Limato
Sentence Fragment Checker
Flags the sentences in your draft that are not sentences — then repairs them without touching your wording. Free, no signup.
This is a heuristic, not a grammar parser: it flags sentences with no finite verb and subordinate clauses standing alone, and it skips questions, exclamations and anything under three words. It will miss some fragments and occasionally flag a correct sentence — check each one. The fix button is the real repair.
How to use the sentence fragment checker
Paste up to 750 words. Two separate things happen:
- The scan is local and instant. Sentences that look like fragments are highlighted as you type, with a count and the share of your sentences flagged. Nothing is sent anywhere. It is a heuristic — two rules, described below — so treat a highlight as "look at this", not "this is broken".
- The fix is a grammar pass. Click Fix the fragments and the text comes back with Limato's Grammar tone applied: it repairs grammar, spelling and punctuation errors — including fragments and run-ons — and leaves your wording, structure and style otherwise intact. It is not a rewrite. The same engine powers the punctuation checker.
What a sentence fragment is
An English sentence needs three things: a subject, a finite verb (one carrying tense — writes, wrote, is writing, not writing or to write), and the ability to stand on its own. Take away any one of them and you have a fragment: a piece of a sentence punctuated as if it were a whole one.
- Because the client cancelled. — subject and verb are there, but because makes it dependent. It cannot stand alone.
- Running late for the meeting. — no subject, and running is not a finite verb.
- A great idea for the next quarter. — no verb at all.
The reason fragments matter more than most style errors: they make a reader stop and re-read. In an email to a client or a hiring manager, that costs you more credibility than any amount of clunky phrasing.
Five kinds of fragment, and how to fix each
Almost every fragment is one of these. The fix is nearly always to attach it to the sentence next to it — the one it was already leaning on.
- 1. Subordinate clause alone. Starts with because, although, since, when, if, while, unless, after. "We delayed the launch. Because the API wasn't ready." → "We delayed the launch because the API wasn't ready."
- 2. Relative clause alone. Starts with which, who, that. "She rewrote the whole deck. Which took two days." → "She rewrote the whole deck, which took two days."
- 3. -ing phrase. A participle pretending to be a verb. "Running late for the meeting. I skipped lunch." → "Running late for the meeting, I skipped lunch." or "I was running late, so I skipped lunch."
- 4. Missing verb (noun phrase or appositive). "Our new pricing. A single tier at $5.99." → "Our new pricing is a single tier at $5.99."
- 5. Afterthought phrase. Starts with for example, such as, especially, like, and, but. "We tested several tools. For example, Grammarly and QuillBot." → "We tested several tools, for example Grammarly and QuillBot."
Three repair moves cover all five: join it to the neighbouring sentence, add the missing subject or verb, or delete the subordinator that made it dependent.
Fragments that are perfectly fine
Fragments are only errors in the contexts that expect complete sentences. Deliberate ones are everywhere in good English writing:
- Dialogue and replies. "Coming?" "In a minute." Nobody speaks in complete sentences.
- Emphasis. "We shipped it in three weeks. Without a designer." The full stop is the point.
- Headlines, titles, bullet points, captions, UI labels. All conventionally verbless.
- Answers to your own question. "Why did it take so long? Two rewrites and a holiday."
- Marketing and fiction, where rhythm outranks the rule.
The distinction that matters: a fragment you chose is a stylistic device, a fragment you did not notice is an error. This checker skips questions, exclamations and anything under three words for exactly that reason — but it cannot read your intent, so the final call is yours. Academic papers, cover letters and formal reports are where you want zero of them.
Fragment patterns in non-native English
Some fragments are specific to writing English as a second language:
- Dropping the subject. Spanish, Italian, Polish and Russian let you leave it implicit — "Envié el informe" is a complete sentence. English does not: "Sent the report yesterday" is a fragment (fine in a chat message, wrong in an email to a client).
- Dropping the copula. Russian, Arabic and Turkish have no present-tense be. "The report ready" needs is to become a sentence.
