--- title: "AI Grader for Teachers: Essays and Open Answers" description: "AI grading for teachers: essays scored on your rubric and open quiz answers checked against your key, with feedback you review first. Start free, no card." canonical: https://formswrite.com/ai-grader last-updated: 2026-10-18 --- AI grading # AI Grader for Teachers Formswrite grades essays against your rubric and checks open quiz answers against your answer key, then shows you the score, the evidence and the feedback before anything is final. You get 30 AI-graded items a month free, and you stay the one who decides every grade. [Start grading free](/accounts/signup?source=ai-grader&returnUrl=%2Fdashboard%2Fgrader%2Fnew)[See the essay grader](/ai-essay-grader) - 30 free a month - Rubric or answer key - You review every grade Science explanation (CER) Student 14 6 / 8 - Claim2/2 - Evidence2/3 - Reasoning2/3 Evidence for Evidence “In our trial the plant in the dark lost 3 cm of height while the one by the window grew 5 cm.” GlowYour claim answers the question directly. GrowConnect the height change to photosynthesis in your reasoning. Hidden from the student until you approveApprove ## Two ways to grade with AI Pick the one that matches the work your students hand in. - Essays and long writing ### The essay grader Create an assignment, pick a rubric (AP, classroom or your own), add essays as text, Word or PDF files, or Google Docs links, and get a level, points, quoted evidence and a reason for every criterion. Approve each essay before students see it. [How the essay grader works](/ai-essay-grader) - Quizzes and short answers ### AI grading in your quizzes Build or convert a quiz in Formswrite and its short answer and paragraph questions are graded against your model answer as students submit, with partial credit. Multiple choice and exact answers are scored instantly. You can rescore any answer. [How short answers are graded](/tools/short-answer-grader) ## Built so you can trust the grades - ### Scores you can check Essay scores come with the sentences that earned them; quiz answers show why they got full, partial or no credit. - ### Nothing final without you Essay feedback waits for your approval, unsure grades are flagged, and you can change any score. - ### Feedback in your voice Choose an encouraging, neutral or direct tone and short or detailed comments for essay feedback. ## What AI grading is good at, and where it needs you AI grading tools for teachers are at their best on high-volume, criteria-based work: a class set of argumentative essays, thirty short answers on the same question, a DBQ practice set. The grader applies the same rubric to every paper without fatigue and gives each student specific feedback the same day. It is weaker where good work breaks the pattern: an unconventional structure, a creative risk, an answer that is right for a reason the key did not anticipate. That is why Formswrite drafts and flags, and you decide. ## Free AI grading, and when Pro makes sense The free plan includes 30 AI-graded essays or quiz responses a month, enough to try the grader on one real class set. Teachers who grade several classes a week move to Pro at $19 a month or $49.99 a year, which covers up to about 400 essays a month under a fair use limit and unlocks the rest of Formswrite Pro, such as Google Forms export. ## Choosing AI grading software Compare tools on four things: whether you can bring your own rubric, whether every score shows its evidence, whether anything can reach students before you approve it, and how student data is handled. Our [comparison of the best AI grading tools for teachers](/blog/ai-grading-tools-for-teachers) lays out prices and trade-offs, including where other tools are ahead of us today, such as LMS sync. ## Calibration, second grades and imports Calibration: grade or correct 3 to 5 essays and mark them as examples; the grader uses them as anchors, shows how often it matches you within 1 point and whether it runs stricter or more generous per criterion, and can regrade the rest with your grading. Double-grading: essays the grader is unsure about get a second, independent grade from another model, and disagreements are flagged for your review. You can also ask for a second opinion on any essay. Essays can come from [phone photos of handwritten pages](/grade-handwritten-essays), a [Google Classroom assignment](/integrations/google-classroom-ai-grading) or the [paragraph answers of a Google