How to write a 3,000 word essay in a day
So you've left your 3,000 word essay until the last minute? Not ideal, but don't stress. You can make it happen by following our steps.
Credit: Prostock-studio, mialapi, Olga_Shestakova – Shutterstock
We know. You had every intention of getting your essay done before the deadline, but sometimes life gets in the way.
Writing 3,000 words can take anywhere between six and 24 hours depending on the topic. But, with our tips, you can easily get the essay done within a day.
Get your head down and you could meet the deadline, and even produce an essay you're proud of. Best of all, you can adapt our tips for a 2,000 word essay, a 4,000 word essay, or whatever length – all in a day!
Take a deep breath. Remain calm. Here's how to write an essay fast.
How to write an essay quickly
"Fail to prepare? Prepare to fail". We've all had it said to us, whether it be from a lecturer or a well-meaning parent.
If you're reading this guide, we suspect you haven't entirely embraced that mantra. But, there are a few things you can do the morning before deadline day that will make your day of frantic essay-writing run smoothly. 3,000 word essay, here we come.
Eat a good breakfast
Fuel your body and mind with a healthy breakfast, like porridge. Its slow-release energy means you won't have a mid-morning slump over your laptop – something you can't afford right now!
Not into porridge? It's far from the only brain food that will help you write an essay. Check out our list of the best foods for brain fuel to see what else will get you off to the best start (and keep that flying start going).
Although you might be tempted to mainline coffee into your veins, try to avoid too much caffeine early on. Caffeine is basically the opposite of slow-release energy, and you'll find yourself crashing after a few hours.
Pick your workstation and equipment
Choose a quiet area where you won't be disturbed. You'll know whether you work better in the library or at home, but don't choose somewhere you've never been before. Make sure you'll be comfortable and able to focus for as long as possible.
Be organised and bring two pens, a bottle of water, your notes and some snacks to use as mini-rewards. These will keep you going without having to take your eyes off the screen (apparently dark chocolate is a great option for concentration!).
Get rid of social media and other distractions
Credit: PIMPAN - Shutterstock
Procrastination is a student's worst enemy (besides a hangover). Turn off your phone (or place it face down on silent) and resist the urge to check social media.
Don't trust yourself? Temporarily deactivate your accounts or get a friend to change your passwords for 24 hours.
Plan a schedule and set yourself time management goals
Time management is pretty important when you have to write an essay in a day.
Assign yourself chunks of time to reach certain milestones. This breaks down the big daunting task and provides extra motivation every time you tick off one of the relatively easy mini-tasks.
Let's say it's 9am and your essay is due first thing tomorrow morning. If you're wondering how to write essays faster, here's a feasible 14-hour timeline that you can follow (remember this is just a brief summary of each stage – we go into more detail below):
- 9am – 9.30am: Choose your essay question and decide on your overall argument
- 9.30am – 11am: Write a plan and outline of your essay (breaking it into mini-essays)
- 11am – 11.45am: Flesh out your introduction
- 11.45am – 1pm: Research quotes and references to back up your arguments
- 1pm – 1.45pm: Lunch break
- 1.45pm – 6pm: Write the body of the essay
- 6pm – 6.45pm: Dinner break
- 6.45pm – 10.30pm: Edit, improve and meet the word count
- 10.30pm – 11pm: Print (if needed) and get everything ready for the morning.
Remember to schedule in a few short 10-minute breaks (one every 45–60 minutes or so should do the trick). Giving your brain a rest is key to keeping your overall productivity levels up, and stretching or doing some brief exercises will also help.
Choosing a question and planning your essay
Choosing an essay question and how to answer it
Time: 9am – 9.30am
If you've been given a choice of essay questions, choose the one you have the most knowledge about, or have strong opinions on.
After all, this isn't the time to learn a new topic from scratch. No matter how much easier the question seems, 24 hours isn't long enough to learn anything in detail.
What's more, questions that seem easy at first glance are often the hardest of all.
The very fact that they're short and worded in a very straightforward way means you're probably expected to construct a much more original and complex essay to respond to it.
Deciding how to answer the question
Next, decide on your approach. How are you going to tackle the question? It's your essay and, as long as you keep relating your arguments to the question, you can take it in any direction you choose.
It helps to come up with a quick answer in your head. This gives you a general idea of what to write about and means you won't need to keep rereading the question.
This will help you understand the question better and avoid you having to keep referring back to it later on (when you should be concentrating on writing the body of your essay).
If you're finding it difficult to work out your argument, write down all the ideas that come to mind. From this, you'll see a theme start to emerge.
Planning your essay
Time: 9.30am – 11am
Once you've decided on your approach to answering the question, you should be able to form a pretty solid plan for the body of the essay.
Write out three to five key points that you want to make in your overall argument. Underneath each one, use bullet points to list all the information, supporting arguments (and, better still, any rebuttals you have to popular counter-arguments) or quotes you already have for each point.
Start with the most obvious or all-encompassing argument. This will allow you to progressively go into more detail on each of the smaller arguments – one of the keys to a good essay.
Once you've done this, actually writing the essay should just be a case of bulking out each point and filling in the gaps.
This method is perfect for writing against the clock. It will keep you on track with the essay, and avoid you from feeling confused about what to write next.
And yes, we realise we haven't got around to finding quotes and references yet. But stick with us, there's a good reason for this.
How to write an essay introduction quickly
Time: 11am – 11.45am
Writing all 3,000 words in one go is not easy, so anything you can do to break up the workload is a positive step.
