- Updated August 5, 2025
Passive voice can be a tricky concept to grasp, but it’s one that can easily sneak into business writing, especially in regulated industries where clarity and precision are paramount. In 2025, the need to communicate clearly and concisely is even more critical due to the increasing reliance on AI writing assistants to help businesses maintain consistency in their communication. This guide will help you understand what passive voice is, how to recognize it, and why you should avoid it in your business writing—especially when automated tools are analyzing and improving your content for clarity.
Why Passive Voice Is More of a Problem Than You Think
In 2025, businesses are not only focused on improving their own writing but also ensuring that the content generated by AI tools adheres to plain language principles. AI writing assistants, such as VT Writer, are increasingly used to analyze content and eliminate passive voice to improve readability, making it even more important to avoid this grammatical structure in your drafts. Passive voice may have been a standard in formal writing, but it now stands as a barrier to clear communication.
Example of passive voice
“Mistakes were made in the implementation of the new policy.”
It’s vague. It hides responsibility and lacks clarity.
Better active voice:
“Our team made mistakes in implementing the new policy.”
In this active voice version, it’s clear who is responsible, and the sentence feels more direct and transparent—qualities that AI-driven tools are designed to prioritize.
What Exactly Is Passive Voice?
Let’s break it down. Active voice means that the subject of the sentence is performing an action:
Active voice: The executive team approved the budget.
Passive voice: The budget was approved by the executive team.
In passive voice, the focus shifts to the action rather than who’s performing it. While it can be useful in certain cases (like when the doer is unknown), overuse can obscure meaning and dilute the impact of your message, especially when readers may be skimming your content or relying on AI assistants to parse the text quickly.
How To Spot Passive Voice in Your Writing (And Why AI Can Help)
As AI writing assistants like VT Writer have become more sophisticated in recent years, they’ve made it easier to detect passive voice in your content. These tools can scan your document, identify it, and suggest active voice alternatives that are clearer and more engaging.
Tip: If you’re unsure whether a sentence is in passive voice, consider whether it sounds indirect or evasive. AI tools now flag these areas for you, improving your writing with a few clicks.
How Passive Voice Affects Your Business Writing in 2025
In the era of AI-powered communication tools, businesses are expected to write clearly, avoid jargon, and build trust with their audiences. Passive voice can harm that trust for several reasons:
It’s Wordy
Passive voice often leads to unnecessarily longer sentences. With AI’s assistance, you can easily identify and trim these sentences, helping you communicate your point with fewer words.It Lacks Clarity
With the rise of automated content analysis tools, the consequences of passive voice in terms of clarity have never been more apparent. For instance, “The document was submitted” doesn’t tell you who submitted it, which could cause confusion, especially in regulated industries where accuracy is critical.It Evades Responsibility
Passive voice can sound like you’re hiding something. In the corporate world, especially within industries like healthcare, government, or finance, transparency is crucial. Using active voice makes it clear who is responsible for actions and decisions, building credibility and trust.It Sounds Detached and Formal
AI writing assistants encourage a more conversational tone. While passive voice might have been the norm for legal documents in the past, in 2025, the shift is toward writing that feels personal, approachable, and direct—qualities that AI can enhance when given the right guidelines.
The Tools You Need
With the increased use of AI writing assistants, businesses can now monitor and manage their writing more effectively. Tools like VT Writer can identify passive voice usage and provide a readability score so you can refine your content. Whether you’re writing a proposal, an internal memo, or customer-facing emails, these AI-driven tools ensure your writing remains clear and to the point.
Using software to monitor your usage isn’t just a luxury; it’s essential for maintaining a professional tone and building trust in a rapidly evolving digital landscape.
How to Avoid Passive Voice in Your Writing (with AI Assistance)
1. Look for the “Doer” of the Action
When analyzing your sentences, ask yourself: Who is doing the action? With AI, tools like VT Writer can flag sentences where the doer is hidden or delayed.2. Use the “By Zombies” Test
Add “by zombies” to the end of a sentence. If it still makes sense, it’s likely passive voice. AI tools can help identify these instances automatically.3. Focus on Key Phrases
Certain words often indicate passive voice, like “was,” “were,” and “by.” AI writing assistants analyze these words to provide you with specific areas for revision.
Why Active Voice Should Be the Standard
In 2025, businesses using AI tools to help craft content must prioritize active voice to meet modern expectations for clarity, precision, and trustworthiness. Passive voice may still have a place in specific contexts, but for most business writing, active voice is the clear choice.
With AI tools like VT Writer, eliminating passive voice has never been easier, and as AI continues to evolve, these tools will become even more adept at helping you write in the clearest, most efficient way possible.
Conclusion
In a world where AI-powered writing assistants can streamline your content creation process and ensure clarity, avoiding passive voice has become a crucial part of maintaining professionalism and building trust with your audience. Use these tools to review your writing and increase use of active voice, and you’ll not only improve your writing style but also your overall communication effectiveness.
