What is an acceptable level of Turnitin similarity percentage? How much plagiarism is actually too much on Turnitin? What should be the ideal or good Turnitin score?
Do you have the same questions?
I too had…
Actually, every student wants to know the answer to these questions. Who wants to get low grades in subjects because of a high Turnitin score?
Table of Contents
Factors that Determine How much Turnitin Similarity is too much
Before we finalize what is acceptable Turnitin similarity score, we have to find out what Turnitin actually checks in our paper. Turnitin provides various options to the instructor while creating a class for checking Turnitin score.
These options determine Turnitin originality report acceptable percentage.
Question 1: Exclude bibliographic materials from Similarity Index for all papers in this assignment?
The instructor can either select yes or no. This setting allows the instructor to choose to exclude text appearing in the bibliography, works cited, or references sections of a student paper from being checked for matches while generating Similarity Reports.
If the instructor has selected the yes option, the Turnitin acceptable plagiarism score should be increased by the instructor. It is because there is more likely a chance that students unknowingly get online data from similar sources. You should ask your instructor about this feature.
Turnitin will show plagiarism for the text appearing in the bibliography, works cited, or references sections even students have not copied from each other. That’s why the instructor will increase the acceptable Turnitin similarity score.
Question 2: Exclude Quoted Materials from Similarity Index for all Papers in this Assignment?
The instructor can either select yes or no. This setting allows the instructor to choose to exclude text appearing in the quotes from being checked for matches while generating Similarity Reports.
If the instructor has selected no, the acceptable Turnitin score will be high. There is more chance to get plagiarism or high turnitin score if everyone is writing on the same topic. Same topics will use similar terms and Turnitin will consider it plagiarism if three words match in a single line.
The instructor should exclude the quoted materials from the acceptable turnitin percentage if all students are working on same topic. Otherwise, the ideal acceptable Turnitin score should be high.
Question 3: Exclude Small Sources?
The instructor can either select yes or no. This setting allows the instructor to choose to exclude sources that are not sufficient length (determined by the instructor) from being considered while generating Similarity Reports.
Note: The instructor can override all above options in individual Similarity Reports as well.
We have made a test to analyze the impact of all the above options and you will be astonished to see how much plagiarism these factors were including. You can see from the below picture that the total Turnitin plagiarism score is 45%.
That’s means your content is not original???
Wait…
Let us apply the above filters where we will exclude quoted material, bibliography, or any citation and also exclude small resources as shown below.
You will be astonished to see the difference from 45% to 10% Turnitin score. We still have to discover one more option available for instructors to evaluate how much Turnitin similarity is too much.
Here it is…
Question 6: Search Options?
This option determines the diversity of Turnitin plagiarism check. It has three options to select including student paper repository, current and archived internet, periodicals, journals, & publications. If the instructor selects all options, it means that a strict plagiarism policy is applicable.
In this case, the instructor should increase the allowable Turnitin percentage limit. You can also ask your instructor about what resources will be checked for this purpose and it may help you reduce the plagiarism percentage to an acceptable level.
Turnitin Similarity Percentage. How much is too much?
After analyzing the above discussion, you can evaluate that defining the Turnitin Score limit is very subject to the instructor, institution and depends on various factors. The most commonly acceptable Turnitin percentage limit is 60% to 70% for freshman year (First year at University), 50% for the sophomore year (2nd year at University), 40% for the junior year (3rd year at University), and 20% to 30% for senior year students.
If you are writing a journal or research article then it is recommended to have turnitin Plagiarism of less than 10%. It increase authenticity and originality of your work. Now, how much turnitin similarity is actually too much?
If you just copy-paste from the internet and don’t add value to your work, it will definitely show plagiarism and that is too much. You have to make sure you have done your work. If Turnitin similarity crosses the 40% limit, it is too much.
What is Acceptable Turnitin Similarity Percentage or Score?
If you want to make sure that your content is not rejected due to plagiarism, you should keep your turnitin percentage nearly 20% to 30%. Turnitin score of 20% is ideal score and is acceptable almost everywhere.
The Best Alternative of Turnitin
As we know that Turnitin is a paid tool and most students cannot afford this so, we need to go for some alternatives.
Finding alternatives as efficient as Turnitin can be difficult but we did it for you!
· Prepostseo
Prepostseo is one of the finest and efficient tools and we can easily use it as an alternative to Turnitin due to the accuracy and efficiency of this tool.
You can get these features:
- You can upload files to check plagiarism
- You can use chrome extension
- Content safety and security is ensured
- Report generation
- Report with proper sources and percentage
· Check-Plagiarism.com
Check-plagiarism.com can also be a good alternative to Turnitin if your preference is performance and ease of use.
This tool is free and provides all the features that are needed and can make this tool the best.
So, let’s have a look at them:
- Fast and accurate
- Safe
- Check multiple files at a time
- Multiple formats are available
- User-friendly interface
Final Piece of Advise
You should ask your instructor about options included for checking Turnitin plagiarism and score. And also inquire about the acceptable limit for content originality. You don’t need to spend too much of time just to remove plagiarism rather focusing on your learning.
When you are done with half of your report just check its Turnitin score to evaluate how much originality you need to add before finalizing your report. This technique always helped me to get a Turnitin score below 20 and got maximum grades every time.