How do blind people type on a computer?

Blind people type on a computer with a standard keyboard and a screen reader, which speaks what they type. On a phone or tablet, they use the touchscreen keyboard with the screen reader turned on. The research we found on typing speed comes from two setups, a physical keyboard with VoiceOver and a smartphone keyboard, and both are slow compared with sighted typing. That speed is the main reason dictation is worth testing alongside typing.

This page covers the screen reader and the keyboard. It does not cover braille displays or braille input, because we could not check a source for them. We also did not find a checkable study of how many blind people touch type on a physical keyboard, so no rate is given for that.

The screen reader speaks each key or word, and you choose how much

Typing with a screen reader depends on its typing echo, the setting that decides what is spoken as you type. On a Mac, Apple's VoiceOver Utility offers four choices for what VoiceOver says while you type: Characters, Words, Characters and Words, or Nothing ¹. You find the option under the Verbosity settings as While typing speak, so test the setting in the apps you use most.

In NVDA on Windows, the NVDA user guide says the Speak typed characters command, NVDA+2, controls when NVDA announces characters you type ². Choose a level that gives you the feedback you need without reading every key twice.

The screen reader you use matters too. In WebAIM's tenth survey, JAWS was the primary desktop or laptop screen reader for 40.5 percent of respondents, and NVDA for 37.7 percent ^{3 4}. The survey is self-selected, so these are shares of the people who answered, not of all blind computer users.

Typing speed is slow in studies, and the numbers depend on the device

In a longitudinal study with 12 blind participants, the average entry speed on a QWERTY keyboard with VoiceOver was 7.5 words per minute ⁵. That is a dissertation's measurement, with its own sample and method, so read it as one data point rather than an average for everyone.

On a smartphone, a 2024 study found that the average typing speed on the default keyboard, without word prediction, was 1.87 words per minute ⁶. That study counts five characters as one word ⁷, so its figure is a typing rate by convention. It cannot be compared directly with a count of real words in a different study.

The table shows two numbers from different studies, with different methods and sample sizes. Do not read the gap between them as a measured difference between a computer and a phone.

Word prediction does not fix the speed problem

Word prediction is one option for slow typing, and the 2024 study tested it on a smartphone keyboard. Its authors found that word prediction did not enhance typing accuracy, and that it increased both physical and temporal workload, compared with the default keyboard ⁸. So prediction is not a free speed gain for every user. Test it before you rely on it, and keep it only if it helps your own typing.

It depends: the device, the screen reader and the task

The answer changes with the setup, the screen reader and the task. The typing echo decides how much you hear while you type, so a level that is too loud slows you down and a silent one leaves mistakes unnoticed. We did not find a study that compares writing at length on a computer with writing on a phone, so the choice is yours to test. If you are writing a long document, combine typing for edits and short corrections with dictation for drafting, then compare your speed on each. The guide to dictation for blind and visually impaired people explains how to time both methods.

What to do

1. Set what the screen reader speaks as you type. On a Mac, set While typing speak in the VoiceOver Utility. In NVDA, use the Speak typed characters command (NVDA+2). Choose a level you can keep up with, and test it in your main apps.
2. Learn your screen reader's text commands. Learn the commands that move by word, line and sentence, so you can hear what you wrote without reading the whole document again. Use the screen reader's own documentation for the keys.
3. Time a 200-word draft by keyboard and by dictation. Include the time you spend correcting, since correction is where the two methods differ most.
4. Use dictation for drafting if the timing favors it, then check the text by listening. The guide to dictation for blind and visually impaired people describes a checking routine.
5. Recheck the settings after a major update. Defaults can change between screen reader versions, so test the echo level again when you upgrade.

Related reading

For the other side of this topic, see does dictation work with a screen reader and do blind people use voice typing. For speed figures in general, see dictation words per minute and can you type faster than you talk. The accessibility overview lists the other guides in this section.

Terms used here: screen reader, VoiceOver, QWERTY, words per minute and home row.