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Identify the important ideas and facts

To help you summarize and analyze your argumentative texts , your articles, your scientific texts, your history texts as well as your well-structured analyses work of art, Resoomer provides you with a "Summary text tool" : an educational tool that identifies and summarizes the important ideas and facts of your documents. Summarize in 1-Click, go to the main idea or skim through so that you can then interpret your texts quickly and develop your syntheses .

Who is Resoomer for ?

College students.

With Resoomer, summarize your Wikipedia pages in a matter of seconds for your productivity.

Identify the most important ideas and arguments of your texts so that you can prepare your lessons.

JOURNALISTS

If you prefer simplified information that summarizes the major events, then Resoomer is for you !

Identify and understand very fast the facts and the ideas of your texts that are part of the current news and events.

PRESS RELEASES

With the help of Resoomer, go to the main idea of your articles to write your arguments and critiques .

Save time, summarize your digital documents for a relevant and fast uptake of information.

Need to summarize your books' presentations ? Identify the arguments in a matter of seconds.

Too many documents ? Simplify your readings with Resoomer like a desktop tool.

Need to summarize your chapters ? With Resoomer, go to the heart of your ideas.

Identify your books' or your authors' ideas quickly. Summarize the most important main points.

From now on, create quick summaries of your artists' presentation and their artworks .

INSTITUTIONS

Identify the most important passages in texts that contains a lot of words for detailed analyses .

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SUMMARIZE YOUR ONLINE ARTICLES IN 1-CLICK

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Surf online and save time when reading on internet ! Resoomer summarizes your articles in 500 words so that you can go to the main idea of your text.

HOW DOES RESOOMER WORK ?

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• Summary and synthesis: the difference?
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Summarize any | in a click.

TLDR This helps you summarize any piece of text into concise, easy to digest content so you can free yourself from information overload.

Enter an Article URL or paste your Text

Browser extensions.

Use TLDR This browser extensions to summarize any webpage in a click.

Single platform, endless summaries

Transforming information overload into manageable insights — consistently striving for clarity.

100% Automatic Article Summarization with just a click

In the sheer amount of information that bombards Internet users from all sides, hardly anyone wants to devote their valuable time to reading long texts. TLDR This's clever AI analyzes any piece of text and summarizes it automatically, in a way that makes it easy for you to read, understand and act on.

Article Metadata Extraction

TLDR This, the online article summarizer tool, not only condenses lengthy articles into shorter, digestible content, but it also automatically extracts essential metadata such as author and date information, related images, and the title. Additionally, it estimates the reading time for news articles and blog posts, ensuring you have all the necessary information consolidated in one place for efficient reading.

• Automated author-date extraction
• Related images consolidation
• Instant reading time estimation

Distraction and ad-free reading

As an efficient article summarizer tool, TLDR This meticulously eliminates ads, popups, graphics, and other online distractions, providing you with a clean, uncluttered reading experience. Moreover, it enhances your focus and comprehension by presenting the essential content in a concise and straightforward manner, thus transforming the way you consume information online.

Avoid the Clickbait Trap

TLDR This smartly selects the most relevant points from a text, filtering out weak arguments and baseless speculation. It allows for quick comprehension of the essence, without needing to sift through all paragraphs. By focusing on core substance and disregarding fluff, it enhances efficiency in consuming information, freeing more time for valuable content.

• Filters weak arguments and speculation
• Highlights most relevant points
• Saves time by eliminating fluff

Who is TLDR This for?

TLDR This is a summarizing tool designed for students, writers, teachers, institutions, journalists, and any internet user who needs to quickly understand the essence of lengthy content.

Anyone with access to the Internet

TLDR This is for anyone who just needs to get the gist of a long article. You can read this summary, then go read the original article if you want to.

TLDR This is for students studying for exams, who are overwhelmed by information overload. This tool will help them summarize information into a concise, easy to digest piece of text.

TLDR This is for anyone who writes frequently, and wants to quickly summarize their articles for easier writing and easier reading.

TLDR This is for teachers who want to summarize a long document or chapter for their students.

Institutions

TLDR This is for corporations and institutions who want to condense a piece of content into a summary that is easy to digest for their employees/students.

Journalists

TLDR This is for journalists who need to summarize a long article for their newspaper or magazine.

Featured by the world's best websites

Our platform has been recognized and utilized by top-tier websites across the globe, solidifying our reputation for excellence and reliability in the digital world.

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Best Summarizing Tool for Academic Texts

• Custom writing
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⚙️ 11 Best Summarizing Tools

• 🤔 How to Summarize an Article without Plagiarizing?
• 📝 How to Proofread Your Summary?

⭐ Best Summarizing Tool: the Benefits

🔗 references, ✅ 11 best summary generators to consider.

We’re here to offer the whole list of text summarizers in this article. Every tool has a strong algorithm so you won’t have to proofread a lot in order to make the summary look hand-written. The usage of such websites can be productive for your studying as long as you can focus on more important tasks and leave this routine work to online tools.

In this blog post, you’ll also find tips on successful summarizing and proofreading. These are basic skills that you will need for many assignments. To summarize text better, you’ll need to read it critically, spot the main idea, underline the essential points, and so on. As for proofreading, this skill is useful not only to students but also to professional writers.

To summarize a text, a paragraph or even an essay, you can find a lot of tools online. Here we’ll list some of these, including those that allow choose the percent of similarity and define the length of the text you’ll get.

If you’re asked to summarize some article or paragraph in your own words, one of these summary makers can become significant for getting fast results. Their user-friendly design and accurate algorithms play an important role in the summary development.

1. Summarize Bot

Summarize Bot is an easy-to-use and ad-free software for fast and accurate summary creation in our list. With its help, you can save your time for research by compressing texts. The summary maker shows the reading time, which it saves for you, and other useful statistics. To summarize any text, you should only send the message in Facebook or add the bot to Slack. The app works with various file types: including PDF, mp3, DOC, TXT, jpg, etc., and supports almost every language.

The only drawback is the absence of web version. If you don’t have a Facebook account and don’t want to install Slack, you won’t be able to enjoy this app’s features.

SMMRY has everything you need for a perfect summary—easy to use design, lots of features, and advanced settings (URL usage). If you look for a web service that changes the wording, this one would never disappoint you.

SMMRY allows you to summarize the text not only by copy-pasting but also with the file uploading or URL inserting. The last one is especially interesting. With this option, you don’t have to edit an article in any way. Just put the URL into the field and get the result. The tool is ad-free and doesn’t require registration.

Jasper is an AI-powered summary generator. It creates unique, plagiarism-free summaries, so it’s a perfect option for those who don’t want to change the wording on their own.

When using this tool, you can summarize a text of up to 12,000 characters (roughly 2,000-3,000 words) in more than 30 languages. Although Jasper doesn’t have a free plan, it offers a 7-day free trial to let you see whether this tool meets your needs.

4. Quillbot

Quillbot offers many tools for students and writers, and summarizer is one of them. With this tool, you can customize your summary length and choose between two modes: paragraph and key sentences. The former presents a summary as a coherent paragraph, while the latter gives you key ideas of the text in the form of bullet points.

What is great about Quillbot is that you can use it for free. However, there’s a limitation: you can only summarize a text of up to 1,200 words on a free plan. A premium plan extends this limit to 6,000 words. In addition, you don’t need to register to use Quillbot summarizer; just input your text and get the result.

5. TLDR This

TLDR This is a summary generator that can help you quickly summarize long text. You can paste your paper directly into the tool or provide it with a URL of the article you want to shorten.

With a free plan, you have unlimited attempts to summarize texts in the form of key sentences. TLDR This also provides advanced AI summaries, but you have only 10 of these on a free plan. To get more of them, you have to go premium, which starts at $4 per month.

HIX.AI summarizer is an AI-powered tool that can help you summarize texts of up to 10,000 characters. If you use Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge, HIX.AI has a convenient extension for you.

You can use the tool for free to check 1,000 words per week. Along with this, you get access to over 120 other AI-powered tools to help you with your writing tasks. These include essay checker, essay rewriter, essay topic generator, and many others. With a premium plan, which starts at $19.99 a month billed yearly, you also get access to GPT-4 and other advanced features.

7. Scholarcy

Scholarcy is one of the best tools for summarizing academic articles. It presents summaries in the form of flashcards, which can be downloaded as Word, PowerPoint, or Markdown files.

This tool has some outstanding features for students and researchers. For example, it creates a referenced summary, which makes it easier for you to cite the information correctly in your paper. In addition, it can find the references from the summarized article and provide you with open-access links to them. The tool can also extract tables and figures from the text and let you download them as Excel files.

Unregistered users can summarize one article per day. With a free registered account, you can make 3 summary flashcards a day. Moreover, Scholarcy offers free Chrome, Edge, and Firefox extensions that allow you to summarize short and medium-sized articles.

Frase is an AI-powered summary generator that is available for free. The tool can summarize texts of up to 600-700 words. Therefore, it’s good if you want to, say, summarize the main points of your short essay or blog post to write a conclusion. However, if you need summaries of long research articles, you should choose another option.

This summary generator allows you to adjust the level of creativity, meaning that you can generate original, plagiarism-free summaries. Frase also has lots of extra features for SEO and project management, which makes it a good option for website content creators.

9. Resoomer

Resoomer is another paraphrasing and summarizing tool that works with several languages. You’re free to use the app in English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish.

This online tool may be considered as one of the best text summarizers in IvyPanda ranking, because it allows performing many custom settings. For example, you can click to Manual and set the size of the summary (in percent or words). You can also set the number of keywords for the tool to focus on.

Among its drawbacks, we would mention that the software works only with argumentative texts and won’t reword other types correctly. Also, free version contains lots of ads and does not allow its users to import files. The premium subscription costs 4.90€ per month or 39.90€/year.

10. Summarizer

Summarizer is another good way to summarize any article you read online. This simple Chrome extension will provide you with a summary within a couple of clicks. Install the add-on, open the article or select the piece of text you want to summarize and click the button “Summarize”.

The software processes various texts in your browser, including long PDF articles. The result of summarizing has only 7% of the original article. This app is great for all who don’t want to read long publications. However, it doesn’t allow you to import file or download the result.

