Conflict of Interest Scanner Free & Online for Papers

Check author interests before trusting a favourable result.

What this tool does

This tool finds conflict of interest statements in a paper. It looks for a conflict of interest or competing interests section first, then picks sentences containing COI cues such as declare, no conflict, consultant, and shareholder. Author interests do not prove bias, but a favourable result from an author with a commercial stake deserves a closer look than the same result from an author without one.

It works fully in your browser. Nothing is uploaded to a server, and you do not need an account. Paste your text, press the button, and read the result on the same page. That makes it useful for students, researchers, and anyone who has to get through a long paper quickly without losing the important parts.

How to use it

Paste a full paper or its end matter, where COI statements live, and press the scan button. Read the returned sentences and note which authors declare what, and whether the declared interest connects to the product or finding being reported. Then judge the results on their methods, with the interests as context, not as a verdict.

Worked example

A statement saying Dr. Smith is a consultant for SleepTech Ltd, while the other authors declare no competing interests, returns both sentences together. You immediately see that one author has a relevant commercial tie and the rest do not, which is exactly the level of detail a careful reader needs before deciding how much scrutiny the paper deserves.

How to read the results

The output is a list of COI sentences in original order, with a count and a note when no dedicated section was found. Sentences are unedited, so the authors’ own wording, including careful phrasing such as no competing interests, is preserved rather than paraphrased into a simpler claim.

Do not treat the output as a final answer. It is a starting point for your own reading. Skim the highlighted parts first, then read the full passage around anything that matters for your work. A tool can point at the likely important sentences, but only you can judge whether they are actually important for your question.

Honest limits

This scanner uses headings and cue words, not understanding. It can miss interests described unusually, in a separate disclosure form, or in an image, and it cannot detect undisclosed interests, which are by definition not in the text. A clean scan means no statement was found in the paste, not that no interest exists. For high-stakes decisions, check the journal’s disclosure records as well.

This tool does not use artificial intelligence, and it does not understand your paper the way a human reader does. It follows fixed rules that you can inspect in the results. That is a strength when you want transparent, repeatable results, and a weakness when a passage needs real understanding, context, or judgement.

Tips for best results

Paste clean text. Remove page headers, footers, and reference lists before you paste, because they add noise to word counts and sentence scores. Work on one section at a time for long papers, and keep your original file open beside the tool so you can check anything surprising against the source. If you use the result in your own writing, always cite the original paper, never the tool output.

Frequently asked questions

Is it free? Yes. The tool is free to use online, with no sign-up and no download.

Is my text stored anywhere? No. Everything runs in your browser tab. Closing the tab removes your pasted text.

Can I trust the output completely? No tool of this kind should be trusted blindly. Use it to speed up reading and checking, then verify the important claims yourself in the original text.

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