How to Shorten a College Essay to Meet the Word Limit


The 650-word essay is known by many names like personal statement or common application essay. The most crucial essay for undergraduate applicants hoping to enroll in a US university is this one. More than 800 US universities accept this 650-word essay as their major admission criteria! That translates for students to be both practical and terrifying at the same time. How do you decide which 650-word essay prompt would produce the best college essay when you’re comparing them all? Nothing to be concerned about.


This blog, written by the experts at will guide you through best practices and all aspects related to a 650-word essay. By reading this piece, you will be able to ideate, make, and eventually achieve positive results with any admission essay.

A 650-word essay is typically a short essay that is used to evaluate the abilities of a candidate planning to join a USA-based university to pursue higher studies. Such pieces of content bring their inner self in front of the admission officers’ panel and through proper evaluation of these essays, candidates are being selected for continuing their further studies.

How Many Pages Is 650 Words? (YouTube Short)

Pursuing higher studies in a famous USA-based university is the dream of many overseas students. And one of the common processes for admission here in the US is submitting a 650-word essay. This essay is evaluated by the panel of admission officers and then the candidates are selected.

If you are also an aspirant and looking forward to continuing your educational journey from any of the USA-based colleges, it is a must for you to hone your essay writing skills to produce an engaging essay within the 650-word limit.

The final number of references that you should include in an essay of 650 to 700 words will depend on the assignment’s genre and complexity. For instance, on middle-school level, you’ll have to add 4 references on average. A bachelor-level assignment of 650 words will require 8 references, while a graduate-level paper should refer to at least 13 sources.

The 650-word essay is quite critical and needs much writing skills and patience from the students. There are some common issues that students face while writing such a piece.


650-Word Essay Samples: A+ Paper Examples for Free

You can’t include every detail of your life in the 650 words allotted. To assist the reader in understanding your , focus your common application essay on a specific experience or issue that highlights one of your strongest qualities.

How Many Pages Is a 650-Word Essay Double Spaced

The easiest way to organize a 650-word essay is to use a standard 5-paragraph structure. The paper should start with an introduction: a hook, some background data, and a thesis statement. Then come three body paragraphs, each focused on one argument. The concluding paragraph is to contain a summary and a restated thesis.

Guide for writing the best 650-word essay?

Notice that the intro is pretty quick—it uses just over 50 words to give us a clear sense of focus and direction and voice. That allows the author to dedicate more like 100-150 words to each body paragraph, showing a different side of who she is and what she values. It wouldn’t necessarily be bad to have a longer intro, but keep in mind that it’s the moments and experiences in the body that demonstrate your values and insights that will tend to have the biggest impact on the reader.

Is a 650-word essay too long for college applications

A 650-word essay contains 4 to 7 paragraphs on average. The length of a typical academic paragraph is about 100 words. You should include at least four sentences in your paragraph.

How Long Is an Essay? The Ultimate Essay Length Guide

To be able to get rid of all these common errors need a clear understanding of what is asked of you to write and analysis of it. This can only be done when you spare some quality time practicing such essays regularly. Unfortunately, students at their undergrads level already have huge academic pressure and literally think to ask someone Can you please do my 650-word essay? The solution to this common issue is finding a genuine essay writing service on your search engine and paying them a small amount to get it done professionally.

Essay Guide: How Long is an Essay

Unfortunately, many students leave their admissions essay as the last step of their application process after studying for the SAT and learning how to request letters of recommendation. High school students don’t have the time, energy, experience, or organizational skills to prioritize their essay word count and word limits when writing their draft and receiving , , or , depending on your admissions documents.