11. Summary Generator

The last article and essay Summary Generator in our list which can be helpful for your experience in college or university. This is free open software everyone can use.

The tool has only two buttons—one to summarize the document and the other to clear the field. With this software, you’ll get a brief summary based on your text. You don’t have to register there to get your document shortened.

Speaking about drawbacks of the website, we would mention too many ads and no options to summarize a URL or document, set up the length of the result and export it to the popular file types.

These were the best online summarizing tools to deal with the task effectively. We hope some of them became your favorite summarizers, and you’ll use them often in the future.

Not sure if a summarizer will work for your paper? Check out this short tutorial on how the text summarizing tool can come in handy for essay writing.

🤔 Techniques & Tools to Summarize without Plagiarizing

Of course, there are times when you can’t depend on online tools. For example, you may be restricted to use them in a class or maybe you have to highlight some specific paragraphs and customizing the tool’s settings would take more time and efforts than summary writing itself.

In this chapter, you’ll learn to summarize a long article, essay, research paper, report, or a book chapter with the help of helpful tips, a logical approach, and a little bit of creativity.

Here are some methods to let you create a fantastic summary.

• Know your goal. To choose the right route to your goal, you need to understand it perfectly. Why should you summarize the text? What is its style: scientific or publicistic? Who is the author? Where was the article published? There are many significant questions that can help to adapt your text better. Develop a short interview to use during the summary writing. Include all the important information on where you need to post the text and for what purpose.
• Thorough reading. To systemize your thoughts about the text, it’s significant to investigate it in detail. Read the text two or more times to grasp the basic ideas of the article and understand its goals and motives. Give yourself all the time you need to process the text. Often we need a couple of hours to extract the right results from the study or learn to paraphrase the text properly.
• Highlight the main idea. When writing a summary, you bear a responsibility for the author. Not only you have to extract the significant idea of the text but to paraphrase it correctly. It’s important not to misrepresent any of the author’s conclusions in your summary. That’s why you should find the main idea and make sure, you can paraphrase it without a loss of meaning. If possible, read a couple of professional reviews of a targeted book chapter or article. It can help you to analyze the text better.
• Mark the arguments. The process of summarizing is always easier if you have a marker to highlight important details in the text. If you don’t have a printed text, there’s always Microsoft Word to use a highlight tool on the paper. Try to mark all arguments, statistics, and facts in the text to represent them in your summary. This information will turn into key elements of the summary you’ll create, so keep attention on what you highlight exactly.
• Take care of plagiarism. Before you start writing, learn what percent of originality should you aim at. Various projects have different requirements. And they determine how many efforts you should put into writing to get a perfect summary your teacher will like. Depending on the percent of originality, build a plan for your short text. Allow yourself copy as much information as allowed to save your time.
• Build a structure. With the help of key elements, which you’ve highlighted in the text, it’s possible to create a powerful structure including all the interesting facts and arguments. Develop an outline according to a basic structure – introduction, body, and conclusion. Even if your summary is extremely short, the main idea should sound in both the first and last sentences.
• Write a draft. If you’re not a professional writer, it can be extremely difficult to develop a text with the correct word count on the first try. We advise you to develop a general text firstly – include all the information without controlling the number of sentences.
• Cut out the unnecessary parts. On this step, you should edit the draft and eliminate the unnecessary parts. Keep in mind, the number of sentences your summary must contain. Make sure the main point is fully represented in the text. You can cut out any sentence except those concluding the significant arguments.
• Wordiness – you should delete unnecessary words, which make it difficult to understand the text
• Common mistakes – mistakes made in academic papers are basically the same, so it’s helpful to have an article like this one when you’re proofreading
• Appropriate terminology – for each topic, there’s a list of the terminology you can use
• Facts and statistics – you can accidently write a wrong year or percent, make sure to avoid these mistakes
• Quotes – every quote should be written correctly and have a link to its source.

📝 How to Proofread the Summarized Text?

Now, when you know how to summarize an article, it’s time to edit your text whether it’s your own writing or a summary generator’s results.

In this chapter, you’ll see the basic ways to proofread any type of text: academic paper (essay, research paper, etc.), article, letter, book’s chapter, and so on.

• Proofread your summary. Are there times when you can’t remember an appropriate synonym? Then you should use Thesaurus and analogous services from time to time. They can expand your vocabulary a lot and help to find the right words even in the most challenging situations.
• Pay attention to easily confused words. It’s especially significant if you edit a nonfiction text – there’s a number of words people often confuse without even realizing. English Oxford Living Dictionaries have a list of these word pairs so you won’t miss any.
• Proofread one type of mistakes at a time. To edit a paper properly don’t split your attention to grammar and punctuation—this way you can miss dozens of mistakes. To get more accurate results, read the first time to edit the style, the second to eliminate grammar mistakes, and the third to proofread punctuation. Take as many times as you need to concentrate on each type.
• Take a rest from your paper. If you use an online summarizing tool, you can skip this step. But if you’ve been writing a paper for several hours and now trying to edit it without taking a break, it may be a bad idea. Why? Because without a fresh pair of eyes there’s a great possibility not to spot even obvious mistakes. Give yourself some time to slightly forget the text—go for a walk or call a friend, and then return to work as a new person.
• Hire a proofreader. If you need to get perfect results, think about hiring a professional. Skills and qualification, which they have, guarantee a perfect text without any mistakes or style issues. Once you find a proofreader, you can optimize your work perfectly. Search for specialists on freelance websites like UpWork — it’s comfortable and safe to use. Of course, there’s one flaw you should think about—hiring a pro is expensive. So, everyone should decide on their own whether they need to spend this money or not.
• Switch your paper with a friend. If you can’t afford a professional editor, there’s a less expensive option—ask a friend to look through your paper and proofread theirs in return. Make sure, you both make manual editing, not just check it with Microsoft Office or analogous software. Although there are great grammar tools, they still can’t spot many mistakes obvious to a human.
• Use grammar checking tools. We recommend you not to depend on multiple grammar tools. But the assistance it can offer is irreplaceable. Start your proofreading by scanning your text with Grammarly or an analogous tool. The service detects many types of errors including confusing words’ pairs, punctuation, misspellings, wordiness, incorrect word order, unfinished sentences, and so on. Of course, you should never correct the mistakes without thinking on every specific issue. Tools not only miss a lot of mistakes but they also can be wrong about your errors.
• Read aloud. It’s amazing how different the written text can sound when read aloud. If you practice this proofreading method, you know that many mistakes can be spotted if you actually pronounce the text. Why does it happen? People understand information better if they perceive it with the help of different senses. You can use this trick even in learning— memorize the materials with the help of reading, listening, and speaking.

These tips are developed to help students proofread their papers easily. We hope this chapter and the post itself create a helpful guide on how to summarize an article.

Here you found the best summarizing tools, which are accessible online and completely free, and learned to summarize various texts and articles on your own.

Updated: Dec 19th, 2023

• Summarizing: Academic Integrity at MIT
• 4 of the Best Online Summarizer Tools to Shorten Text: maketecheasier
• Summarizing: University of Toronto
• 5 Easy Summarizing Strategies for Students: ThoughtCo.
• Summarizing: Texas A&M University Writing Center
• Comparative Study of Text Summarization Methods: Semantic Scholar
• How to Write a Summary: UTEP
• How to Write a Summary: UW
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This page is for anyone interested in creating a summary for an essay or any other written work. It lists the best online summarizing tools and gives advice on how to summarize an article well. Finally, you'll find tips on how to properly proofread your summary.

Free Text Summariser

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Want to be 100% sure you’re not plagiarising?

Make your life easier with the free summariser tool.

Academic research

Speed up your academic research by extracting key points.

Every day use

Reduce your reading time by summarising long blocks of text within seconds.

Easily condense transcripts of long meetings into concise bullet points.

Difficult text

Simplify hard-to-read paragraphs, sentences or complete articles with 1 click.

Why use this summariser?

• 100% free: Generate unlimited summaries without paying a penny
• Accurate: Get a reliable and trustworthy summary of your original text without any errors
• No signup: Use it without giving up any personal data
• Secure: No summary data is stored, guaranteeing your privacy
• Speed: Get an accurate summary within seconds, thanks to AI
• Flexible: Adjust summary length to get more (or less) detailed summaries

How to use this summariser

1. insert, paste or download your text, 2. pick the way you want to summarise, 3. adjust your summary length, 4. get your summary in seconds.

2 ways of summarising your text

1. key sentences.

Extracts the key points of your text and turns them into digestible bullet points 

2. Concise paragraphs

Summarises your text in a concise paragraph

Summarise your text today

Want to make sure your summary doesn’t contain any plagiarism, ask our team.

Want to contact us directly? No problem. We are always here for you.

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Frequently asked questions

Yes, it can. The AI has been trained on a big dataset, so technical or complex data won’t be a problem for the text summariser .

The  text summariser  is accessible on both desktop and mobile.

This  text summariser  can condense long text within seconds.

At the moment, a maximum of 6,000 words can be summarised at once, within a few seconds. Want to summarise more? Just paste another block of text. There’s no limit on how much text you can summarise with our text summariser .

The  text summariser  can give you a longer or shorter summary, depending on your wishes. Want a more detailed summary? Just adjust the summary length at the top.

AI Summarizer

Get Premium for a 10,000-word limit.

Our Free Summarizing Tool Captures Your Key Points in a Flash

Wordvice AI's text summarizer instantly sums up lengthy content in articles, essays, papers, and other documents to their main points, saving you valuable time. Our free AI summarizer finds the key sentences of your text using natural language processing, identifying crucial content while retaining your original meaning and context. Capture your meaning in fewer words with our instant summarizing tool.

Key Features of Our Text Summarizer

What is a summarizing tool.

A summarizing tool is an advanced tool that allows you to take an article, paper, or document and condense it into the most important information instantly. These AI tools use advanced algorithms to locate central points and arguments in the text and create concise summaries. If you’re looking for an AI that summarizes articles, essays, papers, and other documents, then Wordvice AI has the best summary generator tools to identify the key points in any journal article, blog content, or essay without changing the original meaning of the work.