- Dummy it and there. English requires a placeholder subject: not "Is important to confirm" but "It is important to confirm"; not "Are three options" but "There are three options".
- Long subordinate opener with no main clause. The longer the opener gets, the easier it is to forget to finish: "Although we discussed the timeline with the client last week during the review call." — and then nothing.
- The full stop where a comma belongs. Writers taught that long sentences are bad sometimes chop them at the subordinator, producing a fragment out of an instinct that was otherwise good.
For the wording habits that mark a text as non-native even when every sentence is complete, see 12 ESL patterns native speakers never use.
Fragments, run-ons and comma splices
These three are the family of sentence-boundary errors, and they are opposites in the same way:
- Fragment: less than one sentence punctuated as one. "Because the client cancelled."
- Run-on (fused sentence): two sentences with nothing between them. "I sent the report she never replied."
- Comma splice: two sentences joined by a comma, which cannot do that job. "I sent the report, she never replied."
Fixing one badly produces another — chop a run-on at the wrong place and you get a fragment. The Grammar tone behind the fix button handles all three, and so does the punctuation checker. If commas are the specific problem, the comma checker goes rule by rule.
What this checker flags, and what it misses
The local scan applies two rules, and nothing more:
- No finite verb. If a sentence contains no auxiliary, no modal, no common verb and no verb-shaped word, it is flagged. That catches "A great idea for the next quarter" and "Running late for the meeting".
- A subordinate clause standing alone. A sentence opening with because, although, though, whereas, unless, whenever, wherever, which or who and containing no comma is flagged.
What it deliberately does not do: flag questions, exclamations or sentences under three words, since that is where legitimate fragments live. What it will miss: fragments whose words happen to look verb-shaped, and dropped subjects in sentences that otherwise contain a verb. What it may over-flag: unusual but complete sentences. It is a first pass — the fix button, which reads the whole sentence in context, is the real check.
The scan never leaves your browser. Only the fix button sends text to the API, and that text is processed and returned, never stored.
Fix it anywhere you write
Limato's Chrome extension rewrites and corrects text inline on any website — Gmail, Slack, LinkedIn, Notion. Highlight, fix, paste back. 20 free rewrites a day.
Add to Chrome — FreeFrequently asked questions
What is a sentence fragment?
A group of words punctuated as a sentence that cannot stand alone — because it has no subject, no finite verb, or because it starts with a subordinator like because or although that makes it depend on another clause. "Because the client cancelled." and "A great idea for next quarter." are both fragments.
How do I know if a sentence is a fragment?
Read it out of context, with nothing before or after it. If it leaves you waiting for the rest, it is a fragment. Then check the three ingredients: a subject, a finite verb (one with tense — writes, wrote, is writing; not writing or to write), and no leftover subordinator at the front.
How do I fix a sentence fragment?
Three moves cover almost every case: join it to the sentence beside it ("We delayed the launch because the API wasn't ready"), add the missing subject or verb ("Our new pricing is a single tier"), or delete the word that made it dependent (drop "Because"). The fix button here does the same thing while keeping your wording.
Are sentence fragments always wrong?
No. Dialogue, emphasis, headlines, bullet points, captions and answers to your own question all use them deliberately, and good writers do it constantly. A fragment you chose is a device; one you did not notice is an error. In academic papers, cover letters and formal reports, aim for none.
Is the fragment detection accurate?
It is an honest heuristic, not a grammar parser. It applies two rules — no finite verb, and a subordinate clause with no main clause — and skips questions, exclamations and very short sentences. Expect it to miss some fragments and occasionally flag a correct sentence. The AI fix that follows reads the sentence in context and is the more reliable check.
Does fixing fragments change my writing?
As little as possible. The fix runs Limato's Grammar tone, which corrects grammar, spelling and punctuation and is told explicitly not to rephrase, simplify or change your style. Fragments get joined or completed; the rest of your wording stays as you wrote it.