As your intro is unlikely to need many (if any) quotes, it's a good place to start. As soon as you've planned your essay, you'll be able to get a sense of achievement by writing the introduction.
This way, when you sit down after lunch to tackle the main body of the essay, you'll have already knocked a couple of hundred words off the word count.
Don't worry too much about making it sound amazing at this point. Just get stuck into introducing your argument and telling the reader how you'll support it. You can go back and improve it later on when you're at the editing stage.
Create a mini-outline in your introduction so you signpost exactly what it is you're planning to argue.
And don't use the introduction as a space to throw in random references to things that are vaguely relevant, especially if you're just doing it to hit the minimum number of references required. When in doubt, leave it out.
How to find sources for your essay
Time: 11.45am – 1pm
Now it's time to gather the all-important information and quotes to support your arguments.
It's important to limit the time you spend on this to avoid getting distracted by irrelevant info. However, the essay will be easier to write if you're well-informed on the topic, so don't scrimp on the research either.
Choose the keywords you're searching for wisely, and copy and paste any key ideas and quotes you find into a separate 'Research' document.
If you're using reference books rather than online resources, give yourself an extra 10 minutes to get anything that looks useful from the library. And, although it sounds obvious, remember to use the index.
Where to look for quotes online
Google Scholar is a great place to find direct quotes without spending time going through endless paragraphs.
Of course, your best bet will be any references that you've picked up in your lecture notes. Even if you haven't noted down the names, look through the lecture slides (if your lecturer is kind enough to put them online) and see if they contain any gems.
Go straight to the source and check to see whether the lecturer has published a list of advised reading on your module's online platform.
While you gather quotes, keep a note of your sources and format them for your bibliography.
This helps you avoid any risk of accidental plagiarism, but compiling your list of citations as you work saves having to do them all at the end (the last thing you want after writing 3,000 words).
Extra referencing tips
Say you're reading a text by Author A, which includes references to quotes by Authors B, C and D. Rather than referencing the text by Author A, use the quotes from Authors B, C and D and use the bibliography from Author A to find the references to use for B, C and D.
Aside from being how you're supposed to reference anyway, it has the added benefit of adding three sources to your bibliography instead of just the one.
Also, if you're using Microsoft Word (2007 or later) to write your essay, make use of the automatic referencing system.
Simply enter the details of sources as you go along, and it will automatically create a perfect bibliography or works cited page at the end. This tool is amazing and could save you a lot of extra work typing out your references and bibliography.
Writing your essay
Time: 1.45pm – 6pm
You've had your brain-fuelling lunch, and now it's time to write the 3,000 word essay. With your detailed plan, it should just be a case of expanding on the points you've already listed.
If you struggle to word your ideas in an eloquent way, focus first on getting all of your content down.
You can refine the wording at the editing stage, and it's much easier to think about style once you've typed up everything you want to say first.
While your essay plan should see you through, there's nothing to say that more ideas won't occur to you as you go along.
Unless they absolutely have to be included, jot them down on a notepad. They could come in handy if you need to make up the word count later.
How to reach the word count
Use the research you gathered earlier to support the key ideas you set out in your outline, but don't ramble for the sake of it. Try to be concise and have faith that the strength of your arguments will take you to around 2,500(ish) words.
Imagine your essay is a bit like a kebab stick: the meat is your essential argument and you surround each chunk with vegetables (quotes and remarks) to make the full kebab... We can't wait for dinner at 6pm.
If you're struggling to reach the word limit, don't panic.
Pick out a single point in your argument that hasn't been fully built upon yet, and head back to your research. There will almost certainly be an additional quote or two that you could throw in to make your point even clearer.
Of course, if you're using a lot of quotes from other sources, make sure you paraphrase your main arguments to give the essay your own voice and make it clear which words are yours and which are someone else's. Plagiarism is serious and all your hard work could be completely discounted if you don't cite properly!
Your conclusion shouldn't take too long at all. You're basically summarising the arguments you've spent the last few hours detailing, and explaining how they all tie together to support your overall response to the essay question.
Editing your essay to perfection
Credit: Atanas Bezov - Shutterstock
Time: 6.45pm – 10.30pm
We've allowed 3 hours and 45 minutes for editing your essay, which might sound a bit excessive. For some of you, it will be.
If you're blessed with the ability to write immaculately and at speed, you may not need this long to edit your essay.
Although, as we touched on earlier, not everyone can get their ideas written down and do it eloquently all in one go. If this is you, then take the time to refine what you've produced and make sure it gets full marks for written communication.
However long you're taking, you should still check that your essay flows nicely.
Are your paragraphs linked? Does it all make sense? Do a quick spell check and make sure you have time for potential printer issues (if your uni still requires you to provide a paper copy). We've all been there.
A lot of students overlook the importance of spelling and grammar. It differs from uni to uni, subject to subject and tutor to tutor, but generally your writing style, spelling and grammar can account for up to 10% – 20% of your grade.
Finally, ensure that all the points you wanted to explore are on paper (or screen) and explained fully. Are all of your facts correct? Make things wordier (or more concise, depending on your circumstance) in order to hit your word limit.
Time to get started
While starting essays a day before the deadline is far from recommended and unlikely to get you the best grades, this guide should at least prevent tears in the library (been there) and the need for any extensions.
Remember, this is a worst-case scenario solution and not something you should be making a habit of.
Good luck!
Exams coming up? You may want to bookmark how to revise in one day too...
