How long does it take to learn touch typing?
How many hours and weeks touch typing takes, why short daily sessions beat long ones, and when you get back to your old typing speed.
Guide
What helps when you learn touch typing: timing, how to structure practice, speed, and ergonomics. The articles build on research and list their sources.
Is touch typing still worth learning?
What research says about touch typing versus self-taught typing, who gains the most from switching, and what the slow phase will cost you.
The home row: where every finger belongs
Where your fingers rest on a US or UK keyboard, which finger types which key, how to use Shift, and how to fix the most common mistakes.
How to type faster: what the research says
What studies of real typists show about speed: why fewer errors pay off, how rollover and reading ahead help, and how to practice above your pace.
What is a good typing speed? WPM explained
How words per minute are calculated, what studies say about typical typing speeds, and why accuracy and your own trend matter more than rankings.
WPM and characters per minute: what the numbers mean and what employers expect
How to convert WPM to characters per minute, how gross and net speed differ, and which typing speeds office job listings usually ask for.
Typing ergonomics: wrists, elbows, keyboard
What studies say about wrist angles, elbow height, and keyboard position, and how to set up your desk so that touch typing stays comfortable.
US, UK and international keyboard layouts compared
How the US, UK, and US-International layouts differ: where @, £, € and quotation marks are, how dead keys work, and what changes on a Mac.
Learn touch typing for free: tools compared
Six free touch typing tools compared: what Tipp10, TypingClub, keybr.com, Monkeytype, typista, and AgileFingers offer, and what typando does differently.