What is headline clarity?

Headline clarity is a composite verdict that flags when a title is cognitively demanding in at least 1 of 3 ways: too long (more than 12 words), too complex (Flesch-Kincaid grade above 12), or overloaded with persuasive language (more than 3 power words). All 3 conditions must hold simultaneously for the headline to be marked clear; failing any one of them results in a "hard to parse" message.

The check is distinct from the raw word-count and character-count meters. The word-count and character-count meters each reward proximity to an ideal of 6 words and 55 characters respectively. Clarity is binary and more permissive on length — it accepts up to 12 words — because the concern here is comprehension, not brevity. A 10-word headline at grade 8 with 2 power words is perfectly clear even if its raw word-count score is below peak.

3 independent checks combine into 1 verdict. Word count comes from tokenisation (Seeklyn splits on whitespace and strips punctuation). Reading grade is the Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level — a formula based on average syllables per word and words per sentence; for a single-sentence headline it depends almost entirely on syllable count per token. Power-word count is the number of tokens in Seeklyn's curated persuasive-word list (words like "proven", "ultimate", "guaranteed").

3 or more power words in a single headline shifts the register from informative to promotional — a density that is both harder to parse and less credible to an answer engine. Seeklyn's word-balance scoring targets 1–3 power words as the optimal range; beyond that, the repetition of emphatic language clutters the main claim. The clarity check uses the same threshold (≤ 3) to flag the tipping point, so the two checks reinforce each other without double-penalising the writer.