If you could improve only one thing about your prose, verb choice would give you the highest return on investment. Verbs are the engines of sentences. A precise, vivid verb can do the work of an entire phrase. A weak, generic verb forces you to prop the sentence up with adverbs, adjectives, and extra clauses that dilute rather than strengthen.
But like most craft advice, "use strong verbs" needs qualification. Not every sentence needs to crackle with active energy. The skill is knowing when a strong verb transforms a sentence and when it just draws attention to itself.
What Makes a Verb Weak
Weak verbs are not bad verbs. They are imprecise verbs, words that convey the general category of an action without specifying how it was performed. "Walked" tells you someone moved on foot. "Shuffled," "strode," "limped," "strolled," and "marched" each tell you how they moved, and that how carries character, mood, and information that "walked" does not.
The most common weak verbs fall into a few categories.
Being verbs: "was," "were," "is," "are." These are state-of-being verbs that describe conditions rather than actions. "The room was dark" is a being construction. "Darkness filled the room" uses an active verb. "She could not see her hand in front of her face" eliminates the abstract description entirely and shows the darkness through experience.
Generic action verbs: "went," "got," "put," "took," "made," "came." These are so broad that they convey almost no specific information. "She went to the window" versus "She crossed to the window" versus "She drifted to the window." The generic verb is a placeholder. The specific verb is a choice.
Verb-plus-adverb constructions: "walked slowly" ("ambled"), "said quietly" ("murmured"), "looked carefully" ("examined"). When you find yourself adding an adverb to a verb, it is often a sign that you chose the wrong verb. A single precise verb is almost always stronger than a generic verb modified by an adverb.
The Was/Were Audit
The fastest way to improve your prose is to search for every instance of "was" and "were" in your manuscript and evaluate each one. Not every instance needs to change. "It was raining" is fine. "She was a doctor" is fine. Being verbs are legitimate and necessary parts of English.
But many instances of "was" signal a missed opportunity. "He was walking toward the bridge" is a past progressive construction that almost always works better as simple past: "He walked toward the bridge." Or better: "He strode toward the bridge." The progressive form creates a sense of ongoing action that is rarely intentional and usually just a habit.
"Was" combined with an adjective is another pattern worth examining. "The house was old" states a fact. "The house sagged under its own weight, paint peeling in long strips from the clapboard" shows the age. The first version tells the reader. The second lets them see it.
Not every "was + adjective" construction needs to be expanded into a descriptive passage. That would make your novel exhausting to read. But in moments that matter, where you want the reader to see and feel and experience rather than simply be informed, converting being constructions into active ones makes a measurable difference.
Sensing and Perceiving Verbs
"Looked," "saw," "heard," "felt," and "noticed" are verbs that describe a character perceiving something rather than the thing itself. "She saw a bird land on the railing" puts the character between the reader and the image. "A bird landed on the railing" is more direct.
In point-of-view narration, everything the reader encounters is already filtered through the character's perception. You do not need to remind them. "She heard footsteps in the hallway" can simply be "Footsteps echoed in the hallway." The reader understands that the viewpoint character is the one hearing them.
These filtering verbs have their place. When the act of perception itself is important, when a character is straining to hear or struggling to see, the sensing verb earns its keep. But in most cases, it is an unnecessary layer between the reader and the story.
When Weak Verbs Are the Right Choice
Dialogue almost always uses weak verbs naturally. People do not speak in carefully crafted prose. A character saying "I went to the store and got some milk" sounds human. A character saying "I ventured to the store and procured some milk" sounds like a thesaurus in a trenchcoat.
Pacing sometimes demands simplicity. In fast-moving action sequences, simple verbs keep the prose from getting in the way of the action. "He ran. He jumped. He grabbed the ledge." These are weak verbs by any analysis, but they create urgency through brevity. Replacing them with more elaborate constructions would slow the pace.
Being verbs are appropriate for statements of fact that do not benefit from dramatization. "She was thirty-two years old" does not need to be converted into an active construction. Not everything is a showing opportunity.
The goal is not to purge weak verbs from your writing. It is to make every verb a conscious choice. Use weak verbs when they serve the sentence. Replace them when a stronger verb would serve better.
Building Your Verb Vocabulary
The limiting factor for most writers is not knowing the principle but having the vocabulary to apply it. When you search for an alternative to "walked," you need a mental library of movement verbs to draw from. If your library is small, you will either stick with the weak verb or reach for an awkward synonym.
Read widely and pay attention to verb choices. When a verb strikes you as particularly effective, note it. Not to copy it, but to add it to your working vocabulary. Over time, your instinctive verb choices will become more precise.
A thesaurus is a tool, not a crutch. Use it to find the right word when you know the meaning you want but cannot access the vocabulary. Do not use it to find impressive-sounding alternatives to simple words. The right verb is the precise verb, not the longest one.
The Revision Approach
Verb improvement works best as a dedicated revision pass. Read each sentence and examine the main verb. Is it the most precise verb available? Does it convey not just the action but the manner of the action? Would a different verb eliminate the need for a modifying adverb?
Be especially attentive in high-impact moments: openings, climaxes, revelations, and emotional turning points. These are the sentences that bear the most weight, and strong verbs will make the difference between prose that informs and prose that lives.
Draft's Prose Quality analysis identifies weak verb patterns throughout your manuscript, highlighting sentences where a stronger verb choice could improve clarity, vividness, and impact. Try it free.