too short is a problem. But sometimes, students ask about the maximum essay length, thinking that either the graders will take off points or that the essay will simply be cut off, not able to continue.<\/p>\n<p>But I can say in short, there is no maximum. You can write an enormous essay and get a perfect score.<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"TOEFL Tuesday: Can my essay be too long?\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/gyDDTWeLtZk?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h2>Official recommendations from ETS<\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">ETS (the company that makes the TOEFL) gives specific numbers for essay length in all their preparation material and during the actual test. \u00a0The recommendations are simple:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><b>Integrated essay<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">: 150 &#8211; 225 words<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><b>Independent essay<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">: 300 words<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">These aren\u2019t maximum scores, nor are they minimums. But to be honest, an essay that\u2019s shorter than these recommended lengths may not get a perfect score. Usually, top scoring essays are longer.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Still, writing much more does not mean a higher score.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2>Quantity and quality<\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There\u2019s a clear reason why shorter essays might have lower scores\u2014they don\u2019t have enough room to include details. That means the essay is not just shorter, but also lower quality. A longer essay gives enough room to add those important details.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Still, a long essay can cause a problem. Imagine trying to write 1000 words in 30 minutes for the independent essay. How much will you be able to focus on grammar, vocabulary, structure, and clarity? Not much. The more you write, the less attention you can pay to each word and sentence. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In other words, it\u2019s possible to write too much, but only because you\u2019re not focusing on the more important aspects of your essay. \u00a0It\u2019s possible to write a 1000 word essay and get a perfect score, but I don\u2019t recommend trying it. It\u2019s much easier to write a 400 or 500 word essay with a perfect score.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So first, try to reach the recommended lengths from ETS. If you can write more, that\u2019s best. But don\u2019t worry about writing two times the recommended length\u2014it\u2019s better to focus on quality at that point, not quantity.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>How much is too much? Everybody knows that writing an essay that\u2019s too short is a problem. But sometimes, students ask about the maximum essay length, thinking that either the graders will take off points or that the essay will simply be cut off, not able to continue. But I can say in short, there [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":42,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13619],"tags":[13621],"ppma_author":[13628],"class_list":["post-3700","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-writing","tag-video"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v21.7 (Yoast SEO v21.7) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>TOEFL Tuesday: Can a TOEFL Essay Be Too Long? - Magoosh Blog \u2013 TOEFL\u00ae\ufe0f Test<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/magoosh.com\/toefl\/toefl-tuesday-can-toefl-essay-long\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"TOEFL Tuesday: Can a TOEFL Essay Be Too Long?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"How much is too much? Everybody knows that writing an essay that\u2019s too short is a problem. But sometimes, students ask about the maximum essay length, thinking that either the graders will take off points or that the essay will simply be cut off, not able to continue. 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