Sentence voice
Sentence voice is the relationship between a sentence's subject and the action it describes, determining whether the subject acts or is acted upon in the sentence.
Also known as:
Grammatical voice, Verb voice
What is sentence voice?
Sentence voice describes how a sentence positions its subject in relation to the verb. In active voice, the subject performs the action: "The writer revised the draft." In passive voice, the subject receives it: "The draft was revised by the writer." Every sentence you write uses one of these two constructions, and the choice affects how direct, clear and confident your writing sounds to the reader.
Active: The writer revised the draft.
Passive: The draft was revised by the writer.
Passive with doer omitted: The draft was revised.
Why does sentence voice matter?
Sentence voice is one of the most consistent signals of writing quality in brand content. Teams that do not have a clear rule on voice end up with a mix of active and passive constructions across their content, which creates an uneven, inconsistent tone. Defining a voice preference and enforcing it through your brand voice rules is one of the fastest ways to raise the overall standard of your content without changing what you say.
How do you use sentence voice?
Establish a default voice for your content: active voice is the right choice for most brand, product and support writing.
Identify passive constructions by scanning for "to be" verbs followed by a past participle, such as "was written," "is being reviewed" or "has been updated."
Set a sentence voice rule in Brivvy so every AI tool connected to your workspace applies your preferred construction automatically.
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