Reading your plagiarism report: sources, matches, percentages

Quick answer: The report has three parts — an overall match percentage, color highlights in your text, and a list of matched sources. Click any source to see exactly which sentences matched it.

The three parts of the report

After a scan, you see:

1. Overall plagiarism percentage — how much of your text matched something already online.
2. Inline highlights — matched segments are shaded in your text so you can see what triggered the match.
3. Matched sources — a list of URLs, each with a match percentage and a count of matched segments.

What the percentage means

The overall percentage is the share of your text that overlaps with sources on the web. A few points of overlap are normal — common phrases, names, and citations match too. A high percentage means large passages line up closely with existing pages and are worth reviewing.

Note: A match is not automatically plagiarism. Quotes you cited, your own previously published text, and standard phrasing all show up as matches. Read the highlighted segments before drawing conclusions.

Sources and sentence-level attribution

The Matched Sources list shows each source URL with:

• Its match percentage — how much of your text overlaps with that one source.
• A segment count — how many separate passages matched it.

Click a source to see sentence-level attribution: the exact sentences in your text that matched that source are highlighted. This is the part that tells you what to fix, not just how much.

Fixing a high score

• Rewrite the highlighted passages in your own words, or quote and cite them properly.
• Re-run the scan after editing to confirm the overlap dropped.
• For loose paraphrases that still match, change sentence structure, not just a few words.

FAQ

Does the checker scan academic databases? No — it scans the open web. Paywalled databases like JSTOR or ProQuest are not in scope.

Can I export the report? The on-screen report is the report. Use your browser's print or save-as-PDF to keep a copy.

Why did it find matches in my own original text? Common phrasing, names, and citations match existing pages. Check the highlighted segments to judge each one.

Related

• How to run a plagiarism check
• Plagiarism Checker daily word limit (free plan)
• How GPTinf handles your content (privacy overview)