Summarize a long text with AI without losing the point

Summaries fail quietly. The result reads well, you nod along, and only later do you find a claim in it that wasn't in the original at all. So the prompt this page builds pins down how short the summary has to be, then ends by telling the AI to use nothing but the text you pasted.

What a thin request looks like

Most people start here:

summarize this

The built version says who the summary is for, caps its length, asks for bullets instead of a wall of paragraphs, and tells the AI to stay inside the text you pasted.

Build your prompt

Role Act as someone who reads carefully and reports back only what the text says.

Task Summarize the text below for me, so I can decide whether to read it.

Context I haven't pasted the text yet. Ask me for it before you write anything.

Format Give it to me as bullet points, one idea per bullet.

Constraint Keep it under 120 words. Keep the tone direct.

Guardrail Only use what is in the text I give you. Do not add anything from outside it.

Show as plain text 
Act as someone who reads carefully and reports back only what the text says.
Summarize the text below for me, so I can decide whether to read it.
I haven't pasted the text yet. Ask me for it before you write anything.
Give it to me as bullet points, one idea per bullet.
Keep it under 120 words. Keep the tone direct.
Only use what is in the text I give you. Do not add anything from outside it.

Why this prompt works

Role
Telling the AI who to be aims the voice before it writes a word. Skip this line and the draft tends to drift toward the flat, committee-written tone everyone recognizes on sight.
Task
One clear instruction, with one verb. A vague ask gets a vague answer, and most disappointing results start right here.
Context
The AI knows nothing about your situation. Anything you leave out, it fills in with a guess, and that guess is why so many drafts come back sounding like they were written for somebody else.
Format
This is the line that asks for bullets, or a subject line on top, or one idea per row. Leave it out and the answer usually arrives as a block of paragraphs you have to chop apart by hand before you can use any of it.
Constraint
Left to itself, the AI writes long and formal, so name the length and the tone you actually want.
Guardrail
This line names the two habits that waste the most of your time and asks the AI to skip them: inventing facts that sound right, and padding the answer to feel thorough. It will not always listen, but the asking costs you nothing.

Frequently asked questions

How long a text can I paste in?

That depends on the chat tool you paste into, not on this page. If a tool turns down a very long text, split it into parts, summarize each part, then summarize those summaries.

Why does the prompt end by telling the AI to stick to the text?

Because an added detail is the hardest kind of error to catch in a summary. It reads smoothly and sits next to things that are true. That line asks the AI to stay inside what you gave it, so anything you don't recognize is worth checking against the original.

Should I still read the original?

For anything that matters, read at least the parts the summary points you to. A summary is for working out what deserves your attention. It's not a replacement for the reading.

More on this: ChatGPT for everyday tasks, or pick another job on the prompt builder page.