How does the AI Summarizer work?

Wordvice AI's summarize tool accurately captures the key points of any text. Whether you need to summarize an article or an entire book, Wordvice AI has you covered with our automated AI summary generator.

How to Use Wordvice AI's Summary Generator

Summarize any text using our free summarizing tool in a few simple steps.

Paste your text into the AI Summarizer tool

Click "summarize", all done a bullet-point summary of your text will appear in the text field, what document types can your tool summarize.

Summarizing with AI can be applied to nearly any kind of document. For best results, use excerpts of a few hundred words instead of long documents.

Combine Our Text Summarizer with Expert Editing

Although our summary generator is great at shortening your writing and capturing your intended meaning, it has limitations when it comes to preparing your important work for submission for publication. If you need revision by a professional editor, be sure to check out Wordvice’s proofreading services for the highest-quality language editing on the market. When combined with our powerful suite of AI revision tools, our expert editing services will ensure that your important work is polished and impactful.

Wordvice AI Summarizer FAQ

Here are some frequently asked questions about the Wordvice AI summarizing tool.

• What is the Wordvice AI Summary Generator? The AI Summarizer captures the main points of articles, essays, papers, and other documents with the click of a button. Identifying crucial points while removing unnecessary information, our free summarizing tool uses natural language processing to immediately condense any form of writing into bullet points while also preserving the original context and meaning.
• How do I use the online summarizing tool for free? Our text summarizer is free for anyone to use. Extract key points from any paragraph or longer text and generate a concise and accurate summary of your document. Simply enter the text you would like to summarize–the longer the text, the more useful the summary. Our free text summarizer creates a bulleted list of the main points or arguments in your text. Wordvice AI's summarizing software applies AI technology to process your text and create a bullet list summary that retains your overall meaning while cutting out unnecessary details. Big data allows our tools to create some of the most accurate and reliable AI revisions you will find online.
• Is the AI Summarizer free to use? Yes! The free AI Summarizer is completely free to use. No full registration or payment is required. Create a Wordvice AI account and get instant summarizing for your article, essay, email, or other document.
• What is the best AI document summarizer? Wordvice AI’s summarizing solution is the most accurate and sophisticated summarizer with AI available online. It uses AI-powered technology to identify and capture the crucial elements of your work. Our summary app condenses texts of any length or type into concise sentences, creating some of the most high-fidelity AI bullet-point lists you will find in any online AI revision tool.
• What’s the difference between the AI summarize tool and AI Paraphraser? While the AI Paraphrasing Tool changes the text at the level of the word and sentence to make your writing more original, the AI Summarizer extracts the main points of your input text and lists it in bullet-point form so the reader can see the important points, arguments, or ideas of your writing. Our summary website makes it quick and easy to reduce very long or difficult-to-understand passages to easy-to-comprehend points, saving the user time and increasing productivity.
• - AI Proofreader : proofread and edit your text with separate modes
• - AI Paraphrasing Tool : avoid plagiarism by rephrasing and restyling your text
• - AI Translator : accurate AI translation between multiple source and target languages
• - AI Plagiarism Checker : scan for copied text in billions of published documents

Summary Generator

Streamline large content into concise, SEO-friendly descriptions with our free AI text summarizer. Choose between a paragraph or bullet-point summary. Summarize large text in mere seconds.

Instructions

1. Choose the style & the length of your output using the drop-down menu.

2. Enter the text you want to summarize.

3. Click “Generate Summary”

4. Paste the generated summary in a document.

💡Pro Tip: Enhance your summaries with our 'Free AI Paraphrasing Tool' for unique and impactful content.

What is a Text Summarizer?

A text summarizer is an AI-powered software that condenses extensive texts into concise summaries without losing essential context or meaning. It extracts salient points from your text, enabling quicker comprehension of large volumes of information.

The tool saves time & effort and also enhances productivity & efficiency. It's perfect for professionals who need to digest vast amounts of data or students with a bulk of reading materials.

Benefits of Using a Text Summarizer Tool?

Enhances productivity.

Amplifies your efficiency by reducing the time spent on reading and understanding long-form content. Get the essence without losing precious time.

Improved Comprehension

Draws out core ideas, simplifies complex texts, and aids in better understanding, thus leading to informed decision-making.

SEO & Content Marketing

Condensed versions of your content make your webpages more search engine friendly, boosting SEO performance. You can generate summaries of large text on your web page and reuse as marketing copy on social media or email campaigns.

Summarizer Tool - Use Cases

Text summarizer tool constitutes an essential asset in modern information processing. It provides quick insights from lengthy texts, facilitates faster decision-making, and ensures audiences aren't overwhelmed with information.

1. In academia and research, these tools condense detailed articles into digestible summaries, aiding students and researchers.

2. Executives in business, media, and content creation can save time, understanding the heart of reports, emails, or news quickly.

3. Programmers and data analysts can swiftly summarize data reports or convey complex topics in crisp sentences.

Technology Behind Quattr's Text Summarizer

Quattr's summary generator tool leverages the latest AI technology, utilizing the same language models that power ChatGPT. This integration allows the tool to automatically distill extensive texts into concise summaries, effectively identifying key information and encapsulating the essence of the original text in a more concise format. Combining these advanced AI tools strengthens Quattr's ability to deliver clear, precise, and substantial text summaries.

How to Make the Most of the Text Summarizer Tool?

Ensure the text you provide is well-structured and free of grammatical errors. The more coherent the original text, the more understandable the summary will be. Consider the purpose of your summary and select the desired tone.

For example, if you are writing a summary for a business audience, you may want to choose a tool that produces more formal summaries.

Consider breaking it up into smaller sections when summarizing a long text, such as a research paper or news article. It will help the tool better understand each section's context and generate a more accurate summary.

Summarize Text & More With Content AI!

With just a few clicks, you can create a concise and engaging summary that will captivate your audience. Our user-friendly and intuitive tool makes it easy to get the desired results in no time! But wait, you're one step closer to a world of content excellence. It's easy, it's efficient, and it's tailored to your needs.

With Content AI, you can do more than just summarize text. You can also:

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2. Streamline your content production process

3. Gain a competitive edge in your industry

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Our summarizer excels at handling complex technical jargon. Its advanced algorithms dissect intricate content, producing concise, coherent summaries without missing crucial details.

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• Knowledge Base
• Working with sources
• How to Write a Summary | Guide & Examples

How to Write a Summary | Guide & Examples

Published on November 23, 2020 by Shona McCombes . Revised on May 31, 2023.

Summarizing , or writing a summary, means giving a concise overview of a text’s main points in your own words. A summary is always much shorter than the original text.

There are five key steps that can help you to write a summary:

• Read the text
• Break it down into sections
• Identify the key points in each section
• Write the summary
• Check the summary against the article

Writing a summary does not involve critiquing or evaluating the source . You should simply provide an accurate account of the most important information and ideas (without copying any text from the original).

Table of contents

When to write a summary, step 1: read the text, step 2: break the text down into sections, step 3: identify the key points in each section, step 4: write the summary, step 5: check the summary against the article, other interesting articles, frequently asked questions about summarizing.

There are many situations in which you might have to summarize an article or other source:

• As a stand-alone assignment to show you’ve understood the material
• To keep notes that will help you remember what you’ve read
• To give an overview of other researchers’ work in a literature review

When you’re writing an academic text like an essay , research paper , or dissertation , you’ll integrate sources in a variety of ways. You might use a brief quote to support your point, or paraphrase a few sentences or paragraphs.

But it’s often appropriate to summarize a whole article or chapter if it is especially relevant to your own research, or to provide an overview of a source before you analyze or critique it.

In any case, the goal of summarizing is to give your reader a clear understanding of the original source. Follow the five steps outlined below to write a good summary.

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You should read the article more than once to make sure you’ve thoroughly understood it. It’s often effective to read in three stages:

• Scan the article quickly to get a sense of its topic and overall shape.
• Read the article carefully, highlighting important points and taking notes as you read.
• Skim the article again to confirm you’ve understood the key points, and reread any particularly important or difficult passages.

There are some tricks you can use to identify the key points as you read:

• Start by reading the abstract . This already contains the author’s own summary of their work, and it tells you what to expect from the article.
• Pay attention to headings and subheadings . These should give you a good sense of what each part is about.
• Read the introduction and the conclusion together and compare them: What did the author set out to do, and what was the outcome?

To make the text more manageable and understand its sub-points, break it down into smaller sections.

If the text is a scientific paper that follows a standard empirical structure, it is probably already organized into clearly marked sections, usually including an introduction , methods , results , and discussion .

Other types of articles may not be explicitly divided into sections. But most articles and essays will be structured around a series of sub-points or themes.

Now it’s time go through each section and pick out its most important points. What does your reader need to know to understand the overall argument or conclusion of the article?

Keep in mind that a summary does not involve paraphrasing every single paragraph of the article. Your goal is to extract the essential points, leaving out anything that can be considered background information or supplementary detail.

In a scientific article, there are some easy questions you can ask to identify the key points in each part.

If the article takes a different form, you might have to think more carefully about what points are most important for the reader to understand its argument.

In that case, pay particular attention to the thesis statement —the central claim that the author wants us to accept, which usually appears in the introduction—and the topic sentences that signal the main idea of each paragraph.

Scribbr Citation Checker New

The AI-powered Citation Checker helps you avoid common mistakes such as:

• Missing commas and periods
• Incorrect usage of “et al.”
• Ampersands (&) in narrative citations
• Missing reference entries

Now that you know the key points that the article aims to communicate, you need to put them in your own words.

To avoid plagiarism and show you’ve understood the article, it’s essential to properly paraphrase the author’s ideas. Do not copy and paste parts of the article, not even just a sentence or two.

The best way to do this is to put the article aside and write out your own understanding of the author’s key points.

Examples of article summaries

Let’s take a look at an example. Below, we summarize this article , which scientifically investigates the old saying “an apple a day keeps the doctor away.”

