Turnitin FAQ
Note: My turnitin policies may be different from your past or future teachers. Always ask
your current teacher any specific questions you have about turnitin.
1. Turnitin gave my essay a percentage score after I uploaded it. What does it mean?
This is your originality score. This is the percent of your paper that turnitin has identified as
“unoriginal material.” In other words, this is the percentage of your paper that you did not write
yourself.
2. If I have a percentage of higher than 0%, does that mean I plagiarized?
Not necessarily. Some of it may be quotes. Turnitin highlights all “unoriginal material,” and as
long as all of the highlighted portions are properly enclosed in quotes, given credit using MLA
in-text citations, given credit on the Works cited page, and are not excessively long, you didn’t
do anything wrong. (“Excessively long” is more than four lines of your essay.)
3. Should I try to have a 0% originality score?
Not for an essay that requires you to do research and/or quote from a widely read text in order to
provide support for a claim. If you receive a 0% originality score, this probably means that you
have not included enough quotations to back up your claim.
4. How do I know if turnitin has found plagiarism in my essay?
If a significant portion of your essay that you did not mark with quote marks and an in-text
citation has been highlighted, it is plagiarism. Without quote marks and a citation, you are
basically claiming that you wrote these words yourself. This is false, and you need to fix it,
either by adding quote marks and citations (both in-text and on the Works Cited page) or by
rewriting.
5. What is a “significant portion” of my essay?
A “significant portion” might mean anything from a unique phrase of three or four words to an
entire (plagiarized) essay. For example, if you use Wordsworth’s statement that poetry is
“emotion recollected in tranquility,” you need to put quote marks around it, even though it’s only
four words, because those four words are unique to Wordsworth. On the other hand, a quote from
a source of five or six sentences would also be required to begin and end with quote marks and
be followed by an in-text citation to set it off from the writing that is unique to you.
6. What do I do if I find plagiarism in my essay?
If turnitin has only highlighted one or two plagiarized sentences, and you remember where the
quotes came from, simply put quote marks at the beginning and end of the words from the source
that turnitin marked, give credit to the author using an in-text citation, and make sure that the
source of the quote is on the works cited page at the end of your essay. If the quote is
excessively long, you can shorten the quote, or you can remove the quote entirely and paraphrase
the content of the quote, making sure to give credit to the source at the end of the paraphrase. If
you do not remember where the quote came from, you must take it out completely. When you
have corrected the accidental plagiarism, you can upload the new, correct version of your essay,
and it will replace the old version that contained the mistake. This means that it is a good idea to
give yourself some time to upload your essay before the cutoff time.
If turnitin highlighted your entire essay or an extremely high percentage of it, this means that you
copy-pasted the essay from an online source or sources, or you submitted an essay that has
already been submitted to the turnitin database. If this happens, then turnitin has caught you in
the worst form of cheating: intentional plagiarism. If this happens to you, you’d best hope that
you have enough time to take it down and upload something that is yours before I see it, because
if your submission is still heavily plagiarized after the due date, I will fail you on the assignment
with no hope of revising, and this may result in a failing grade in the class.
7. What is an acceptable originality score?
Usually, 25% or less is best. However, because I understand that turnitin does mark
considerable portions of the works cited page in some students’ essays, the maximum
originality score I will accept is 30%. If your originality score is more than 30%, you need to
either remove some of your quoted material, or you need to lengthen your own original ideas,
perhaps in response to the quoted material. Remember, your own response to any quote
should be at least twice as long as the quote itself. This will help you to keep a good balance
between quoted material and your own words.
8. Turnitin highlighted parts of my Works Cited page as unoriginal. Is that bad?
No. All this means is that another student or some other source in turitin’s database has included
a Works Cited entry for the same source you used. This is not plagiarism.
9. Turnitin highlighted my last name, my heading, or a very common phrase in my essay as
unoriginal. Is that bad?
No. Sometimes turnitin highlights headings because students from the same course have the
exact same heading, and this shows up as “unoriginal.” The same thing is true for last names and
common (not unique) phrases like, “Every day in America,” etc. If turnitin highlights these
things in your essay, there is no need to worry. This is not plagiarism.
10. How soon can I see my originality score after I upload my essay?
In most cases, your originality score is visible as soon as you upload the essay. If the turnitin
servers are very busy, you might not be able to see it immediately. Check back in five minutes,
and in most cases, it will be visible. In very rare cases, it might take up to an hour.