As a longtime copy editor and self-proclaimed “grammar enforcer,” I’ve always believed mistakes mattered. I side-eye every error I spot in books, magazines, Facebook posts and texts—even on restaurant menus. I’ve always thought that clean, correct writing wasn’t negotiable.
Now, that expectation seems to be sliding. Messages are faster, looser and a lot messier. Lowercase letters slip in. Autocorrect goes unchecked. Terminal punctuation is left off. And instead of standing out, these imperfections often blend right in.
In some cases, they even send a message of their own.
So when I started seeing typos framed as a good thing—somehow signaling status or authenticity—I was horrified, and I had questions. Are people really embracing messy writing? Or are we just getting used to it?
To understand what’s driving the shift, I spoke to Mignon Fogarty, aka Grammar Girl, and Amy Gallo, a workplace communications expert and Harvard Business Review contributor. Read on to find out whether you should be leaning into the typo trend or quietly fixing those mistakes before anyone notices.
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What’s with all the typos?
The rise in typos isn’t about people suddenly forgetting how to spell or how to use an apostrophe. It’s about what writing signals now—and how those signals have changed in an AI-saturated, always-on world.
At the same time, workplace norms themselves are evolving. “For sure, we’re seeing a shift,” Gallo says. “Over the course of my career, I’ve gone from swearing I’d never include an emoji or an exclamation point in my emails to casually texting with colleagues and even clients, often without any punctuation.”
Here are some of the reasons for the apparent surge in typos.
Typos can signal status
In some contexts, typos suggest something counterintuitive: importance.
Fogarty hadn’t initially thought of typos this way, but she sees the logic. “It does make sense,” she says, noting that careful writing traditionally signals effort—and effort signals respect.
“If you are so important that you don’t have to spend time making your message clear and simple, it shows that you have status, that you don’t need to value your reader’s time,” she explains. “They should be recognizing that you are so important, you don’t even have time to get it right for them.”
Gallo has seen the dynamic play out in real workplaces. “If they are generally well regarded, people interpret their typos as a sign that they are too busy to double-check what they’ve written,” she says of senior leaders. “We might imagine them rushing between meetings or answering swiftly during a hectic travel day.”
Of course, this works only if the reader already assumes you’re credible. Otherwise, a typo is just … a typo.
Errors make writing feel more human in the age of AI
Perfect writing used to be the goal. Now, it can raise suspicion.
Since AI-generated text is typically polished and error-free, “adding a typo or a mistake is a low-level way of making your writing look like a real person is behind the message,” says Fogarty.
Gallo has noticed the same shift in perception. “When people suspect that their colleague has used AI to write an email (and a telltale sign is often a lack of typos or other grammatical mistakes!), they think less of them—we often think they’re lazy, for example.”
That said, Fogarty doesn’t recommend faking mistakes to seem real. “Adding your own voice [and] mixing up your style are all better ways to make your writing sound human,” she says.
Voice-to-text is quietly changing how we write
Not all typos are intentional. Some are just the result of how we communicate now.
“I’ve seen a big increase in people using voice-to-text,” Fogarty says. When messages are dictated, rushed and sent on the go, small errors slip in—and increasingly, no one is surprised when they do.
Casual communication has lowered the bar
Workplace communication isn’t what it used to be. Slack messages, quick emails and text-like exchanges have replaced more formal writing.
Perfect grammar “is definitely more important in your client communications than it is in an internal Slack message,” Fogarty notes.
Gallo agrees that expectations vary widely by platform. “How I write an email versus a Slack message versus a text is very different,” she says. “With platforms like Slack, Teams, text and WhatsApp, there are unspoken rules that you’re allowed to be more informal and not worry as much about mistakes.”
In fact, being overly polished in casual channels can give off the wrong vibe. As Gallo puts it, “formality in those platforms can often backfire and make you seem awkward.”
You just don’t care
Sometimes, the explanation is straightforward: People aren’t prioritizing proofreading.
With constant notifications, packed schedules and an expectation of quick replies, many messages are sent as soon as they’re written. The goal is to respond, not refine.
And in some cases, that trade-off is intentional. Gallo points to one colleague who regularly sends imperfect emails without consequence. “I don’t think twice about it because I know how productive and efficient she is. I just assume that she’s moving fast and not rereading messages before she presses send.”
Is it rude to send typo-ridden messages?
It depends. The acceptability of typos still hinges on context and audience.
Gallo emphasized that relationships matter: “We tend to think of people who send emails with typos as less conscientious and trustworthy,” she says. But that judgment softens with familiarity. “It’s likely, given affinity bias, that we are more forgiving of mistakes made by people we know well.”
When to let the typos slide
Typos are generally fine in low-stakes, informal communication: quick updates, internal chats or casual emails where clarity isn’t affected. “Nobody is perfect, so nobody is going to think less of you because you have a typo here and there,” Fogarty says.
But if you’re thinking about adding mistakes on purpose to seem relatable or “more human,” don’t do it. “Most people are going to notice a blatant typo,” she says. “If you’re putting it in so that it stands out, to show that you are not AI, it’s still standing out in a negative way.”
When to clean up those typos, stat
In high-stakes situations, typos still matter—a lot. Think: job applications, client communications, formal reports or anything tied to your credibility. (I’ll admit, when I was a hiring manager, I automatically rejected any resume with a typo.)
“The most important thing is to consider your audience: What are their expectations? Is this someone who will judge me for typos? Then I’ll take the time to review,” says Gallo.
That calculus matters more when the stakes are uneven, she points out. It’s riskier to include typos in messages to people you don’t know well or to those with more power, because they may see them as a sign of disrespect.
Research shows that people from underestimated groups (for example, women and people of color) are judged more harshly for mistakes. “So it may be riskier for people in those groups not to double-check their messages for typos and grammatical mistakes,” Gallo adds.
That’s why the basics still matter. As Fogarty puts it, “writing well and carefully shows respect for your audience.”
When that effort is missing, she says, people notice—especially in high-stakes settings, like a corporate message that should have gone through multiple rounds of editing. “That’s when you think, Wow, this company doesn’t care about the details,” she says.
Should you hop aboard the typo train?
This is a train I won’t be boarding (no surprise). Typos may be more acceptable, but they’re not meaningless.
The real shift isn’t about mistakes; it’s about what counts as good writing. “Mechanically correct writing is no longer a sign that you’ve spent a lot of time and care on your work,” Fogarty says, noting that strong writing comes down to “word choice, the style, the rhythm and pacing.”
In other words, correctness isn’t everything—but it still counts.
The smartest move is to adjust to context. A quick Slack message? Don’t stress about every comma. A client email or job application? Proofread like it matters—because it does.
Typos aren’t just errors anymore. They’re signals. And whether you intend them or not, people are still reading between the lines.
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Sources:
- Mignon Fogarty, creator and host of the Grammar Girl podcast, and author of The Grammar Daily; phone interview, April 21, 2026
- Amy Gallo, workplace expert, Harvard Business Review contributor and author of Getting Along; email interview, April 22, 2026
The post Typos Are the Latest Status Symbol, but Should You Really Let Those Messy Messages Fly? appeared first on Reader's Digest.
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