Davis et al. (2015) set out to empirically test the popular saying “an apple a day keeps the doctor away.” Apples are often used to represent a healthy lifestyle, and research has shown their nutritional properties could be beneficial for various aspects of health. The authors’ unique approach is to take the saying literally and ask: do people who eat apples use healthcare services less frequently? If there is indeed such a relationship, they suggest, promoting apple consumption could help reduce healthcare costs.

The study used publicly available cross-sectional data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Participants were categorized as either apple eaters or non-apple eaters based on their self-reported apple consumption in an average 24-hour period. They were also categorized as either avoiding or not avoiding the use of healthcare services in the past year. The data was statistically analyzed to test whether there was an association between apple consumption and several dependent variables: physician visits, hospital stays, use of mental health services, and use of prescription medication.

Although apple eaters were slightly more likely to have avoided physician visits, this relationship was not statistically significant after adjusting for various relevant factors. No association was found between apple consumption and hospital stays or mental health service use. However, apple eaters were found to be slightly more likely to have avoided using prescription medication. Based on these results, the authors conclude that an apple a day does not keep the doctor away, but it may keep the pharmacist away. They suggest that this finding could have implications for reducing healthcare costs, considering the high annual costs of prescription medication and the inexpensiveness of apples.

However, the authors also note several limitations of the study: most importantly, that apple eaters are likely to differ from non-apple eaters in ways that may have confounded the results (for example, apple eaters may be more likely to be health-conscious). To establish any causal relationship between apple consumption and avoidance of medication, they recommend experimental research.

An article summary like the above would be appropriate for a stand-alone summary assignment. However, you’ll often want to give an even more concise summary of an article.

For example, in a literature review or meta analysis you may want to briefly summarize this study as part of a wider discussion of various sources. In this case, we can boil our summary down even further to include only the most relevant information.

Using national survey data, Davis et al. (2015) tested the assertion that “an apple a day keeps the doctor away” and did not find statistically significant evidence to support this hypothesis. While people who consumed apples were slightly less likely to use prescription medications, the study was unable to demonstrate a causal relationship between these variables.

Citing the source you’re summarizing

When including a summary as part of a larger text, it’s essential to properly cite the source you’re summarizing. The exact format depends on your citation style , but it usually includes an in-text citation and a full reference at the end of your paper.

You can easily create your citations and references in APA or MLA using our free citation generators.

APA Citation Generator MLA Citation Generator

Finally, read through the article once more to ensure that:

• You’ve accurately represented the author’s work
• You haven’t missed any essential information
• The phrasing is not too similar to any sentences in the original.

If you’re summarizing many articles as part of your own work, it may be a good idea to use a plagiarism checker to double-check that your text is completely original and properly cited. Just be sure to use one that’s safe and reliable.

If you want to know more about ChatGPT, AI tools , citation , and plagiarism , make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples.

• ChatGPT vs human editor
• ChatGPT citations
• Is ChatGPT trustworthy?
• Using ChatGPT for your studies
• What is ChatGPT?
• Chicago style
• Paraphrasing

 Plagiarism

• Types of plagiarism
• Self-plagiarism
• Avoiding plagiarism
• Academic integrity
• Consequences of plagiarism
• Common knowledge

A summary is a short overview of the main points of an article or other source, written entirely in your own words. Want to make your life super easy? Try our free text summarizer today!

A summary is always much shorter than the original text. The length of a summary can range from just a few sentences to several paragraphs; it depends on the length of the article you’re summarizing, and on the purpose of the summary.

You might have to write a summary of a source:

• As a stand-alone assignment to prove you understand the material
• For your own use, to keep notes on your reading
• To provide an overview of other researchers’ work in a literature review
• In a paper , to summarize or introduce a relevant study

To avoid plagiarism when summarizing an article or other source, follow these two rules:

• Write the summary entirely in your own words by paraphrasing the author’s ideas.
• Cite the source with an in-text citation and a full reference so your reader can easily find the original text.

An abstract concisely explains all the key points of an academic text such as a thesis , dissertation or journal article. It should summarize the whole text, not just introduce it.

An abstract is a type of summary , but summaries are also written elsewhere in academic writing . For example, you might summarize a source in a paper , in a literature review , or as a standalone assignment.

All can be done within seconds with our free text summarizer .

Cite this Scribbr article

If you want to cite this source, you can copy and paste the citation or click the “Cite this Scribbr article” button to automatically add the citation to our free Citation Generator.

McCombes, S. (2023, May 31). How to Write a Summary | Guide & Examples. Scribbr. Retrieved April 18, 2024, from https://www.scribbr.com/working-with-sources/how-to-summarize/

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Best Summary Generator for Essays

Number of sentences in results:

Wondering what is the best summary generator for essays? Try our free online tool! It can summarize an article, research paper, or any other academic piece in no time.

• ️🛠️ How to Use the Tool?
• ️🤷 What Is a Summary?
• ️❓ Summary Generator Q&A
• ️👓 Making an Objective Summary
• ️🌐 Choosing a Summarizer
• ️🔗 References

🛠️ Summary Generator: How to Use?

• Go to the document or website text you would like to summarize.
• Highlight it and press “Copy” or Ctrl+C. Make sure it does not exceed 15,000 characters.
• Go to Summary Generator.
• Click in the blank field and press “Paste” or Ctrl+V in the text summarizer.
• Specify the desired number of sentences in the result.
• Click the “Summarize” button.
• Enjoy your summary!

🤷 What Is a Summary?

A summary is a brief description of any text that mentions its highlights, leaving aside the details. It is usually short but depends on the length of the original work.

A summary never includes personal opinions, analysis , considerations, etc.

The academic sphere approves only objective summary writing, while summaries for commercial purposes tend to withhold some facts to raise interest.

We come across summaries every day. For example, we can find them:

• In the theoretical part of a research paper or article, listing the sources being analyzed
• In conclusion to any piece of any academic writing
• In recommendations to a book suggested for reading or a film presented for watching
• In product descriptions
• In summary generators

❓ Summary Generator Q&A

❓ how to write a good summary.

• Do not pick sentences to reword . Get the idea and explain it in your own words.
• Avoid including details. Use only those critical to understand your summary.
• Abstain from judging. It is not an essay. No personal opinion is welcome here.
• Avoid compiling a list of statements. Make your text flow.
• While reading the story or article to be summarized, write down the key points and relations. Use your notes as an outline for the summary.

❓ What is an objective summary?

First of all, any summary should be objective. To make sure you stick to the rule, after writing every paragraph, ask yourself the following questions:

• Does it contain my opinion?
• Did my feelings or emotions influence what I have written?
• Does my summary distort what the original author intended to say?

If you answered “No” to all these questions, your resume is perfectly objective and does not require any revision.

❓ How long should a summary be?

If you are a student, and the summary is your homework, we highly recommend asking this from your professor. The assignment should contain the preferred length. In all other cases, the word count is defined by the size and genre of the original text.

For a summary of an article, the publisher requests a specific length. It is usually either one paragraph or one-third of the article.

For a summary of a chapter, it should be 10 to 15% of its word count.

❓ How is a paraphrase similar to a summary?

The main similarity is that both methods allow a writer to incorporate another person’s text into theirs. Both of them also require referencing the author of the source. The third common feature is the use of simplified language, as compared to the sample.

Still, there are some differences between them. A paraphrase deals with shorter passages (a sentence or a paragraph) and tries to preserve all of its elements. A summary condenses the meaning of the entire text or its section, prioritizing the central ideas.

👓 How to Summarize in Your Own Words

An objective summary is devoid of personal reasoning or judgments.

It only comprises the information that comes from the source .

If you wonder how to write a synopsis without losing anything essential, here is the best advice. If an idea is clear without the detail, leave it out.

Therefore, to write an objective summary, use these rules:

We recommend tackling this stage in three steps:

• Briefly scan the general structure of the text, paying attention to headings.
• Carefully read the text, marking the essential information and making notes .
• Reread the most complicated passages for a better understanding.
• Compare the introduction and conclusion . It will show you the author’s intention.

If the text contains no subheadings, it is helpful to outline. Divide the text into parts and name each of them. You will use them to structure your summary.

Make a list of the main points under each heading. It won’t take you long, but the summary-writing process will be accelerated.

Using the plan you've made under the points 2 and 3, write a summary in your own words. After that, use a plagiarism checker to make sure you have paraphrased all the author’s expressions.

Once everything is ready, check the following items:

• Is your summary an accurate representation of the original?
• Did you preserve the essential information?
• Isn’t your summary wording too similar to the original?

🌐 Best Summary Generator: How to Choose?

Certainly, you can walk the way of trials and errors and look for the best summary generator by yourself. But we would like to warn you: it will take much time, and it happens that you need a well-composed summary right now. The World Wide Web contains hundreds of tools, starting from the most simple and free and ending with the most sophisticated, professional, and paid applications.

That is why, while looking for a tool that meets your needs the most, pay attention to the following features:

• Are there any limits for the length of the inserted text? If yes, opt for those who allow the most extended text.
• Is there an option to upload a file in addition to simply copying and pasting the text? In combination with the unlimited text length, this feature works great with long books.
• If the previous point is fulfilled, which file formats are supported? Sometimes, it is critical to have a summary maker that processes less popular formats than docx.
• Is there a possibility to adjust the length of the result? This one is the most critical for all users. You can need a paragraph-long summary of a dozen-page document or a detailed overview of a two-page article.
• Does the paraphrasing tool highlight keywords? It can be helpful when you use the summary generator to process large volumes of text in a short time.
• Which languages does it support? There is often a lack of information available in one language, while you can access extensive materials in another. If you speak both, that’s quite an asset. Make sure the auto summarizer you choose supports all of them.
• How much time does it take to process the text? The quicker, the better.
• Does the web page with the tool have advertisement bars and pop-ups? If yes, they will distract you from your educational or research work.
• How much does it cost to use the summary generator? This item requires no explanation.

Hope the above tips will be useful. By the way, the key to a great academic paper is a decent thesis statement! If you need to create one, you are welcome to use our thesis-making tool .

📍 References

• How to effectively summarize the work of others | SFU Library
• What is a Summary? - Definition & Concept - Study.com
• Summarizing | Academic Integrity at MIT
• Summarizing - University of Toronto Writing Advice
• Definition and Examples of a Written Summary of Text

Summary Generator

Text summarizer powered by ai.

