How it works
The Raygor estimate (1977) is similar to Fry but counts long words (6+ letters) instead of syllables — easier to do by hand or in code.
It plots sentences-per-100-words against long-words-per-100-words to estimate a grade level.
Readability scores
Raygor Readability Graph Calculator
A visual readability estimator that uses letter counts instead of syllables. Useful when syllable counting is unreliable.
Built and maintained by Paul Clark, Redmoon Software · Last verified · Sources
When to use this
Use Raygor when you want a Fry-style graph but cannot rely on syllable counts — for example, when working with scanned text, OCR output, or text containing many proper nouns where syllable counting is unreliable.
How it compares
Raygor is to Fry what Coleman–Liau is to Flesch–Kincaid: a long-word/character-based shortcut around syllable counting. Faster, slightly less accurate.
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FAQs
How is Raygor different from Fry?
Raygor uses "long words" (6+ letters) instead of syllables. This eliminates the syllable-counting step but loses some accuracy.
How do I read the Raygor graph?
Plot the average number of sentences per 100 words on one axis and the average number of letters per 100 words on the other. The point where they cross falls inside a numbered zone that estimates the grade level, and points outside the plotted curve indicate the sample is too inconsistent to score reliably.
How many samples should I take for Raygor?
Take at least three 100-word passages from the beginning, middle, and end of the text, then average them. A single passage can be skewed by an unusually short or long stretch of writing.
Why use letters instead of syllables?
Letters can be counted by software or by hand with far less ambiguity than syllables, which require pronunciation judgments. This makes Raygor faster and more consistent across different people scoring the same text.
Worked example
Input
~100-word passage of business writing.
Output
Raygor plot: ~5 sentences / 100 words, ~30 long words / 100 words → Grade 12.
Raygor counts words with 6+ letters instead of syllables. Business writing typically lands grade 10–14 on the Raygor graph.
Common pitfalls
- Equates long words with hard words; many 6+ letter words (e.g., "however", "between") are perfectly easy.
- Like Fry, requires multiple samples for stability.
- Less validated than Fry; primarily a research tool today.
- Capped grade range; very dense academic text plots off-chart.
Fry's method with long words instead of syllables
The Raygor Estimate Graph, published by Alton Raygor in 1977, is structurally the same idea as Fry: plot two measurements from 100-word samples and read a grade level off a region. The substitution is that Raygor counts words of six or more letters rather than syllables.
That makes it faster to do by hand and, more importantly here, immune to syllable-counting error. Where Fry and Raygor disagree noticeably on the same text, the syllable heuristic is usually the reason, and Raygor is the more defensible of the two on names and unusual vocabulary.
Like Fry, it has regions outside the plotted bands where no grade estimate is meaningful, and for the same reason.
Where these numbers come from
The method behind this tool, so you can check it rather than take it on trust.
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Raygor, A.L. (1977). “The Raygor Readability Estimate: A Quick and Easy Way to Determine Difficulty.” National Reading Conference Yearbook.
A Fry-style graph that substitutes long-word counts for syllable counts.
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