What Is a Good Typing Speed? WPM Levels Explained

A good typing speed on a computer keyboard is about 60 words per minute (WPM). Speeds of 78 WPM or more put you in the fastest tenth of a large measured sample ¹. The measured averages sit lower, between about 35 and 52 WPM ^{2 3}. A speed only counts with good accuracy. The court reporting skills test sets that bar at 95 percent ⁴, and this guide uses the same floor.

This guide sets out those levels and where each number comes from. If you want the basic definition first, read our guide to how typing speed is measured. For your own result, the average typing speed guide breaks the data down by age and device.

Typical typing is 35 to 52 WPM, and 60 is a good speed

One figure you may see is 40 WPM, labeled as the average. The measured data does not support that label. In a 1999 study, the average typist typed plain text at 35 WPM, and the fast group averaged 40 ². The 40 figure is the average of that fast group, not the middle of the population.

Larger and more recent data gives a higher middle. An online typing test with more than 168,000 volunteers ⁵ recorded an average of 51.56 WPM ³. Those volunteers chose to take the test, so they are not a random sample of everyone ⁶. The two studies used different texts and different people, so part of the gap is method. The useful reading is a range, not one number: the middle of measured typing sits between roughly 35 and 52 WPM ^{2 3}. We did not find a newer sample of this size when writing this guide, so the 2018 figures are the best large-scale reference here. Typing habits may have shifted since, and a phone-based or device-based sample would give different numbers.

That is why we call 60 WPM good. It is above the online average and below the top tenth. A typist at 60 is faster than the online average, but not yet in the group that stands out.

A level chart: measured thresholds set the bands

Averages are useful for comparison, but the most reliable way to set levels is with percentile thresholds. The same 2018 study gives two of them. Typists faster than 90 percent of participants were those above about 78 WPM ¹. The slowest 10 percent were those below about 26 WPM ⁷. Those two lines, plus the average, give the level chart below.

The top of the table is set by data, not by taste. The fastest typists in the same dataset reached 120 WPM or more ⁸, but the paper does not say how far above 120 the top speeds went.

Two features of the data matter for reading the chart. First, the speed distribution is not bell-shaped. The authors report that it is not a normal curve and shows slight positive skew ⁹. A skewed group has a long tail of fast typists, so the mean can sit above the middle of the group. Second, the thresholds are set on one dataset. Another test, a different text or a different group of people could move the lines somewhat. Treat the bands as a guide to where you stand, not a grade.

The top-tenth line is about 1.5 times the online average ¹⁰. That gap is why a typist can feel quick at 60 and still be far from the fast group.

Touch typing is not the only route to a good speed. In the How We Type study, self-taught typists reached speeds comparable with touch typists, even when using fewer fingers ¹¹. That was a small laboratory study, so it does not show where those typists would fall in the bands above. The touch typing guide explains what touch typing is and how to learn it, and keyboard layouts compared covers QWERTY, Dvorak and Colemak.

Phone typing is measured separately. In a web-based study of 37,370 volunteers entering text on mobile phones, the average was 36.2 WPM ¹². A phone speed of about 36 is therefore close to the phone average, not a sign of slowness. For the numbers by device, see our guide to phone typing speed.

Accuracy decides whether a speed counts: this guide uses 95 percent as its floor

A speed without an accuracy figure cannot be compared with another. A typing test counts words, and the counting convention matters. The How We Type study defines one word as five characters long ¹³, so every passage is scored by its character count. A test that counts real words can score the same keystrokes differently, depending on word length.

Testing bodies handle errors in two ways. Some report gross words per minute, which counts every word typed, and net words per minute, which counts only correct words ¹⁴. The CBSE typing test calculates accuracy as net speed divided by gross speed, times 100 ¹⁵, and sets its merit criteria at 35 WPM for English and 30 WPM for Hindi ¹⁶. The court reporting exam sets its floor at a fixed accuracy: each leg of the NCRA skills test needs 95 percent accuracy ⁴. That is the same floor this guide uses.

Accuracy also changes how speech compares with the keyboard. In a 1999 study, a combined correction method was slower than correcting by typing for users with good typing skills ¹⁷. Speech is quick to enter text, but correction by speech can take back some of that advantage. A speed figure from dictation should therefore include the time spent on corrections, not only the time spent speaking.

So a good speed has two parts. The first is the words per minute. The second is the share of those words that were correct. A WPM figure alone does not show how many words had to be fixed, so a result should always report both numbers. Our typing accuracy entry defines the measure in more detail.

The English tests here set the bar at 35 WPM, and stenography starts far higher

Many employers and public bodies test typing before hiring, and their thresholds are useful reference points because they are written down. The Delhi Development Authority's recruitment notice requires English-medium candidates to reach a minimum of 35 WPM ¹⁸. Its instructions also penalize incorrect words ¹⁸, so a candidate who types fast but makes errors can fall below the line. A candidate whose adjusted speed is below 35 WPM does not qualify ¹⁹.

The CBSE criteria are 35 WPM for English and 30 WPM for Hindi ¹⁶. The gap between languages is a reminder that thresholds are set by each body for its own work, not by a universal scale. For thresholds by role, see typing speed requirements for jobs.