In our modern, information-heavy world, processing large amounts of text efficiently is crucial. This AI-powered tool is specifically designed for professionals, students, and researchers who frequently need to extract key details from lengthy documents.

It utilizes advanced AI algorithms to allow users to quickly access the essential parts of a text, avoiding unnecessary sections and concentrating on the most critical data or statistics. This AI-driven precision in summarizing text ensures that no important information is overlooked. As a result, users can process more content in less time, which is crucial for rapid learning and adhering to tight schedules.

Operating this tool is simple: just paste the text you need summarized, click "Summarize," and a clear, concise summary is generated. This summary serves as a reliable resource for research or as a quick method for finding the information you need.

This AI-enhanced tool offers a more intelligent way to manage and learn from large volumes of text, significantly improving efficiency in information processing.

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Project Management

10 executive summary examples and how to write one yourself (with ai).

February 14, 2024

In a world where people have the attention span of a goldfish (or less), we don’t make time to read long, detailed documents unless they are valuable to us. So, how do we convince the reader that the document is valuable? That’s where the executive summary comes in.

What is an Executive Summary?

1. identify the story, 2. bring the data, 3. expand on the benefits, 4. conclude powerfully, best practices for writing executive summary, 1. board report executive summary, 2. research report executive summary example from mckinsey, 3. study report executive summary by the un, 4. project performance report executive summary, 5. payroll report executive summary template, 6. mailchimp content style guide’s tl;dr, 7. clickup release notes, 8. the title and description of a new yorker article, 9. survey report executive summary by harvard, 10. meta executive summary with clickup ai.

An executive summary is a shorter version of a longer corporate document. It summarizes the salient points of a business plan, proposal, or report so executives can get the gist and read further about what matters to them.

In other words, the tl;dr (too long; didn’t read) version.

A typical executive summary includes:

• Problem statement
• Proposed solution
• Expected outcomes

This might vary depending on what you write an executive summary for. Let’s take the example of a project report. You might have to replace the proposed solution and expected outcomes with execution solutions and actual outcomes achieved, respectively. Or, if you’re writing a business plan, research proposal, or market analysis, you might include your methodology, too.

Now that you know the purpose of an executive summary, let’s see how to write one.

How to Write Executive Summaries and Examples

While an executive summary is just a condensed version of a longer report, it isn’t easy to write. It needs to capture the essence of the report, outline the salient points, and tell a story as compelling as the full report. Here are some ways you can achieve that.

Just stating facts and data wouldn’t be a compelling read for anyone. So, identify the story that really impacts people’s lives. While industry terms like workflow optimization or cost control capture people’s attention, they don’t tell the real story behind your efforts. Focus on the latter.

If you’re writing the project executive summary in software development, you might begin with what matters to the reader as follows.

In 2020, the retail major was managing its inventory on spreadsheets. So, whenever a customer asked whether a product was in stock, a staff member had to walk across the 5000 sq. ft. store to check, often with the customer in tow. The new ABC digital inventory management system records stock in and out online in real time. The staff member can check and confirm in a flash. More pertinently, the customers themselves can check at any of the 25 kiosks throughout the store.

While the story is more important, data isn’t useless. Accurate and relevant data helps establish credibility. Your next section might say the following in the ABC digital inventory management system example.

Since the implementation of the ABC inventory management system, the retail major has seen: 85% decrease in time taken to check stock 75% decrease in time taken to find where stock is placed

The data demonstrates that there has been real improvement. However, for the reader to understand its impact, you must explain the benefits. This can be done with real-life scenarios or even quotes. For example,

Adrian, the customer service manager at the Central Park store, says, “Now, from anywhere—a kiosk, the checkout counter, or my mobile phone—I can quickly check stock and confirm we have the products the customer needs. I see that customers are delighted at getting their answers instantly.”

You can also use data to do this. For example, you can explain how the decreased time taken to check stock has increased staff productivity, customer satisfaction, or company revenue. Or you can include your suggestions here. Based on your observations, explain the process improvement methodologies you recommend.

This is the time to complete the story. Here, talk about how your project has delivered the changes in the present and sets up for an even more prosperous future. This could be something like:

The ABC inventory management system marks the first step in the retail major’s digital transformation journey. By Q2 next year, we will link the store solution to the e-commerce inventory platform to give 360-degree visibility into the stock situation. This would also enable a new sales channel in the form of Buy Online, Pick Up in Store (BOPIS), enabling same-day fulfillment.

While you write your executive summary, here are some best practices to remember.

Keep it short and simple : The length might depend on the report you’re summarizing, but it’s best to keep it under one page for quick reading. Also, avoid cliches and jargon; make it easy to read. A quick business plan under one page is the best first impression you can make.

Focus on the target audience : Not all executive summaries are read by business executives. Often, you might want to address your summary to peers, vendors, partners, or even teens. Know your target audience and customize your executive summary accordingly.

Use the right tool : You can, of course, use Notepad or Word doc to write your executive summaries. But give it a boost with modern document software like ClickUp Docs .

• Use rich formatting features without jumping through hoops
• Style the critical information with color-coded banners, buttons, and more
• Collaborate in real time with comments, action items, and trackable tasks
• Securely share with anyone with appropriate access controls

Pick a suitable template : If it’s your first time writing an executive summary, we’ve got your back. Fire up one of ClickUp’s executive summary templates or content writing templates , and kickstart your work.

Get the AI boost : If you’ve thoughtfully created your report, you can write your executive summary much quicker with one of the many AI writing tools . For instance, ClickUp AI offers a single-click summarize option right on ClickUp Docs.

What’s more? ClickUp AI supports you in brainstorming new ideas, writing the first drafts of your executive summaries, and proofreading them for good measure.

10 Executive Summary Examples

Now that we have discussed the theory of executive summary writing, let’s look at some examples to see what it looks like in practice. Here are ten to learn from or emulate.

Periodically, the board would expect to see a report on the organization’s performance. Various departments typically write their reports, which are consolidated into a board report. An effective executive summary of this would include the following.

• Revenue and expenditure
• Key areas of focus
• Critical success factors
• Financial information
• Challenges and roadblocks

This ClickUp Board Report Summary Template brings all these aspects together to get you started on your executive summary right away. You can customize this free executive summary template to suit your needs and fill in the data as appropriate.

McKinsey, one of the world’s leading consulting firms, publishes dozens of research reports annually. For every one of them, they write executive summaries, often called ‘in brief.’

In this report titled, ‘ Performance through people: Transforming human capital into competitive advantage ,’ the executive summary takes a two-pronged approach. It presents key insights in text on one page and data in infographics on the next.

Insights in text : The report begins by directly addressing the primary purpose of the research. Below are the first few sentences.

How does developing talent affect financial returns for firms? This research finds that companies with a dual focus on developing human capital and managing it well have a performance edge.

This section summarizes the key insights from the research. The headlines of each section are presented in bold, making it easy for the reader to skim.

Data in visuals : The text section is followed by an infographic of the key findings from the data. Within one page, it presents all the graphs relevant to the reader engagingly.

Within two pages, McKinsey gives the reader a bird’s eye view of what to expect, customized for the target market, from the 40-page document.

You can read the executive summary of this report on McKinsey’s website .

The Adaptation Gap Report 2023 by the United Nations Environment Programme is a 112-page report with a rather detailed executive summary, stretching eight pages. The depth of information and seriousness of the topics covered demand an extended executive summary.

Yet, the writers make every effort to make it engaging with a combination of typography, design, and graphs. It begins with the following.

Despite the clear signs of accelerating climate risks and impacts worldwide, the adaptation finance gap is widening and now stands at between US$194 billion and US$366 billion per year. Adaptation finance needs are 10–18 times as great as current international public adaptation finance flows – at least 50 percent higher than previously estimated.

In the following pages, it presents graphs to demonstrate the underpinnings of these key findings.

Every project manager creates performance reports at the end of each week, month, or quarter. This typically includes the tasks tracking , burn up, burn down, hours spent, etc.

While this can be written down in a list, presenting this information as a slide with visual elements is far more effective.

One way to achieve this is to use ClickUp’s project summary templates , which offer custom-designed templates for various project management purposes.

The other way is to use the dynamic reports on the ClickUp Dashboard , which brings together all the key metrics and keeps them updated in real time for you to share with anyone you’d like to.

Human resources or people management teams create payroll reports, typically in spreadsheets, for every payment period—bi-weekly or monthly. This data is also helpful for building financial projections. For the senior finance leaders, they often create an executive summary of critical information, such as:

• Total salaries paid
• Deductions across categories
• Year-to-date salary expenses
• Paid time off credits
• Net pay summary

ClickUp’s Payroll Summary Report Template can save time by automatically gathering all relevant data from the platform. When data is unavailable on ClickUp, you can highlight any text to @mention team members who can fill in the correct information.

Once complete, you can update the Doc’s settings for access control and share it with the management team instantly.

A company description or how it projects itself is often important to stand out in a crowded market. Mailchimp stood out with its style guide. The guide is comprehensive and widely used by smaller content teams that don’t yet have their own.

Mailchimp has made it public and available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International license for anyone to adapt to their needs.

While every section in this style guide is engaging and valuable, for the purposes of this article, we want to draw your attention to the tl;dr section , which acts as a quasi-executive summary.

It is a bulleted list of seven sub-sections, highlighting the foundations of Mailchimp’s writing style.

The striking thing about this tl;dr version is its simplicity. Even without any visual elements, infographics, or charts, this page gives readers a real and actionable summary of the entire style guide.

When we speak of executive summary, we almost always think of a smaller version of an entire document. It need not be so.

For a software engineering team, the release notes are a kind of executive summary of all the changes/upgrades made in the latest version.

Take the example of ClickUp’s release notes 3.04 . Each release gets:

• An organized yet concise summary of all the changes that have been made
• “ClickTips” to help readers make the best use of new features
• Visuals and app images to show how the changes look
• Links to help pages of each of those features so the reader can learn more
• A list of bugs fixed
• And any other resources, such as on-demand webinars or training

These release notes inform users and developers of the latest upgrades to the ClickUp platform without overwhelming them with the details.

