What's with all these exclamation points???

Four exclamation points in colorful text bubbles

The English major in me says that the use of exclamation points is like cooking with hot pepper chili flakes; something to use sparingly for extra oomph. Still, the old "bang" in writing could be argued as unnecessary. If the choreography of the words themselves haven't generated excitement, is a line with a dot on the bottom really going to make it better? Quite the contrary—exclamation points can dull the impact with visual white noise. And don't even get me started on exclamation points in business communications. They can make you look insecure, unprofessional...lazy.

But what about exclamation points in texts? How many are really needed to get your point across?

Consider this scale based on my personal observations:

! I'm generally happy/excited/emotionally charged for you

!! I'm really happy/excited/emotionally charged for you

!!! - !!!! I'm insecure about whether or not you get my (negative or positive) exuberance

!!!!! I'm not happy/excited/emotionally charged for you - I'm probably pissed more than anything

With texting, my exclamation point use is visceral. My fingers just type it in and then I hit send. When there's a string of exclamation points—like 4 or 5+— I feel like I'm running through a field, not knowing when to stop. But when I do, I reflect: it looks ridiculous, possibly even insincere.

Case in point: "OMG!!!!!!!"

With unbridled enthusiasm, I just typed 7 bangs. Sleepy, Dopey, Doc... yeah, you get it. Visually, it looks like I'm fully engaged with either OMG, this is amazing news and/or OMG, this is terrible news.

What if I kept running through that field of screams?

"OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Visually, it doesn't even look like exclamation points anymore but rather a picket fence, a sleeve of Thin Mint Girl Scout Cookies, one of those exercise ladders you jump in and out of in a HITT class.

Believe it or not, there's actual data around exclamation point use.

• A 2025 article in the Harvard Business Review reports that in one study of work-related email, when exclamation points are present, 61% of participants expected the writer to be female.

• A 2024 news piece from Le Monde reported a trend labelled “bangorrhea” — the spread of multiple exclamation points in work messaging (inspired by social media / texting conventions). Younger workers were more likely to view frequent “!” as friendly or sincere, while older generations sometimes saw them as artificial or too eager.

The role of "textism" — things like emoticons, irregular spellings (sooooo) and irregular use of punctuation (!!!) — help us fill non-verbal gaps. Lack of voice tone, facial expressions, and gestures could leave texters and textees questioning what someone means. Textisms help fill that void by modernizing language —and in some ways preserving the emotional intent— for a digital world.

• A 2025 study found that emojis and exclamation marks improve perceived warmth and friendliness in online messages — even outperforming plain language for emotional clarity. In messaging, punctuation becomes emotional: a period (.) can seem curt, while an exclamation (!) feels friendly.

So, what's my (exclamation) point????

Just pondering language and human behavior in the every day, and hoping you liked going along for

the ride!