Using more words than your story needs, whether through flowery descriptions, redundant phrasing, or scenes that run long.
Overwriting is the tendency to use more words, more detail, or more emphasis than a passage requires. It shows up as purple prose, unnecessary adverbs, over-explained emotions, repetitive descriptions, and scenes that take two pages to do what one page could handle. Almost every writer overwrites in early drafts. The skill is learning to recognize it during revision.
Overwriting dilutes the impact of your best material. When everything is described with maximum intensity, nothing stands out. Readers start skimming, which means they'll miss the moments you actually want them to linger on. Learning to spot your own overwriting is one of the fastest ways to improve the quality of your revision process.
Overwriting usually comes from enthusiasm and skill - you have the vocabulary and you're using it. The problem isn't ability, it's restraint. Knowing when to hold back is a sign of maturity, not a lack of talent.
"She felt a deep, overwhelming, soul-crushing sadness that consumed her entire being" is overwriting. "She sat on the kitchen floor and ate cereal out of the box" shows sadness through behavior and lets the reader feel it themselves.
Lush, detailed prose isn't automatically overwriting. The difference is purpose. Toni Morrison's prose is dense and lyrical, but every word earns its place. Overwriting is when the density serves the writer's ego, not the reader's experience.
Dialogue can be overwritten too - characters who give speeches when a sentence would do. So can action scenes that describe every micro-movement. Check everywhere, not just your landscape paragraphs.
Find the most descriptive paragraph in your current draft. Rewrite it in exactly half the words. Then read both versions aloud and notice which details you kept and which you cut. The details you instinctively kept are the ones doing the real work. The ones you cut were probably overwriting.