The New Yorker Magazine wrote a 10,000-word profile of Geoffrey Hinton , a computer scientist and cognitive psychologist, for their November 20, 2023 issue, titled ‘Metamorphosis.’ Even in podcast form, it’s over 60 minutes long.

When it was published online, they needed a title and description that summarized the article in a way that attracted a lay reader’s attention to click and read. The headline captures the primary conflict explored in the article. The description introduces the protagonist.

While this is typically not what we’d categorize as an executive summary, it is a fantastic example of capturing the essence of a long article in a few powerful words.

This executive summary serves as an inspiration for writers, irrespective of what you’re writing about, to summarize their main points not just briefly but also powerfully and attractively.

In the spring of 2019, Harvard University conducted its first-ever survey about campus culture. The executive summary of the report on these survey responses makes for great reading. It is also a great example of how to honestly and authentically present key findings, even unpleasant ones.

The executive summary is honest on multiple fronts. It admits that:

• 2019 was the first time in history that Harvard surveyed campus culture
• Three in ten of the Harvard community don’t feel like they belong
• 34% of students disagreed with the belief that Harvard will take appropriate action against incidents of harassment and discrimination
• Those from historically underrepresented and disadvantaged groups reported less positive views

At the end of this, the executive summary outlines the specific steps Harvard will take to address these responses from the community.

Project managers can use this as inspiration for handling executive summaries of projects that have gone awry. It helps leaders take responsibility for what has occurred and build systems to prevent future mistakes.

Not all executive summaries have to be written manually by you. A free executive summary template is also something to explore. Plenty of tools offer it. Dozens of AI tools for automation can summarize text in seconds. Here’s what ClickUp AI returned when we inserted the article above and asked for a summary.

The article discusses the purpose and importance of an executive summary, which provides a brief overview of detailed documents, making them more palatable for readers with limited time. Executive summaries typically include problem statements, proposed solutions, expected outcomes, and a conclusion. To create a compelling summary, it’s crucial to identify the main story, incorporate relevant data, expand on benefits, and conclude powerfully. The use of modern document software like ClickUp Docs and AI tools like ClickUp AI can enhance the quality and efficiency of writing executive summaries. The article also provides practical examples of executive summaries across different fields, showcasing their versatility and applicability. This provides a great starting point for those who fear the blank page. You can now edit this to add details, add images, or insert a quote.

With ClickUp AI, you can choose the tone (from professional, straightforward, inspirational, optimistic, casual, confident, friendly, or humorous) and creativity (low, medium, and high) to customize the summary to your needs.

That’s not all! For project managers and business leaders, ClickUp AI offers a wide range of writing and summarizing tools for scope documents, project briefs, meeting agendas, statements of work, survey questions, and more.

You can tag people to invite input or feedback. You can also convert comments into tasks and manage them effortlessly, all in one place.

Never used AI for writing before? No worries there, too. Here are AI prompt templates that will get you started instantly.

With a custom-built AI assistant tailored to your role, you can work faster, write better, spark creativity, and be significantly more productive.

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Opinion | NPR suspends an editor for his essay blasting … NPR

The firestorm caused by Uri Berliner’s critical essay in The Free Press continues to rage

When a senior editor at NPR recently wrote a 3,500-word essay for another outlet, blasting where he works and saying that NPR had “lost America’s trust,” my first thought, quite frankly, was, “ … and he still works there?”

Well, it was learned on Tuesday that the editor in question, Uri Berliner, is currently serving a five-day suspension without pay. NPR media writer David Folkenflik reported the suspension began last week. Folkenflik wrote, “In presenting Berliner’s suspension Thursday afternoon, the organization told the editor he had failed to secure its approval for outside work for other news outlets, as is required of NPR journalists. It called the letter a ‘final warning,’ saying Berliner would be fired if he violated NPR’s policy again. Berliner is a dues-paying member of NPR’s newsroom union but says he is not appealing the punishment.”

Berliner, who has been at NPR for 25 years, wrote his scathing essay for the online news site The Free Press, a publication on Substack. Folkenflik described The Free Press as a “site that has become a haven for journalists who believe that mainstream media outlets have become too liberal.”

The suspension does not mean the firestorm created by Berliner’s essay has been suppressed. Folkenflik wrote, “Yet the public radio network is grappling in other ways with the fallout from Berliner’s essay for the online news site The Free Press. It angered many of his colleagues, led NPR leaders to announce monthly internal reviews of the network’s coverage, and gave fresh ammunition to conservative and partisan Republican critics of NPR, including former President Donald Trump.”

The New York Times’ Benjamin Mullin wrote , “After Mr. Berliner’s essay was published, NPR’s new chief executive, Katherine Maher, came under renewed scrutiny as conservative activists resurfaced a series of years-old social media posts criticizing former President Donald J. Trump and embracing progressive causes. One of the activists, Christopher Rufo, has pressured media organizations into covering controversies involving influential figures, such as the plagiarism allegations against Claudine Gay, the former Harvard president.”

Maher was not at NPR at the time of her posts and, furthermore, the CEO has no involvement in editorial decisions at the network.

But Berliner told Folkenflik in an interview on Monday, “We’re looking for a leader right now who’s going to be unifying and bring more people into the tent and have a broader perspective on, sort of, what America is all about. And this seems to be the opposite of that.”

In a statement earlier this week, Maher said, “In America everyone is entitled to free speech as a private citizen. What matters is NPR’s work and my commitment as its CEO: public service, editorial independence, and the mission to serve all of the American public. NPR is independent, beholden to no party, and without commercial interests.”

As far as Berliner’s essay, many, particularly inside NPR, are pushing back against his various assertions, including that NPR has a liberal bias.

Mullin wrote for the Times, “Several NPR employees have urged the network’s leaders to more forcefully renounce Mr. Berliner’s claims in his essay. Edith Chapin, NPR’s top editor, said in a statement last week that managers ‘strongly disagree with Uri’s assessment of the quality of our journalism,’ adding that the network was ‘proud to stand behind’ its work.”

Tony Cavin, NPR’s managing editor for standards and practices, pushed back against specific claims made by Berliner and told the Times, “To somehow think that we were driven by politics is both wrong and unfair.”

NPR TV critic Eric Deggans tweeted , “Many things wrong w/terrible Berliner column on NPR, including not observing basic fairness. Didn’t seek comment from NPR before publishing. Didn’t mention many things which could detract from his conclusions. Set up staffers of color as scapegoats.”

So what happens now? Will Berliner be in further trouble for criticizing the CEO in an interview with Folkenflik, his NPR colleague?

Berliner told Folkenflik, “Talking to an NPR journalist and being fired for that would be extraordinary, I think.”

I urge you to check out Folkenflik’s piece for all the details. And, by the way, kudos to Folkenflik for his strong reporting on his own newsroom.

CNN’s response

In Tuesday’s newsletter , I wrote how “King Charles” — the limited series featuring Gayle King and Charles Barkley — has ended after 14 shows. I wrote that the network had “pulled the plug” on the show.

CNN said that description was inaccurate and that I was wrong in framing it the way I did.

While I did say that CNN announced from the beginning that the show was a limited series, I also wrote that the show reached its ending “a little ahead of time.” The network, however, said it was clear all along that the show was scheduled to end in the spring, that it is spring right now, and the show was not canceled early.

A CNN spokesperson told me, “‘King Charles’ has come to the end of its limited run, as we announced when it launched last fall that it would run through spring. The show was a great addition to CNN’s lineup, with the youngest, most affluent, and most diverse P2+ audience in its cable news time period and brought new audiences to CNN. It’s inaccurate to report that the show was canceled as it went through its full run and duration of the limited series. We hope to work with both of these incredible talents in the future as they balance their very busy schedules.”

With the NBA playoffs about to begin, Barkley is about to head into extra duty at his main job as studio analyst for TNT’s “Inside the NBA.”

The show’s average viewership was under a half million and lagged behind competitors Fox News and MSNBC, but CNN said it was pleased that the King-Barkley broadcast brought new audiences to CNN. It pointed to this statistic from Nielsen via Npower that said 43% of the “King Charles” audience was nonwhite, compared to 7% for Fox News and 27% for MSNBC during that Wednesday at 10 p.m. Eastern hour.

Smartmatic and OAN settle suit

Smartmatic, the voting technology company, and One America News, the far-right TV network, have settled their lawsuit. Smartmatic was suing OAN, claiming the network lied that the company rigged the 2020 election in favor of Joe Biden and against Donald Trump.

Neither side disclosed the terms of the settlement.

Smartmatic still has pending lawsuits against Fox News and Newsmax. And OAN is still facing a defamation lawsuit from Dominion Voting Systems. That’s the company that Fox News settled with out of court a year ago by agreeing to pay Dominion a whopping $787.5 million.

Missing at the Masters

According to Sports TV Ratings , Sunday’s final round of The Masters golf tournament on CBS averaged 9.58 million viewers, which was down 20% from last year’s final round, which averaged 12.05 million. This shouldn’t be a surprise. This year’s final round lacked drama, with winner Scottie Scheffler pretty much in control throughout the day.

Sports Media Watch’s Jon Lewis noted that in the past three decades, only COVID-era Masters in 2020 (5.64 million) and 2021 (9.54 million) had fewer viewers. Those were the least-viewed Masters since 1993.

But Lewis also points out, “As one would expect, the final round of the Masters still ranks as the most-watched golf telecast and one of the most-watched sporting events of the past year — placing ahead of four of five World Series games and every Daytona 500 since 2017. It also goes without saying that the Masters dominated all other weekend sporting events.”

Just for fun, however, I will mention that the 9.58 million was nowhere near the number of viewers (18.7 million) that watched the NCAA women’s college basketball final between South Carolina and Iowa (and star Caitlin Clark) one week earlier on a Sunday afternoon.

