Do Paperpal and Writefull both work in Overleaf?

Yes. Writefull works inside Overleaf and checks the LaTeX source directly. Paperpal reaches Overleaf through its Chrome and Edge extensions.

Which one adds citations?

Paperpal, through Research and Cite. Writefull doesn't add citations; Writefull Cite only flags sentences that look like they need one, for institutions.

How much is Writefull Premium?

US$21 a month on monthly billing or US$150 a year on annual billing. Paperpal's Prime and Pro carry regional prices you'll only see on its pricing page.

Is there a plan for a research group?

Writefull has one: Group is US$285 a year for two seats as shown, for up to 100 users, billed annually only, and institutions can get a quote. Nothing on this page describes a group plan from Paperpal.

Does Writefull keep my text?

Your text isn't stored or used to train its AI, Writefull says, and it asks for consent before sending anything to third-party AI services.

Compare

Paperpal vs Writefull: which academic editor should you use?

Pick Writefull if you live in LaTeX and care where your text goes. Pick Paperpal if you want everything around the language too: source search, citations and plagiarism checks.

On the core job they overlap. Both edit academic English with models built on scholarly writing, and both work in Microsoft Word and in Overleaf. The differences are in what surrounds that core, and in how much each tells you before you pay.

Prices and features checked on October 16, 2026.

At a glance

Writing assistants help you write; essay generators write the essay for you.

Summary comparison of every product on this page
Product	Type	Paid from	Free tier	Citations	Ghostwriting
Paperpal	Writing assistant	See pricing page	Yes	Your sources, or papers it finds for you	Drafts text when asked
Writefull	Writing assistant	US$21/month	Yes	Does not cite	Drafts text when asked

The Paperpal editor, signed in, on Paperpal's own “Tips & Tricks” sample document, with the Grammar panel suggesting three rewrites in one sentence and Accept all and Reject all buttons. — Paperpal editor on its built-in sample document, signed in to a free account.

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Writefull's Academizer: the informal sentence “The results of this study are pretty good, and so other fields should also use them.” beside three more formal rewrites. — Writefull Academizer run on its own example sentence, signed out (the Word and Overleaf tools need an account).

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The editing itself

Writefull trains its language models on published papers and tailors them to academic prose. Open it in Overleaf and it checks the LaTeX source itself, and it can write LaTeX tables and equations. People working in LaTeX appreciate that, and one user's informal grammar test put it level with Grammarly.

Paperpal's grammar and tone engine is trained on scholarly edits, and 30+ pre-submission checks measure your text against journal language and formatting standards. It reaches Overleaf and Google Docs through Chrome and Edge extensions, and Word through an add-in.

Both draw sceptics. In one thread, researchers found Writefull's suggestions wrong or intrusive, from correcting maths as prose to imposing a serial comma on British English. On r/research, commenters asked about Paperpal warned that AI editing can blur what you meant.

Citations: search or nothing

Here Paperpal pulls clear. Research and Cite gives it a search across 250M+ research articles, insight extraction from PDFs and citations in 10,000+ styles, and it can cite your own uploaded references and PDFs. Writefull has nothing to set against that.

Sources are simply outside Writefull's remit: it doesn't find, manage or format them. Writefull Cite flags sentences that need a citation but have none, and it's sold to institutions only. With Writefull, you'll still need a reference manager.

Drafting on the side

Neither is purely an editor. Paperpal advertises drafting grounded in your sources, and its paraphraser reworks sentences. Writefull's Abstract Generator drafts an abstract from your paper, its Title Generator and Ask AI produce text when asked, and the site now promotes a separate Papers AI product to “Draft the whole manuscript”.

Both put drafting a click away even on the free plans. Writefull's free quota covers its title and abstract generators, and Paperpal's free plan includes five uses a day of its AI writing tools. If your course bans AI-generated text, those are the buttons to leave alone.

Checks and privacy

Paperpal includes plagiarism checks against 99B+ sources and AI detection, from lite reports on the free plan to unlimited AI detection on Pro. Those detection checks get praise on Trustpilot, though Paperpal invited most of the reviewers. Nothing on this page describes plagiarism or AI checks in Writefull.

Writefull, for its part, says it never stores your text or uses it to train its AI, and asks your consent before sending text to third-party AI services. If you're editing unpublished results, that statement counts.

Knowing what you'll pay

Writefull lays it out. Premium is US$21 a month billed monthly or US$150 a year billed annually, for unlimited use under fair use. A Group plan is US$285 a year for two seats as shown, for up to 100 users. The free plan is a limited quota of each feature, and some users hit the daily quota quickly; others report charges after cancelling.

Paperpal doesn't show its prices until the pricing page loads them for your region, which makes comparing in advance hard. Prime and Pro are billed monthly or annually. The free plan needs no credit card and covers 200 grammar edits a month, plus five uses a day of the AI writing tools, five of research Q&A, and chat with five files a month.

What the paid tiers buy is at least spelled out. On Prime you get 500 monthly uses of paraphrase, trim, translate and AI review, 20k grammar edits, 25k words of AI detection and 10k words of plagiarism and reference checks. Pro lifts grammar edits and AI detection to unlimited and gives 30k words of plagiarism and reference checks.

Which should you choose?

Choose Paperpal if you want language editing plus a citation search, plagiarism checks and AI detection, in Word, Google Docs or Overleaf. Start on the free plan and check your regional price.

Choose Writefull if you write in LaTeX, want language edits trained on published papers, and value a stated no-storage policy and prices it actually publishes.

Maybe your phrasing is fine and it's the structure of the argument that worries you. Then look at EthiWrite, the tool we build. Examiner Mode flags unsupported claims and structural gaps and has no ability to rewrite your text. Its paper search covers only OpenAlex, not a commercial database.

FAQ

Do Paperpal and Writefull both work in Overleaf?: Yes. Writefull works inside Overleaf and checks the LaTeX source directly. Paperpal reaches Overleaf through its Chrome and Edge extensions.
Which one adds citations?: Paperpal, through Research and Cite. Writefull doesn't add citations; Writefull Cite only flags sentences that look like they need one, for institutions.
How much is Writefull Premium?: US$21 a month on monthly billing or US$150 a year on annual billing. Paperpal's Prime and Pro carry regional prices you'll only see on its pricing page.
Is there a plan for a research group?: Writefull has one: Group is US$285 a year for two seats as shown, for up to 100 users, billed annually only, and institutions can get a quote. Nothing on this page describes a group plan from Paperpal.
Does Writefull keep my text?: Your text isn't stored or used to train its AI, Writefull says, and it asks for consent before sending anything to third-party AI services.

Try EthiWrite free