Form](/integrations/google-forms-ai-grading). Feedback can be written in English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, German, Filipino, Indonesian or Hindi, set per assignment; read it before you approve. Not available: Canvas or Schoology sync, and AI-writing or plagiarism detection. ## What it costs Start free with 30 essays a month. Pro is $19 a month or $49.99 a year (about $4.17 a month). - ### Free $0 No credit card - 30 graded essays a month - Typed, uploaded or handwritten essays, or imports from Google Classroom and Google Forms - Every rubric in the library, plus your own - Review and approve before students see anything [Start grading free](/accounts/signup?source=ai-grader-plans&returnUrl=%2Fdashboard%2Fgrader%2Fnew) - ### Pro $49.99 /year or $19 /month. Cancel or pause anytime. - Up to 400 essays a month (fair use) - Everything in Free: the same grader, rubrics and exports - Room for every class you teach, all year - All Formswrite Pro features, from quizzes to Google Forms export [See Pro plans](/pricing) ## AI grading tools and guides - [AI Essay GraderRubric scores per criterion, quoted evidence, glow and grow feedback.](/ai-essay-grader) - [Short Answer GraderOpen answers graded by meaning, not exact wording.](/tools/short-answer-grader) - [AI Grading for Google Forms quizzesImport a Google Form and grade its open answers with AI.](/tools/ai-grader-for-google-forms) - [Rubric GraderGrade a class set against any rubric you bring.](/rubric-grader) - [Rubric libraryAP DBQ, LEQ, Lang and Lit rubrics explained, with sources.](/rubrics) - [Best AI grading tools for teachersAn honest comparison of the main tools and their prices.](/blog/ai-grading-tools-for-teachers) ## AI grading FAQ What is an AI grader? An AI grader reads open-ended student work, such as essays, paragraphs and short answers, and suggests a score and feedback based on a rubric or an answer key. It replaces the first read, not the teacher: in Formswrite every AI grade can be checked and changed, and essay grades reach students only after you approve them. What can the Formswrite AI grader grade? Two kinds of work. Essays and longer writing go through the essay grader, which scores each rubric criterion with quoted evidence and feedback. Open questions in a Formswrite quiz (short answer and paragraph) are graded against your model answer as students submit, while multiple choice and exact answers are scored instantly without AI. Is there free AI grading? Yes. Free accounts get 30 AI-graded items a month, shared between essays and AI-graded quiz responses, with no credit card. Pro ($19 a month or $49.99 a year) covers up to about 400 essays a month under fair use, plus the rest of Formswrite Pro. Is AI grading accurate enough to use? It is a strong first pass when the rubric or answer key is specific, and weaker on creative or unusual answers. We are measuring the essay grader against officially scored samples and will publish the study before quoting any number. Review every grade, especially borderline ones and anything the grader flags. Can AI grade Google Forms answers? Yes. Google Forms only auto-grades exact answers, so the grader imports the paragraph and short answers of a Google Form your account owns or edits, grades them against a rubric and exports the results as a CSV or a Google Sheet. The Google Forms API cannot take grades back into the form. You can also import a quiz into Formswrite and have its open answers graded as students submit. How is this different from AI grading tools like CoGrader or EssayGrader? All of them draft rubric scores for teacher review. Formswrite puts essay grading next to the quizzes you already build here, includes AP rubrics with official sources, and is part of one Formswrite plan. CoGrader and EssayGrader currently offer more LMS integrations. Our comparison of AI grading tools covers prices and trade-offs. Will students know the work was graded with AI? That is your call and your school’s policy. We recommend telling students that AI drafts feedback and a teacher reviews every grade, and giving them a way to ask for a regrade. Last reviewed October 18, 2026 by the Formswrite team, against the live product. ## Let AI take the first pass Bring a rubric or an answer key, add the work, and review drafts instead of starting from zero. - No credit card - 30 free a month - You approve every grade [Start grading free](/accounts/signup?source=ai-grader&returnUrl=%2Fdashboard%2Fgrader%2Fnew)[See pricing](/pricing)