Other media notes, tidbits and interesting links …

• Speaking of Clark, Tom Kludt writes for Vanity Fair: “Behind the Scenes With Caitlin Clark on WNBA Draft Day: ‘I Definitely Know There’s Eyeballs on Me.’”
• Axios’ Sara Fischer with “Dozens of Alden newspapers run coordinated editorials slamming Google.”
• For the Los Angeles Times, Greg Braxton and Carolyn Cole with “What ‘Civil War’ gets right and wrong about photojournalism, according to a Pulitzer Prize winner.”
• For The Washington Post, Dave Barry, Angela Garbes, Melissa Fay Greene, John Grogan and Charles Yu with “How does the election feel around the country? 5 writers capture the vibe.” Barry, as always looking at things a bit differently, writes, “Greetings from the Sunshine State! The mood down here, as we anticipate the 2024 presidential election, is one of hopefulness. Specifically, we’re hoping that a large, previously undetected meteor will strike the planet before November.”
• For NPR and “Morning Edition,” Elizabeth Blair with “50 years ago, ‘Come and Get Your Love’ put Native culture on the bandstand.”

More resources for journalists

• Thursday webinar : Covering transgender issues with authority and accuracy.
• Applications for Poynter Producer Project close on Friday!
• Reporter’s Toolkit gives you the tools to succeed early in your career. Apply by April 28.
• Delve more deeply into your editing skills with Poynter ACES Intermediate Certificate in Editing .

Have feedback or a tip? Email Poynter senior media writer Tom Jones at [email protected] .

The Poynter Report is our daily media newsletter. To have it delivered to your inbox Monday-Friday, sign up here .

How a longtime film critic’s death represents the great dissolve of local film criticism

Bryan VanCampen of The Ithaca Times was an institution in the central New York college town of 32,000. He might have been the last of his kind.

Opinion | An NPR editor is now a former NPR editor after his resignation

Uri Berliner, an NPR business editor who wrote a scathing essay about his organization in another publication, no longer works at NPR.

No, Stormy Daniels didn’t ‘exonerate’ Donald Trump

The adult film actor denied she had an affair with Trump in a 2018 statement. She has since recanted that statement.

Taylor Swift has not endorsed Joe Biden for president

As of mid-April 2024, Swift has not issued a public endorsement for the 2024 presidential election, despite social posts claiming otherwise

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NPR in Turmoil After It Is Accused of Liberal Bias

An essay from an editor at the broadcaster has generated a firestorm of criticism about the network on social media, especially among conservatives.

By Benjamin Mullin and Katie Robertson

NPR is facing both internal tumult and a fusillade of attacks by prominent conservatives this week after a senior editor publicly claimed the broadcaster had allowed liberal bias to affect its coverage, risking its trust with audiences.

Uri Berliner, a senior business editor who has worked at NPR for 25 years, wrote in an essay published Tuesday by The Free Press, a popular Substack publication, that “people at every level of NPR have comfortably coalesced around the progressive worldview.”

Mr. Berliner, a Peabody Award-winning journalist, castigated NPR for what he said was a litany of journalistic missteps around coverage of several major news events, including the origins of Covid-19 and the war in Gaza. He also said the internal culture at NPR had placed race and identity as “paramount in nearly every aspect of the workplace.”

Mr. Berliner’s essay has ignited a firestorm of criticism of NPR on social media, especially among conservatives who have long accused the network of political bias in its reporting. Former President Donald J. Trump took to his social media platform, Truth Social, to argue that NPR’s government funding should be rescinded, an argument he has made in the past.

NPR has forcefully pushed back on Mr. Berliner’s accusations and the criticism.

“We’re proud to stand behind the exceptional work that our desks and shows do to cover a wide range of challenging stories,” Edith Chapin, the organization’s editor in chief, said in an email to staff on Tuesday. “We believe that inclusion — among our staff, with our sourcing, and in our overall coverage — is critical to telling the nuanced stories of this country and our world.” Some other NPR journalists also criticized the essay publicly, including Eric Deggans, its TV critic, who faulted Mr. Berliner for not giving NPR an opportunity to comment on the piece.

In an interview on Thursday, Mr. Berliner expressed no regrets about publishing the essay, saying he loved NPR and hoped to make it better by airing criticisms that have gone unheeded by leaders for years. He called NPR a “national trust” that people rely on for fair reporting and superb storytelling.

“I decided to go out and publish it in hopes that something would change, and that we get a broader conversation going about how the news is covered,” Mr. Berliner said.

He said he had not been disciplined by managers, though he said he had received a note from his supervisor reminding him that NPR requires employees to clear speaking appearances and media requests with standards and media relations. He said he didn’t run his remarks to The New York Times by network spokespeople.

When the hosts of NPR’s biggest shows, including “Morning Edition” and “All Things Considered,” convened on Wednesday afternoon for a long-scheduled meet-and-greet with the network’s new chief executive, Katherine Maher , conversation soon turned to Mr. Berliner’s essay, according to two people with knowledge of the meeting. During the lunch, Ms. Chapin told the hosts that she didn’t want Mr. Berliner to become a “martyr,” the people said.

Mr. Berliner’s essay also sent critical Slack messages whizzing through some of the same employee affinity groups focused on racial and sexual identity that he cited in his essay. In one group, several staff members disputed Mr. Berliner’s points about a lack of ideological diversity and said efforts to recruit more people of color would make NPR’s journalism better.

On Wednesday, staff members from “Morning Edition” convened to discuss the fallout from Mr. Berliner’s essay. During the meeting, an NPR producer took issue with Mr. Berliner’s argument for why NPR’s listenership has fallen off, describing a variety of factors that have contributed to the change.

Mr. Berliner’s remarks prompted vehement pushback from several news executives. Tony Cavin, NPR’s managing editor of standards and practices, said in an interview that he rejected all of Mr. Berliner’s claims of unfairness, adding that his remarks would probably make it harder for NPR journalists to do their jobs.

“The next time one of our people calls up a Republican congressman or something and tries to get an answer from them, they may well say, ‘Oh, I read these stories, you guys aren’t fair, so I’m not going to talk to you,’” Mr. Cavin said.

Some journalists have defended Mr. Berliner’s essay. Jeffrey A. Dvorkin, NPR’s former ombudsman, said Mr. Berliner was “not wrong” on social media. Chuck Holmes, a former managing editor at NPR, called Mr. Berliner’s essay “brave” on Facebook.

Mr. Berliner’s criticism was the latest salvo within NPR, which is no stranger to internal division. In October, Mr. Berliner took part in a lengthy debate over whether NPR should defer to language proposed by the Arab and Middle Eastern Journalists Association while covering the conflict in Gaza.

“We don’t need to rely on an advocacy group’s guidance,” Mr. Berliner wrote, according to a copy of the email exchange viewed by The Times. “Our job is to seek out the facts and report them.” The debate didn’t change NPR’s language guidance, which is made by editors who weren’t part of the discussion. And in a statement on Thursday, the Arab and Middle Eastern Journalists Association said it is a professional association for journalists, not a political advocacy group.

Mr. Berliner’s public criticism has highlighted broader concerns within NPR about the public broadcaster’s mission amid continued financial struggles. Last year, NPR cut 10 percent of its staff and canceled four podcasts, including the popular “Invisibilia,” as it tried to make up for a $30 million budget shortfall. Listeners have drifted away from traditional radio to podcasts, and the advertising market has been unsteady.

In his essay, Mr. Berliner laid some of the blame at the feet of NPR’s former chief executive, John Lansing, who said he was retiring at the end of last year after four years in the role. He was replaced by Ms. Maher, who started on March 25.

During a meeting with employees in her first week, Ms. Maher was asked what she thought about decisions to give a platform to political figures like Ronna McDaniel, the former Republican Party chair whose position as a political analyst at NBC News became untenable after an on-air revolt from hosts who criticized her efforts to undermine the 2020 election.

“I think that this conversation has been one that does not have an easy answer,” Ms. Maher responded.

Benjamin Mullin reports on the major companies behind news and entertainment. Contact Ben securely on Signal at +1 530-961-3223 or email at [email protected] . More about Benjamin Mullin

Katie Robertson covers the media industry for The Times. Email:  [email protected]   More about Katie Robertson

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NPR suspends veteran editor as it grapples with his public criticism

David Folkenflik

NPR suspended senior editor Uri Berliner for five days without pay after he wrote an essay accusing the network of losing the public's trust and appeared on a podcast to explain his argument. Uri Berliner hide caption

NPR suspended senior editor Uri Berliner for five days without pay after he wrote an essay accusing the network of losing the public's trust and appeared on a podcast to explain his argument.

NPR has formally punished Uri Berliner, the senior editor who publicly argued a week ago that the network had "lost America's trust" by approaching news stories with a rigidly progressive mindset.

Berliner's five-day suspension without pay, which began last Friday, has not been previously reported.

Yet the public radio network is grappling in other ways with the fallout from Berliner's essay for the online news site The Free Press . It angered many of his colleagues, led NPR leaders to announce monthly internal reviews of the network's coverage, and gave fresh ammunition to conservative and partisan Republican critics of NPR, including former President Donald Trump.

Conservative activist Christopher Rufo is among those now targeting NPR's new chief executive, Katherine Maher, for messages she posted to social media years before joining the network. Among others, those posts include a 2020 tweet that called Trump racist and another that appeared to minimize rioting during social justice protests that year. Maher took the job at NPR last month — her first at a news organization .

In a statement Monday about the messages she had posted, Maher praised the integrity of NPR's journalists and underscored the independence of their reporting.

"In America everyone is entitled to free speech as a private citizen," she said. "What matters is NPR's work and my commitment as its CEO: public service, editorial independence, and the mission to serve all of the American public. NPR is independent, beholden to no party, and without commercial interests."

The network noted that "the CEO is not involved in editorial decisions."

In an interview with me later on Monday, Berliner said the social media posts demonstrated Maher was all but incapable of being the person best poised to direct the organization.

"We're looking for a leader right now who's going to be unifying and bring more people into the tent and have a broader perspective on, sort of, what America is all about," Berliner said. "And this seems to be the opposite of that."

Conservative critics of NPR are now targeting its new chief executive, Katherine Maher, for messages she posted to social media years before joining the public radio network last month. Stephen Voss/Stephen Voss hide caption

Conservative critics of NPR are now targeting its new chief executive, Katherine Maher, for messages she posted to social media years before joining the public radio network last month.

