Xiezuocat

Xiezuocat (秘塔写作猫, “Writing Cat”) is a Chinese writing aid from Metaso Technology, the same company behind Metaso AI search. It is built for Chinese: it catches typos, punctuation and grammatical errors, and offers paraphrasing, expansion and continuation. The proofreading is especially handy for formal reports and official documents.

Many writing tools started out in English and are not sensitive to Chinese-specific issues such as mixing up 的/地/得, look-alike characters or full-width versus half-width punctuation. Xiezuocat focused on Chinese from day one, so its judgement on these details fits local writing conventions better.

Its generative features are not much better than a general LLM; the real value is Chinese proofreading, which English-first tools tend to handle poorly.

Key features

• Typo and grammar checks: Flags wrong characters, misused words, bad collocations and incomplete sentences.
• Punctuation and formatting checks: Catches misused punctuation and mixed full-width/half-width characters.
• Rewriting: Paraphrases selected sentences to vary the wording or make them read more smoothly.
• Expansion and continuation: Adds detail to existing text or keeps writing from where you stopped, to help you get unstuck.
• Online editor: A web-based editor that checks as you write, or lets you paste a finished draft for a full review.

How to use

1. Go to the Xiezuocat website, sign up and log in.
2. Create a new document and write, or paste in an existing draft.
3. Go through the issues listed in the sidebar and decide whether to accept each suggestion.
4. To rewrite or expand, select the paragraph and use the relevant AI feature.
5. Copy or export the result when done; give important documents one more read-through yourself.

Best for

• Official documents and work reports: Text where typos and grammar slips are unacceptable deserves a check before submission.
• Social media and blog posts: A quick scan for typos and punctuation before publishing spares you reader nitpicks.
• Student essays and assignments: Checks that Chinese writing follows standard usage.
• Proofreading long drafts: Humans miss things in long text; run the tool first, then review the flagged spots closely.

Strengths and limitations

Strengths

• Focused on Chinese proofreading and more sensitive to Chinese-specific error types.
• Simple to use in the browser with no setup.
• A free tier keeps occasional use cheap.

Limitations

• Generative features offer no clear advantage over general-purpose LLMs.
• Occasional false positives, especially with jargon or deliberate rhetorical choices, so human judgement is still needed.
• Mainly serves Chinese; limited help for English writing.