The short answer
Turnitin and Plagiarism Checker Plus are not substitutes. Which one you use depends on who you are and what you need.
- Turnitin is bought by a school, university or organization. Students and instructors reach it through the school. The report is part of how the work is assessed.
- Plagiarism Checker Plus is self-serve. You check your own text and read the report yourself.
- One does not predict the other. We have no access to Turnitin’s database, and our result will not match a Turnitin result.
Who wrote this, and how. This page is published by Plagiarism Checker Plus. We make one of the two tools on it, so read it as our view. Every statement about Turnitin comes from Turnitin’s own pages, and each one is linked. Facts checked on 10 October 2026. We did not run tests that compare the two tools, so this page does not say which is more accurate. Where Turnitin’s pages did not state something, the table says “Not stated on the pages we read”.
Side by side
The Turnitin column uses Turnitin’s own pages, linked in the sources. The other column describes our own tool.
| Attribute | Turnitin | Plagiarism Checker Plus (ours) |
|---|---|---|
| Who can buy it | Schools, universities and organizations. Turnitin says it does not sell individual licenses or single-use subscriptions. | Anyone. Students, teachers, writers and teams. |
| How you access it | Through your institution. Turnitin says to ask your instructor, the library or the IT help desk. | On the web, in your browser. Also a Google Docs add-on and a Chrome extension. The first check needs no account. |
| Price model | Sold at the institutional level. No price for individuals. A price for schools is not stated on the pages we read. | First plagiarism check and first AI check free, up to 1,000 words each. A free account includes 3,000 words a month. Paid plans start at $4.99 a month, or $3.99 a month billed yearly. |
| Plagiarism sources | Turnitin says it compares work with a repository of student papers, current and archived web pages, and subscription articles from publishers. | Its own set of sources. Every matching passage is linked to its source. |
| Student-paper database | Yes. Turnitin’s documentation says institutions choose whether their student papers are added to the repository. | No. We have no database of other students’ submitted papers. |
| AI detection | Yes, through an add-on called Turnitin Originality, once the institution has licensed and enabled it. | Yes. Anyone can run it. The first AI check is free with no account. |
| Sentence-level detail | The AI report highlights the text segments the model predicts were written by AI. Turnitin shows no score and no highlights when the result is between 1% and 19%. | An overall score and a likelihood for every sentence. |
| Where the report goes | It is part of the school’s Turnitin workflow. Turnitin says only instructors and administrators can see the AI writing indicator. An instructor can download that report as a PDF and share it. | To you, the person who ran the check. |
| Integrations | Learning management systems. Turnitin names D2L, Canvas, Moodle, Sakai and others. | Google Docs add-on, Chrome extension and a REST API. No LMS integration. |
| Other tools | Draft Coach, an add-on for Google Docs or Microsoft Word online. It depends on the institution’s licence. | Grammar checker and citation generator (APA, MLA, Chicago, Harvard, IEEE, AMA, ACS). |
| Published accuracy figure | Turnitin states figures for its AI detector in its help centre. We did not test them. See does Turnitin detect AI? | None. We publish no accuracy figure. |
Our prices can change. The current ones are on our pricing page.
Our result is not a Turnitin preview
We want to be plain about this, because it is the question most people have.
- We have no access to Turnitin’s database. That includes its repository of student papers. If your text matches a paper another student handed in, our check will not find it.
- Our plagiarism result does not predict a Turnitin similarity score. The two tools search different sources, so the numbers will differ.
- Our AI result does not predict a Turnitin AI result. They are different detectors. They can disagree about the same text.
- No tool can do this. Be careful with any service that says it can show you your Turnitin score in advance.
What our report can do is show you passages that match a source, with a link to that source. That is enough to fix a missing quote or citation. It is not a way to aim for a number.
When Turnitin is the right tool
- Your school has it and your work will be assessed with it. That report is the one that counts. No other tool stands in for it.
- You are a school that needs one system for every course. Turnitin’s product page says it works inside learning management systems such as D2L, Canvas, Moodle and Sakai. We do not offer that.
- You need to compare work with other students’ papers. Turnitin has a repository of student papers. We do not.
- Your school offers Draft Coach. Turnitin’s Draft Coach FAQ says it checks a draft against Turnitin’s student repository, publications and web pages, and does not store the draft. If you have it, use it for drafts. The FAQ also says you cannot share those results with your instructor from Draft Coach.
If you are a student, ask your instructor two things: whether you can see your Similarity Report, and whether you may submit a draft first. Turnitin’s help centre says your instructor, the library or the IT help desk can tell you how to get access.
If you are a researcher without a school licence, Turnitin points individuals to iThenticate. Its site listed credits at $125 for a single manuscript of up to 25,000 words, and says AI writing detection is not available with those credits.
When Plagiarism Checker Plus is the right tool
- You cannot get Turnitin. Your school has no licence, or you are not at a school. Independent writers, applicants and freelancers are in this group.
- You want to check your own draft before anyone else reads it. The report goes to you. The first plagiarism check is free with no account, up to 1,000 words.
- You want to see the source of each match. Every matching passage is linked to its source, so you can read the original and decide whether to quote, paraphrase or cite.
- You want to see an AI result yourself. Turnitin shows its AI indicator to instructors and administrators. Our AI detector shows you an overall score and a likelihood for every sentence. Treat it as a second opinion, not as proof.
- You write in Google Docs or check text in the browser. There is a Google Docs add-on and a Chrome extension.
- You are a teacher at a school without a licence. You can check a paper yourself. Paid plans add longer documents and folders. See our page for teachers.
- You are building something. Paid plans include access to a REST API.
Its limits, so you can decide fairly:
- No database of other students’ submitted papers.
- No LMS integration. It does not connect to a school system.
- No published accuracy figure.
- The free check stops at 1,000 words. A free account includes 3,000 words a month.
- An AI score is a likelihood. It is not proof.
Using both
Many students are in this position: the school uses Turnitin, and they want to check a draft first.
- Ask about a draft submission or Draft Coach. If your school allows it, that is the closest you can get to the real check.
- If not, run your own check. Look at each match and open the source. Add a quote or a citation where one is missing.
- Do not aim for a number. A low result in our tool does not mean a low result in Turnitin. What matters is that every borrowed passage is quoted or cited.
- Keep your drafts and notes. They show how you wrote the work if anyone asks.
See how to interpret a plagiarism report and how to avoid plagiarism. For other tools an individual can use, see Turnitin alternatives.
What we do not know and did not test
- Accuracy. We did not run the same papers through both tools. We do not know which finds more matches or which AI detector is right more often.
- The size of each tool’s sources. We did not measure Turnitin’s database or compare it with ours.
- Turnitin’s price. The pages we read do not state one.
- Your school’s setup. Which Turnitin products a school has, and what it does with a score, differs from school to school.
We also have an interest here: we would like you to try our tool. That is why our limits are listed above, and why this page does not name a winner.
Sources
Turnitin’s own pages, read on 10 October 2026.
- Can I purchase an individual Turnitin license? Who can buy it, and how to get access.
- Turnitin Similarity. What it compares work with, LMS integrations and the Originality add-on.
- AI writing detection FAQ. Who sees the AI indicator, the highlights, the 1% to 19% range and the repository.
- Draft Coach FAQ. Where it works and what it stores.
- iThenticate. Credits for individuals.
- Plagiarism Checker Plus: our own plagiarism checker, AI detector, integrations and pricing pages.