He said that he tried repeatedly to make his concerns over NPR's coverage known to news leaders and to Maher's predecessor as chief executive before publishing his essay.

Berliner has singled out coverage of several issues dominating the 2020s for criticism, including trans rights, the Israel-Hamas war and COVID. Berliner says he sees the same problems at other news organizations, but argues NPR, as a mission-driven institution, has a greater obligation to fairness.

"I love NPR and feel it's a national trust," Berliner says. "We have great journalists here. If they shed their opinions and did the great journalism they're capable of, this would be a much more interesting and fulfilling organization for our listeners."

A "final warning"

The circumstances surrounding the interview were singular.

Berliner provided me with a copy of the formal rebuke to review. NPR did not confirm or comment upon his suspension for this article.

In presenting Berliner's suspension Thursday afternoon, the organization told the editor he had failed to secure its approval for outside work for other news outlets, as is required of NPR journalists. It called the letter a "final warning," saying Berliner would be fired if he violated NPR's policy again. Berliner is a dues-paying member of NPR's newsroom union but says he is not appealing the punishment.

The Free Press is a site that has become a haven for journalists who believe that mainstream media outlets have become too liberal. In addition to his essay, Berliner appeared in an episode of its podcast Honestly with Bari Weiss.

A few hours after the essay appeared online, NPR chief business editor Pallavi Gogoi reminded Berliner of the requirement that he secure approval before appearing in outside press, according to a copy of the note provided by Berliner.

In its formal rebuke, NPR did not cite Berliner's appearance on Chris Cuomo's NewsNation program last Tuesday night, for which NPR gave him the green light. (NPR's chief communications officer told Berliner to focus on his own experience and not share proprietary information.) The NPR letter also did not cite his remarks to The New York Times , which ran its article mid-afternoon Thursday, shortly before the reprimand was sent. Berliner says he did not seek approval before talking with the Times .

NPR defends its journalism after senior editor says it has lost the public's trust

Berliner says he did not get permission from NPR to speak with me for this story but that he was not worried about the consequences: "Talking to an NPR journalist and being fired for that would be extraordinary, I think."

Berliner is a member of NPR's business desk, as am I, and he has helped to edit many of my stories. He had no involvement in the preparation of this article and did not see it before it was posted publicly.

In rebuking Berliner, NPR said he had also publicly released proprietary information about audience demographics, which it considers confidential. He said those figures "were essentially marketing material. If they had been really good, they probably would have distributed them and sent them out to the world."

Feelings of anger and betrayal inside the newsroom

His essay and subsequent public remarks stirred deep anger and dismay within NPR. Colleagues contend Berliner cherry-picked examples to fit his arguments and challenge the accuracy of his accounts. They also note he did not seek comment from the journalists involved in the work he cited.

Morning Edition host Michel Martin told me some colleagues at the network share Berliner's concerns that coverage is frequently presented through an ideological or idealistic prism that can alienate listeners.

"The way to address that is through training and mentorship," says Martin, herself a veteran of nearly two decades at the network who has also reported for The Wall Street Journal and ABC News. "It's not by blowing the place up, by trashing your colleagues, in full view of people who don't really care about it anyway."

Several NPR journalists told me they are no longer willing to work with Berliner as they no longer have confidence that he will keep private their internal musings about stories as they work through coverage.

"Newsrooms run on trust," NPR political correspondent Danielle Kurtzleben tweeted last week, without mentioning Berliner by name. "If you violate everyone's trust by going to another outlet and sh--ing on your colleagues (while doing a bad job journalistically, for that matter), I don't know how you do your job now."

Berliner rejected that critique, saying nothing in his essay or subsequent remarks betrayed private observations or arguments about coverage.

Other newsrooms are also grappling with questions over news judgment and confidentiality. On Monday, New York Times Executive Editor Joseph Kahn announced to his staff that the newspaper's inquiry into who leaked internal dissent over a planned episode of its podcast The Daily to another news outlet proved inconclusive. The episode was to focus on a December report on the use of sexual assault as part of the Hamas attack on Israel in October. Audio staffers aired doubts over how well the reporting stood up to scrutiny.

"We work together with trust and collegiality everyday on everything we produce, and I have every expectation that this incident will prove to be a singular exception to an important rule," Kahn wrote to Times staffers.

At NPR, some of Berliner's colleagues have weighed in online against his claim that the network has focused on diversifying its workforce without a concomitant commitment to diversity of viewpoint. Recently retired Chief Executive John Lansing has referred to this pursuit of diversity within NPR's workforce as its " North Star ," a moral imperative and chief business strategy.

In his essay, Berliner tagged the strategy as a failure, citing the drop in NPR's broadcast audiences and its struggle to attract more Black and Latino listeners in particular.

"During most of my tenure here, an open-minded, curious culture prevailed. We were nerdy, but not knee-jerk, activist, or scolding," Berliner writes. "In recent years, however, that has changed."

Berliner writes, "For NPR, which purports to consider all things, it's devastating both for its journalism and its business model."

NPR investigative reporter Chiara Eisner wrote in a comment for this story: "Minorities do not all think the same and do not report the same. Good reporters and editors should know that by now. It's embarrassing to me as a reporter at NPR that a senior editor here missed that point in 2024."

Some colleagues drafted a letter to Maher and NPR's chief news executive, Edith Chapin, seeking greater clarity on NPR's standards for its coverage and the behavior of its journalists — clearly pointed at Berliner.

A plan for "healthy discussion"

On Friday, CEO Maher stood up for the network's mission and the journalism, taking issue with Berliner's critique, though never mentioning him by name. Among her chief issues, she said Berliner's essay offered "a criticism of our people on the basis of who we are."

Berliner took great exception to that, saying she had denigrated him. He said that he supported diversifying NPR's workforce to look more like the U.S. population at large. She did not address that in a subsequent private exchange he shared with me for this story. (An NPR spokesperson declined further comment.)

Late Monday afternoon, Chapin announced to the newsroom that Executive Editor Eva Rodriguez would lead monthly meetings to review coverage.

"Among the questions we'll ask of ourselves each month: Did we capture the diversity of this country — racial, ethnic, religious, economic, political geographic, etc — in all of its complexity and in a way that helped listeners and readers recognize themselves and their communities?" Chapin wrote in the memo. "Did we offer coverage that helped them understand — even if just a bit better — those neighbors with whom they share little in common?"

Berliner said he welcomed the announcement but would withhold judgment until those meetings played out.

In a text for this story, Chapin said such sessions had been discussed since Lansing unified the news and programming divisions under her acting leadership last year.

"Now seemed [the] time to deliver if we were going to do it," Chapin said. "Healthy discussion is something we need more of."

Disclosure: This story was reported and written by NPR Media Correspondent David Folkenflik and edited by Deputy Business Editor Emily Kopp and Managing Editor Gerry Holmes. Under NPR's protocol for reporting on itself, no NPR corporate official or news executive reviewed this story before it was posted publicly.

• Katherine Maher
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Watch CBS News

NPR suspends Uri Berliner, editor who accused the network of liberal bias

By Aimee Picchi

Edited By Alain Sherter

April 17, 2024 / 8:18 AM EDT / CBS News

National Public Radio has suspended Uri Berliner, a senior editor who earlier this month claimed in an essay that the network had "lost America's trust" by pushing progressive views in its coverage while suppressing dissenting opinions.

Berliner's suspension was reported by NPR media correspondent David Folkenflik, who said that the senior editor was suspended for five days without pay starting on Friday. A formal rebuke from NPR said Berliner had violated its policy of securing prior approval to write for other news outlets, and warned that he would be fired if he breached those guidelines in future, Folkenflik reported.

NPR declined to comment to CBS News. "NPR does not comment on individual personnel matters, including discipline," a spokesperson said. 

Berliner's  essay  in the Free Press caused a firestorm of debate, with some conservatives, including former President Donald Trump, calling on the government to "defund" the organization. Some of Berliner's NPR colleagues also took issue with the essay, with "Morning Edition" host Steve Inskeep writing on his Substack that the article was "filled with errors and omissions."

"The errors do make NPR look bad, because it's embarrassing that an NPR journalist would make so many," Inskeep wrote.

In the essay, Berliner wrote that NPR has always had a liberal bent, but that for most of his 25 year tenure it had retained an open-minded, curious culture. "In recent years, however, that has changed," he wrote. "Today, those who listen to NPR or read its coverage online find something different: the distilled worldview of a very small segment of the U.S. population."

Berliner added, "[W]hat's notable is the extent to which people at every level of NPR have comfortably coalesced around the progressive worldview. The "absence of viewpoint diversity" is "is the most damaging development at NPR," he wrote. 

After the essay's publication, NPR's top editor, Edith Chapin, said she strongly disagrees with Berliner's conclusions and is proud to stand behind NPR's work.

COVID coverage, DEI initiatives

Berliner criticized coverage of major events at NPR, singling out its reporting on COVID and Hunter Biden as problematic. With the first topic, he wrote that the network didn't cover a theory that COVID-19 had been created in a Chinese lab, a theory he claimed NPR staffers "dismissed as racist or a right-wing conspiracy."

He also took NPR for task for what he said was failing to report developments related to  Hunter Biden's laptop . "With the election only weeks away, NPR turned a blind eye," Berliner wrote. 

Berliner also criticized NPR for its internal management, citing what he claims is a growing focus on diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, or DEI.

"Race and identity became paramount in nearly every aspect of the workplace," Berliner wrote. "A growing DEI staff offered regular meetings imploring us to 'start talking about race'."

Inskeep said Berliner's essay left out the context that many other news organizations didn't report on Hunter Biden's laptop over questions about its authenticity. He also disputed Berliner's characterization that NPR editors and reporters don't debate story ideas. 

"The story is written in a way that is probably satisfying to the people who already believe it, and unpersuasive to anyone else — a mirror image of his critique of NPR," Inskeep wrote.

—With reporting by the Associated Press.

Aimee Picchi is the associate managing editor for CBS MoneyWatch, where she covers business and personal finance. She previously worked at Bloomberg News and has written for national news outlets including USA Today and Consumer Reports.

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