Glossary
Words per minute (WPM)
Words per minute (WPM) is the number of words typed in one minute. Typing tests count a word as five characters, including spaces, so WPM is a convention rather than a count of real words. The average in the largest online typing test was about 52 WPM.
Updated October 16, 20265 cited facts, each traced to its source
Also called WPM, typing speed unit.
Words per minute (WPM) is the standard unit for typing speed: how many words you type in one minute. Typing tests, job requirements and most typing guides report speed in WPM, but the word in that unit does not mean a dictionary word.
A word is five characters, not a dictionary word
In typing tests, a word has a fixed length. On the How We Type test, one word is defined as five characters long 1. Spaces and punctuation count as characters, so a score measures the keys pressed rather than the meaning of the text. This convention lets any passage, from a list of nonsense letters to a novel, be scored with one number.
The practical result is that WPM from two different tests can differ even for the same typist, because each test may define a word, an error or the start and end of the timer in its own way. When you compare scores, check how the test counts.
An average typist reaches about 52 WPM
In a study of 136 million keystrokes from an online typing test, the average participant typed 51.56 words per minute 2. The slowest tenth of typists were below about 26 WPM 3. Because people choose to take an online test, the study may not represent all adults. Our guide to average typing speed compares the figures from several sources.
Speech is much faster than typing, which is why WPM matters for dictation
WPM is also the unit that makes dictation easy to compare with typing. In a controlled study on an iPhone, English text entered by speech reached 153 words per minute, against 52 words per minute on the built-in keyboard, 2.93 times faster 4. The study counted the finished text, including the time spent correcting errors, and it used short phrases in a quiet room. A long document, a noisy office or heavy editing afterward will produce different numbers.
For a worked example, a typist at 50 WPM enters 250 characters per minute 5. That is the same speed expressed as characters, which the next term explains.
What WPM does not measure
WPM counts speed only. A fast typist who leaves many mistakes in the text has a high WPM and a poor result, so a speed score should always be read with typing accuracy. WPM also says nothing about thinking time, which is often the larger part of writing a document. Two typists with the same WPM can produce text at very different rates.
Related terms
- Characters per minute (CPM): the same speed counted in characters, before the five-character convention.
- Keystrokes per hour (KPH): the unit used for numeric data entry.
- Typing accuracy: the share of typed text that is correct.
- Dictation: speaking so that software writes the words as you say them.
Guides and questions that cover it
Evidence
Every number on this page, with where it comes from. Open a fact to see the exact words in its source.
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- 5.A typist at 50 words per minute enters 250 characters per minute, because one word counts as five characters.
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Related terms
- Typing Speed: Average WPM and How to Type FasterThe topic this term belongs to
- Articulation rateArticulation rate is the number of syllables a speaker produces per second, leaving out pauses. It measures how fast the speech itself comes out, so it is usually faster than the overall speaking rate that counts every pause.
- Characters per minute (CPM)Characters per minute (CPM) is the number of characters typed in one minute, counting spaces and punctuation. Words per minute is the same count divided by five, so a typist at 50 WPM enters 250 characters per minute.
- ColemakColemak is an alternative English keyboard layout, introduced in 2006 and designed for efficient, comfortable touch typing. Its supporters describe it as the third most popular layout for English touch typing, after QWERTY and Dvorak, but that ranking has no stated method.
- Dvorak Simplified KeyboardThe Dvorak Simplified Keyboard is an alternative English keyboard layout that places the most common letters on the home row. Dvorak and Dealey applied for a patent on it in 1932, but the studies that claimed it was faster than QWERTY have been criticized, and the evidence for a speed gain is weak.
- Home rowThe home row is the middle row of keys on a keyboard, where the fingers rest when you touch type. On a QWERTY keyboard it holds A, S, D, F for the left hand and J, K, L and semicolon for the right, and every other key is reached by moving a finger away from it and back.
- Hunt and peckHunt and peck is a typing method in which the typist finds each key by sight and presses it with one or two fingers, usually the index fingers. It is also called two-finger typing, and it differs from touch typing, which relies on memorized key positions and the home row.
- Keystroke dynamicsKeystroke dynamics is the identification of a person from the rhythm of their typing, using the timing between key presses as a pattern much like a handwritten signature. It is a behavioral biometric, so it supports identity checks through statistical matching rather than proving who typed.
- Keystrokes per character (KSPC)Keystrokes per character (KSPC) is the average number of keystrokes a text entry method needs to produce one character of text. A basic QWERTY keyboard scores 1, methods that need more presses score above 1, and word prediction can score below 1.
- Keystrokes per hour (KPH)Keystrokes per hour (KPH) is the number of key presses made in one hour. It is the standard unit for numeric data entry, where many jobs require 8,000 or 10,000 keystrokes per hour, and it counts keys rather than words.
- Oral reading fluency (ORF)Oral reading fluency (ORF) measures how many words a reader gets right in one minute of reading a passage aloud. Schools record the result as words correct per minute (WCPM), which subtracts the words read wrongly from the total.
- QWERTYQWERTY is the standard letter arrangement on English keyboards, named for the first six letters of the top row. Christopher Latham Sholes devised it in the early 1870s for typewriters, and it is still the layout most people type on, even though faster layouts have been proposed.
- Rollover typingRollover, or key rollover, is the number of key presses a keyboard can detect when they overlap. Two-key rollover reliably detects only two keys at once, and a matrix keyboard without diodes can register a ghost key when three keys are pressed together.
Pages that use this term
- Typing Speed: Average WPM and How to Type FasterTopic
- Average Typing Speed: WPM by Age, Gender and DeviceGuide
- What Is a Good Typing Speed? WPM Levels ExplainedGuide
- How to Dictate Into Any App: Built-in vs System-WideGuide
- How Typing Speed Is Measured: WPM, Accuracy and TestsGuide
- Touch Typing: What It Is and How to Learn ItGuide
- How to Type Faster: What Actually Raises Your WPMGuide
- Typing Speed Requirements for Jobs: WPM by RoleGuide
- Speaking vs Typing Speed: What the Research ShowsGuide
- Phone Typing Speed: How Fast People Type on PhonesGuide
- Voice Coding: How to Program by VoiceGuide
- Dictation on iPad and Android TabletsGuide
- Writing Speed: Words per Minute by Hand and per DayGuide
- Stenography and Shorthand: Writing at 225 WPMGuide
- Dictation for Journalists and Content CreatorsGuide
- Text Expanders and Autocomplete: Type Less, Not FasterGuide
- Can you really read 900 words per minute?Question
- Can you touch type with one hand?Question
- Can you type fast without touch typing?Question
- Can you type faster than you talk?Question
- Do women type faster than men?Question
- Does autocorrect make you type faster?Question
- Does touch typing make you smarter?Question
- Does typing speed correlate with intelligence?Question