110+ Expository Essay Topics

Have you just been assigned a project at university to write an expository essay and now you're freaking out about what do? Don't worry - it's actually easier than it seems. An essay is just a string of thoughts that have been put in order to make a coherent idea.

In an expository essay, you are trying to explain how something works or why you think it's a good idea. It's not the same as an argumentative essay where you are fighting to prove something to readers (although both contain arguments).

Expository essay structure and layout

An expository essay consists of three parts -  introduction, body, and conclusion.

An introduction holds your thesis. This statement is a single (most often) sentence summary of what your entire paper is going to be about. It also centers around your topic which we will give you examples of a bit further down.

Essay body holds your arguments. These are a defense points to your thesis, and your main goal is to build them as strong as you can. Usually, that happens by having good research.

A conclusion holds your final appeal to readers and a summary of everything you've talked about. For example, if you've been talking about global warming and ozone layer decay, here you will mention the key arguments and propose your solution.

Expository essay topics

Obviously, any paper starts with a search of good expository essay topics. Essentially, those could be anything - and here are just some examples to prove this point.

Expository essay topics: medicine and health

1. Are doctors treating the sickness or taking our money?
2. Why do medical students experiment with drugs?
3. Is smoking beneficial for the skin?
4. How smoking affects your relationship?
5. Do older people respect their children?
6. How much does a 10-minute visit to the doctor really cost?
7. Can reading cause blindness?
8. Are vaccines necessary?
9. How to treat patients with respect and dignity?
10. What is the best medicine for the flu?

Social expository essay topics

1. What are some fun activities to do with your children?
2. How to be productive on a boring day?
3. Where to travel for summer vacation?
4. How can seaweed treat your hair?
5. Is national security being protected?
6. How to read more than ten books a month?
7. Why don't we use candles for reading anymore?
8. Is global warming causing skin cancer?
9. Is there a good way to die?
10. Why we should never commit suicide
11. Is there something wrong with our species?
12. Are we money hungry?
13. Why we make stories up?
14. Do children lie?
15. The optimal way to lose weight and keep it off
16. Is losing weight beneficial for our well being?
17. Is the president the most powerful person in the world?
18. Is there a difference between fat and overweight?
19. What does music mean to a celebrity?
20. How to take care of your car?
21. Should we buy used vehicles?
22. What is the cost of living on the moon?
23. Proper ways breath and develop a singing voice?
24. Is there a connection between being hungry and being lonely?
25. Do fish feel pain?
26. Is eating a lot of sodium bad for you?
27. Do movies make better books?
28. Do richer people think less of those who are poor?
29. How to talk to mentally exhausted people?

College expository essay topics

1. Why is homework important?
2. Is your child getting too much homework?
3. Do teachers care about their students?
4. How long does it take to go through medical school and why it's a noble profession to be a doctor?
5. How does school affect us as grown-ups?
6. How to invest in our college fund?

General knowledge and high school topics

1. Do cats see in the dark?
2. Can dogs smell fear?
3. If you could go back in time, would you change the future?
4. Is the lethal punishment worth the money it takes to kill a prisoner?
5. How to talk to elders about sex?
6. How to talk to children about sex?
7. How to tell your parents about your new boyfriend
8. Are gay children happier than straight children?
9. Does the movie Coraline fit with the book?
10. Should we read the book before the movie or is that spoiling the fun?
11. How to develop our imagination?
12. Do children want toys just for the sake of wanting or are they interested?
13. Do aliens exist?
14. Is there proof of aliens existing?
15. How big is the universe?
16. How to measure our happiness?
17. What is an acceptable level of sadness?
18. Are abusive relationships a strain on your parents?
19. Do people really change?
20. How can mobile games ruin your relationship?
21. Can video games make your relationship better?
22. What do your clothes say about your personality?

Controversial expository essay topics

1. Does youtube make money from people's lives?
2. How to make money on youtube?
3. How to make your mother smile?
4. How often should we say I love you?
5. Is it a good idea to move in with your boyfriend from the beginning?
6. Are homosexual relationships more stable than heterosexual relationships?
7. Does science have concrete answers?
8. Does magic exist?
9. How accurate is the Bible?
10. What are the benefits of writing a novel?
11. Do publishers pay fair wages?
12. What are some professions for a young adult?
13. Is chemistry a profession that can be beneficial?
14. Should you have children?
15. How many children should a single parent have?
16. Does being a single parent make your child self-sufficient?
17. How to homeschool your children?
18. Are vlogs dumb?
19. Can vlogging be beneficial for your psychological health?
20. Do we learn more at home than at school?
21. Is he being faithful if he doesn't say I love you?
22. Do turtles breathe through the pores of their scales?
23. Are video games art?
24. How Harry Potter changed an entire generation?
25. Were the founding fathers slave owners?
26. Should abortion be legal and supported by the government all over the world?
27. Can bananas help you build muscle mass?
28. What is the difference between living in a village versus living in a busy town?
29. How short stories revolutionized the novel genre?
30. Does the novel need to exist?
31. How have computers affected our ability to talk?
32. How is Facebook controlling its users?
33. Does wikipedia make us smarter?
34. Was Shakespeare a genius?
35. How people survived in Middlesbrough in the 1900s?
36. How had the forest changed over the years?
37. Do mythical creatures exist?
38. How to know if you're being lied to?
39. Was Harry Potter a book about religion?
40. The meaning color blue in literature
41. Did Edgar Allan Poe drink absinthe to come up with some of his classic tales?
42. How did people invent money?
43. Did the ancient egyptians have a favorite God?

Writing tips

Once you've chosen one subject from the range of expository essay topics, it's time to start writing. Here are some important stages to focus on:

Prewriting

Brainstorm ideas on how you will develop your subject. This is especially important for college expository essay topics, as this academic level implies doing research. Search (both online and in libraries) for relevant books you can use. Make a list of where you found all of your research for later use. A good idea about selecting research sources is knowing exactly where they come from. There are two types: unacademic and academic.

Unacademic is any sort of research that comes from places like wikipedia or google. They are not part of university research and hence could have been written by anybody. Be careful around sources like these.

Academic is any research that comes and was written by members of a university press. Those would be places like Oxford and Cambridge press. Again, exercise caution even with academic sources. While they do belong to a university, not every academic is good at their job.

You will need to include all of your research sources in a bibliography. There are separate guides on the proper way to form a bibliography.

Draft

Write a short outline of your paper. Don't stick to a particular format. Just write interesting sections and see what works and what doesn't. Don't be afraid to delete and erase what doesn't work and what does.

Work on your thesis until it works. Read the paper out loud, paying attention to how it sounds.

Revision

Once you've made some progress in your work, start revising. This is the phase where you assemble all of your small parts into a good working paper. Make sure to spot all spelling and grammar mistakes. Check if paragraphs are positioned correctly and make sure that there are good transitions. If you have to, ask someone to sit beside you and listen to you reading the paper out loud. They will be able to hear any mistakes better than you will be able to.

Editing

Try to find someone like a professor or a confidant to edit the paper for you. You can do it yourself but the closer you are to your project, the harder it is to see the mistakes. This is a psychological issue that only writers experience: you either learn to love your work insanely and think it's perfect or think it's horrible.

Once you've finished submit it to wherever you have to. Believe in yourself and remember that absolutely all topics for expository essay, no matter how boring or trivial they may seem, can be conveyed in a creative a clear manner.  It takes time to become good at writing essays and the only way to do that is to experiment and write.