Skip to main content
Cathoven Logo

Measure Text Difficulty with Catile Score

Get a precise, percentile-based reading difficulty rating for native English speakers. Validated by Columbia University research.

📊 Catile Score🏫 Grade Levels🔬 Research-Validated
Try Catile Checker Free

No credit card required

Catile Checker demo

See Catile Checker in action

What is Catile Score?

Catile Score is a percentile-based text difficulty measurement designed for native English speakers. Unlike CEFR, which targets language learners, Catile tells you how hard a text is for native readers — making it ideal for K-12 education, publishing, and content creation.

Analyse Your Text Now

Key Features

A research-validated way to measure text difficulty for native readers.

Native Speaker Focused

Unlike CEFR, Catile measures reading difficulty for native English speakers, making it ideal for K-12 education and native-language assessment.

Percentile-Based Scoring

Get a precise percentile ranking that tells you exactly how difficult your text is compared to a broad range of English reading materials.

Research-Validated

The Catile scoring method is validated by Columbia University research and cited in peer-reviewed publications for text difficulty analysis.

Instant Results

Paste any text and get your Catile percentile score in seconds. No waiting, no complex setup, no sign-up required for basic analysis.

Catile Level and Grade Chart

We did research to find the Catile levels for each grade. The data is collected from students in the United States with a size of over 500 thousand samples. You can see the results in the table below.

The table shows the range of Catile levels suitable for a certain grade. As an example, for grade 5 students, texts with Catile levels between 795C and 1100C are suitable. You can also say a text with 900C is suitable for grade 5 and grade 6 students.

Grade (US)AgeMin. Catile LevelMax. Catile Level
16-75C365C
27-8245C605C
38-9480C810C
49-10700C1005C
510-11795C1100C
611-12875C1180C
712-13940C1250C
813-141000C1310C
914-151050C1360C
1015-161095C1410C
1116-171140C1450C
12+17-181140C1450C

* Based on data collected from over 500,000 student samples in the United States.

How to Use

Three simple steps to get your Catile score.

1

Paste Your Text

Go to Cathoven Language Hub and paste any English text into the Catile analyser.

2

Click Analyse

Hit the Analyse button. Results appear instantly with no sign-up required.

3

Get Catile Percentile Score

See your text's percentile-based difficulty rating for native English speakers, plus grade-level estimates.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does Catile correlate to Lexile scores?
Catile uses a similar grading scale to Lexile, so scores are often very close. However, Catile uses AI and Natural Language Processing for deeper analysis — distinguishing word difficulty by grammatical role and contextual meaning — while Lexile uses simpler formulas. Lexile is not associated with Cathoven.
How can I determine grade level from a Catile score?
Use the Catile–Grade Chart which maps Catile scores to US grade levels from Grade 1 through Grade 12+. You can find the full chart at /blog/catile-score-and-grade-chart-2.
What is the difference between Catile and readability scores?
Readability scores use simple, rigid formulas based on sentence length and syllable count. Catile uses the latest NLP technology to capture all aspects of the text — from word difficulties to sentence structures and beyond. If you need to choose between them, Catile provides a more accurate assessment.
What is a Catile Score?
Catile Score is Cathoven's proprietary reading difficulty measurement for native English speakers. It provides a precise percentile-based difficulty rating validated by research, similar to how standardized tests rank reading levels.
How is Catile different from CEFR?
CEFR measures difficulty for language learners (non-native speakers), while Catile measures difficulty for native English readers. Catile is better suited for K-12 education and native-language reading level assessment.
Is the Catile Checker free?
Yes. You can analyze text difficulty for free with the simple version on the website. Create a free Language Hub account for additional daily analyses.

Check Your Text Difficulty Now

Free to use. No sign-up required. Instant percentile-based results.

Try Catile Checker Free

Explore More Language Tools

Analyze, adapt, and improve your text with Cathoven.

CEFR Checker

Analyze any text by CEFR level (A1-C2). See vocabulary difficulty word by word.

Try CEFR Checker →

Readability Checker

Get Flesch-Kincaid, Gunning Fog, SMOG, and 5 more readability scores instantly.

Try Readability Checker →

Level Adaptor

Rewrite any text to a target CEFR level automatically. Simplify or enrich content.

Try Level Adaptor →