Software & Apps > Google Apps How to Use Google Docs Spell Check Spelling and grammar correction from single words to entire documents By Tim Fisher Tim Fisher Facebook Twitter Senior Vice President & Group General Manager, Tech & Sustainability Emporia State University Tim Fisher has more than 30 years' of professional technology experience. He's been writing about tech for more than two decades and serves as the SVP and General Manager of Lifewire. lifewire's editorial guidelines Updated on November 15, 2021 Reviewed by Ryan Perian Reviewed by Ryan Perian Western Governors University Ryan Perian is a certified IT specialist who holds numerous IT certifications and has 12+ years' experience working in the IT industry support and management positions. lifewire's editorial guidelines Tweet Share Email Tweet Share Email Google Apps Docs Sheets Slides What to Know Go to Tools > Spelling and grammar > Show spelling suggestions. They appear as red or blue text.For longer docs, go to Tools > Spelling and grammar > Spelling and grammar check.Choose Accept or Ignore for each suggestion. Or use the arrows to move on. This article covers how to turn on Google's spelling and grammar checker on the Google Docs desktop site for all operating systems and the mobile app for Android. The app for iOS and iPadOS can’t check for grammatical errors or misspellings, but you will get basic suggestions if you set up your iPad keyboard correctly. How to Use the Desktop Google Docs Spell Check Google Docs uses colored squiggly lines when something is misspelled (red) or needs an edit for grammar (blue). One way to use the spelling and grammar checker is to get suggestions automatically as you type. Automatic Spell Check Here's how to turn on automatic spell check and grammar check. Go to Tools > Spelling and grammar. Select Show spelling suggestions and/or Show grammar suggestions. Return to the document and left-click or right-click one of the suggestions to see what Google Docs recommends as a fix, and then select it to accept the suggestion. You can ignore recommendations by selecting X. If this is happening a lot for the same word, but you don’t want to change the spelling, add it to your personal dictionary. See the steps at the bottom of this page for help. Click-Through Wizard The other method is to use a click-through wizard, a better way to use the Google Docs spell checker if you’re working in a multi-page document. Put the cursor wherever you want to start the spell check. If you’re looking through the whole document, make sure you’ve selected the very top left position before any words. Go to Tools > Spelling and grammar > Spelling and grammar check. Choose Accept or Ignore for the first suggestion to move to the next one, or use the arrows to jump to a different instance. As handy as spelling and grammar checks are, they're not flawless. If several words are missing in a sentence, for example, and Google Docs can’t suggest a fix, it might not tell you that something is wrong even though it’s an incoherent sentence. Continue until you’ve corrected or ignored all of the suggested changes. How to Spell Check Google Docs in the Mobile App Grammar and spell checks are available through the Google Docs app for Android as well: Tap the edit/pencil icon. Select where you want the spell check to start. Use the three-dotted menu at the top right to choose Spellcheck. Note that this includes the grammar check tool as well. The new window at the bottom of the screen is used to Change or Ignore the suggestions. Select the checkmark at the top left to save and exit the editing mode. Use Your Personal Dictionary to Edit How Spell Check Works Spell check can quickly become annoying if it repeatedly reports a bad spelling for a word that you’re intentionally spelling that way. Equally, there may be words that you’re sure are spelled wrong, but Google Docs doesn’t tell you about them. The solution here, in both cases, is to make the necessary change to your dictionary. It's available through the desktop site only. On the replacement suggestion, select the three-dotted button on the bottom right, and then choose Add to personal dictionary. To remove words from this list so that they’ll once again be seen as wrong, select View personal dictionary and then choose the trash icon next to the word. The 5 Best Spelling and Grammar Check Apps of 2023 Was this page helpful? Thanks for letting us know! Get the Latest Tech News Delivered Every Day Subscribe Tell us why! Other Not enough details Hard to understand Submit