Set against the levels above, the 35 WPM threshold sits in the typical band. It matches the 1999 average ² and falls below the 2018 online mean ³. A test at that line is therefore asking for ordinary competence on a keyboard, not for a speed that stands out. A role that asks for more should say so in its notice, and the notice is the document to check.

At the other end, court reporters use shorthand machines rather than standard keyboards. To earn the Registered Professional Reporter credential, a candidate must transcribe dictation at 180, 200 and 225 words per minute ²⁰, with 95 percent accuracy on each test. A stenotype machine is a different instrument, so its speeds are not directly comparable with a QWERTY keyboard. For more on the method, see stenography and shorthand.

The fastest online typists reached 120 WPM, and the best-known records date from the 1980s

The question of the fastest typing speed has no clean answer. The online sample of about 168,000 volunteers reached 120 WPM or more ⁸, using short passages of text.

The best-known claims are higher and date from the 1980s. Barbara Blackburn's peak of 212 WPM in 1986 is a self-claimed figure, held for a brief time ²¹. She typed on the Dvorak layout, so her speed is not a QWERTY number. Guinness dropped its records for electronic and computer keyboards from the 1987 edition, citing accuracy ²². Check Guinness's current listings before you quote a title, because this guide relies on a secondary summary of Guinness's editions.

The practical lesson is the same as the one above. A record is a short burst in a contest, while the levels in this guide come from a large online test that volunteers took on their own devices. For the full answer, read our fastest typing speed question.

Composing sets the pace of writing more than keystrokes do

The evidence points to composing, not keys, as the slow step in writing. Typing only handles the wording once it exists. One measurement compares the speeds people reach when they compose rather than transcribe. Composing by speech software ran at 8 to 15 words per minute in earlier work ²³, which is about 5 to 12 percent of normal speaking speed ²⁴. Those composition rates are far below the keyboard speeds above, which suggests the slow part is deciding what to say.

A second result points the same way. In a 2002 study of postsecondary students with learning disabilities, essay length did not differ significantly between speech recognition, human transcription and keyboarding ²⁵. Input method did not make the essays significantly longer or shorter. The same study found that students wrote higher-quality essays, at a faster rate, with continuous speech recognition than with a keyboard ²⁶. Speed and length were not the whole story, and quality counted as well.

Our reading of this evidence is that once typing reaches about 60 WPM with good accuracy, extra speed buys little in finished writing. Planning, choosing words and revising take most of the time. This is our interpretation, not a measured result. For ways to raise your speed, see the how to type faster guide. For whether typing speed matters at all, see does typing speed still matter.

If raw speed is the goal, speech beat the keyboard in a controlled study

If the goal is to put words on the page quickly, speech was the faster input in that study. In a controlled study on an iPhone, English text entered by speech reached 153 words per minute, against 52 WPM on the built-in keyboard ^{27 28}. The same study found Mandarin speech input at 123 WPM against 43 WPM on the Pinyin keyboard ^{29 30}.

The same study also tracked errors. Speech produced fewer errors during entry than the phone keyboard, but left slightly more errors in the final text ³¹. A faster figure from speech therefore still needs a proofread before it is a finished result.

Two caveats apply. The study used short phrases in a quiet room, so its figures may not hold in noisy places or for long documents. The authors also say that results in non-laboratory settings still need study ³². Ordinary speech is also quick: people normally speak at 125 to 150 words per minute ³³, and conversational speech averages 196 words per minute when all elapsed time is counted ³⁴.

Speech does not replace typing for every task, and the speaking versus typing speed comparison covers the research in more detail. For dictation itself, the built-in tools on most systems are enough to try the idea. Our overview of dictation compared with typing explains when each makes sense. Yap, which we make, is an on-device dictation app for Mac and Windows, and it is one option among several. The free online dictation page lets you try speech in your browser first.

Set your own target in three steps

Your own number is more useful than any table, and it takes only a short test to measure. Work through the steps in this order, because accuracy decides whether the speed means anything.

1. Measure your gross and net speed on a passage of ordinary text, counting each word as five characters ¹³. Report both figures, so you can see how many words needed fixing.
2. Check accuracy before you chase speed. If your accuracy is below the 95 percent floor ⁴, practice corrections first, because a speed only counts at good accuracy.
3. Compare the result with the level table and with any job threshold that applies to you. A typist aiming for a role with a 35 WPM test needs a different target from one aiming for the top tenth.

Repeat the test on several days, since one run is a noisy estimate. If your work is mostly writing rather than data entry, the composition evidence above suggests that gains in planning and in dictation may matter more than the next few words per minute on the keyboard.

Where to go next

• For the whole subject on one page, see the typing speed overview.
• If you want a single number to compare against, start with the level table above and the average typing speed guide.
• To check whether 40 WPM is enough for you, read is 40 words per minute a good typing speed.
• To see how 60 compares with the next level up, read is 60 words per minute a good typing speed.
• For speeds in the 80 to 100 range, read is 100 WPM a fast typing speed.
• To learn what the numbers count, read how typing speed is measured, and for the meaning of words per minute, see the glossary.