How to Paraphrase a Quote (Without Plagiarizing)
Paraphrasing a quote lets you use the idea in your own voice. Here are the steps to do it well, what counts as too close, and why you still cite it.
You found the perfect line in a source, but you have quoted plenty already, or the exact wording does not fit your flow. Paraphrasing it lets you carry the idea in your own voice. Done properly, that is good scholarship; done lazily, it is plagiarism. The difference is entirely in the method.
The four steps
- Read the passage until you genuinely understand it, then look away from it. You cannot reword what you are staring at without echoing it.
- Write the idea from memory, in your own words AND your own sentence structure, not the same sentence with a few synonyms swapped.
- Compare your version to the original. If the structure or distinctive phrases still match, you are too close, redo it.
- Cite it. A paraphrase still uses someone else's idea, so it needs an in-text citation just like a quote does.
Original: "Social media platforms exploit psychological vulnerabilities to maximize engagement." Too close (patchwriting): Social media sites exploit psychological weaknesses to maximize engagement. Real paraphrase: These platforms are built to hold attention by targeting the ways human psychology can be nudged.
The trap: patchwriting
Swapping a few words for synonyms while keeping the author's sentence shape is called patchwriting, and most instructors and detectors treat it as plagiarism. A real paraphrase changes both the words and the structure, and it still gets a citation. If you can lay your version next to the original and see the same skeleton, it is not done yet.
Paste the passage and the Paraphraser rewrites it in your own words while keeping the meaning, then cite the original.
Paraphraser →