Why Contracts Are Hard to Read, Measured
Contracts are hard to read, and the difficulty is measurable. Running a clause through a readability score puts a number on something most people only experience as a headache.
Two standard measures
The plain language scorer computes Flesch Reading Ease and the Flesch–Kincaid Grade Level, both from the same two inputs: average sentence length and average syllables per word.
Reading Ease runs from roughly 0 to 100, with higher meaning easier, and can go outside that range in extreme cases. Grade Level estimates the years of schooling a reader would need. Neither knows anything about meaning — they measure the shape of the prose, not whether it makes sense.
What legalese scores
Take a genuine indemnity sentence: fifty-one words, one sentence, ninety-seven syllables, opening with “Notwithstanding anything herein to the contrary” and running through “pursuant”, “aforementioned”, “forthwith” and “indemnify”.
It scores −5.8 on Reading Ease — below zero — and a grade level of 26.7. There is no such thing as twenty-seventh grade; the formula has simply run off the end of its useful range, which is itself informative.
The same promise, in plain words
“If we cause a problem, we will pay for it. Tell us in writing. We will cover your costs.”
Nineteen words, three sentences: Reading Ease 102.4, grade level 0.5. That is a swing of over a hundred points, and the meaning has not changed. What changed is sentence length — from fifty-one words to about six — and word length.
Sentence length does most of the work
Both formulas are dominated by average sentence length, and legal drafting has a structural tendency toward very long sentences: conditions, exceptions and definitions all get folded into a single period-free construction so that nothing can be read in isolation.
That instinct is not unreasonable — an exception in a separate sentence can be argued to apply differently — but it is the single biggest contributor to unreadability, and splitting sentences is usually the cheapest available improvement.
The legalese counter is a separate signal
Alongside the scores, the tool counts terms from a fixed list of archaisms: heretofore, hereinafter, aforesaid, whereas, pursuant, notwithstanding, whereby, forthwith and others. The indemnity sentence contains six.
Almost none of these carry meaning that a plain word cannot. “Pursuant to” is “under”. “Forthwith” is “immediately”, or better, a stated number of days. They survive by habit rather than by necessity.
What a good score does not prove
An important limit: readability is not accuracy. A clause can score beautifully and be legally wrong, ambiguous, or missing something essential. The tool estimates syllables heuristically and has no idea what the words are doing.
Use it to find the clauses worth rewriting and to check that a rewrite actually reads better. Do not use it to conclude that a document is sound — that judgement requires someone who understands what it is supposed to do.