Looking for a Brisk Teaching alternative? A simpler way to grade essays

Last updated August 2026 · 4 min read

If you teach writing, you have probably run into Brisk Teaching. It is a popular Chrome extension that brings AI into Google Docs and Slides, and it does a lot: feedback on student work, rubric and question generation, reading-level adjustment, lesson planning, translation. For teachers who want one AI toolkit for everything, it is a strong option, and it earns points for working inside the tools you already use instead of sending you to yet another website.

So why do so many teachers search for a Brisk alternative? Usually for one reason. They do not want a whole suite. They want to grade essays. If that is you, here is an honest look at a more focused option, and a straight answer on which one fits.

What teachers actually want from a grading tool

When you are staring down a stack of essays on a Sunday night, you are not shopping for twenty features. You want three things:

• Feedback that matches your rubric, not a generic paragraph that could apply to any paper.
• A suggested grade you can explain to a student or a parent.
• To stay in control. The tool drafts, you decide.

A broad suite can do all of this. It also asks you to learn and navigate a lot of tools you may never touch. A focused tool does one job and gets out of the way.

The focused alternative: Rubricly

Rubricly is a Chrome extension that does one thing. It reads a student's essay in Google Docs and gives you rubric-aligned feedback and a suggested grade, in seconds, in a side panel. You read it, change anything, and make the final call.

What that looks like in practice:

• Graded against your rubric, criterion by criterion. Use the built-in ELA rubric, or build and save your own so every class is graded your way. Each criterion gets its own score and a specific comment.
• A grade you can defend. Not just a number, but a suggested grade with the reasoning behind it.
• You stay in charge. Rubricly writes the first draft of the feedback. You edit it and decide. It is not a replacement for your judgment.
• Your students' work stays private. Essays are read only when you click grade, sent to generate the feedback, and never stored on Rubricly's servers or used to train AI.
• Easy to try. The free plan covers 12 gradings a month, enough to run it on a real class. Pro is $12 a month, or $99 a year, for unlimited grading and custom rubrics that sync across your devices. Cancel in one click.

Brisk vs. Rubricly: which one fits

This is not better versus worse. It is broad versus focused.

Choose Brisk if you want one AI assistant across your whole workflow: feedback plus lesson planning, question generation, reading-level tools, and translation, spanning Google Docs and Slides.

Choose Rubricly if you mostly grade writing and want a tool built only for that: rubric-aligned essay feedback and a suggested grade, with a custom rubric builder at the center and nothing else to wade through.

Prices and features change on both sides, so check each site before you decide.

The honest bottom line

If you want an AI Swiss army knife for teaching, Brisk is a good pick and worth a look. If you mainly want to grade essays faster without adopting a whole platform, a focused tool like Rubricly will feel lighter and get you to the same place: usable feedback and a fair grade, with your judgment still in charge.