Find the words that will get your song flagged, and swap them for syllable-matched alternatives that still scan.
A clean version is not the same song with the bad words deleted — deleting them leaves holes in the metre and the melody has nothing to sit on. It is the same song with different words in the same number of syllables. This tool finds the flagged words and offers replacements counted to match, so the line you hand to radio still works with the tune you already wrote.
Run it and the flagged words show up here.
Why deleting the word is the wrong move
Take a four-beat line ending on a two-syllable word. Remove that word and you have two beats of nothing, which in a sung line reads as a hesitation rather than as a choice. Replace it with a two-syllable clean word and the line is intact: same metre, same melodic shape, same rhyme position. The listener hears a slightly odd word and moves on, which is exactly what a clean version is supposed to achieve.
The syllable count is the part that matters and the part people forget. “Freaking” is two syllables, so it fits anywhere the original did. “Frigging” is two. “Freakin” is two. A one-syllable swap in a two-syllable hole produces a line that rushes, and a three-syllable swap produces one that drags. So this tool only offers alternatives that match, or that come within one syllable with the difference labelled.
How to use the result
- Work down the hard tier first. One hard word will get a track flagged on its own; six mild words usually will not.
- Click a replacement to drop it straight into the clean draft. The draft is an editable box — fix anything that reads oddly by hand afterwards.
- Read the clean version out loud before you send it. Some clean swaps are worse than the original because they draw more attention to themselves.
- Keep both versions. A flagged word in the explicit version is an artistic choice; the clean version is a business artefact, and you will need it again.
Questions people ask
- Is this a broadcast-standards check?
No. It is a word list. It cannot hear your song, it cannot catch innuendo, and it has no idea what your target platform allows. Radio, a streaming playlist and a school assembly have three different definitions of clean.
- Why is an innocent word flagged?
The borderline tier includes words that are fine in most contexts and not fine in others — drug references, weapons, and words that get misheard. Treat that tier as a prompt to think, not as a list of things to change.
- Can it catch meaning rather than words?
No. A line can be completely clean word by word and explicit in intent, and this tool will report nothing. That judgement is yours.
- Does swapping a word change my copyright?
No, but it does create a derivative version. Keep your splits and your registrations straight if the clean version is the one that gets released.
What this tool does not do. This is a word list, not a compliance check. It cannot hear your song, it cannot detect innuendo or context, and “clean” means something different to every platform and every territory. The final call is yours and you should still listen to the finished master before you submit it. Nothing is uploaded; everything runs in your browser and works offline. See the site disclaimer. Written by Nico, who builds these tools and writes about writing at WrittenTone.