Typing tips

[toddhicks209]

Memorizing the keyboard, plenty of practice and using the right fingering should greatly increase your speed.

[kalway]

Hi Guys ,
I am new on this website and would like to ask you how I can improve my speed typing.
Within last few years since end of 2011 I’ve been practising typing. Last year I had a break but now I back to normal as I use to do.

I have polish program called “Mistrz Klawiatury” – Keyboard Master. There are 50 lessons start from beginning. I did all and spent many hours for learning and practice – approx. 100 hours. Then I’ve decided to practice more and I downloaded PDF of The Count of Monte Cristo. I converted to .txt document and created second document for my practice. I cut 2-3 pages from main document and paste to my .txt which is enough for 15-20 minutes. I do practice mostly every day with my own text. I spent more than 150 hours (re-typing book:

Count of Monte Cristo

63 chapters – 486 pages) and currently I can type without watching keyboard which is good If you see below picture the program shows that I did 2269 exercises, total practice time is 253:47:49, actual speed 391.64 signs per minute and accuracy is 94.37%.

Keyboard Master.jpg (118.31 KiB) Viewed 54501 times

When I did 1 minute test on your website I get 41WPM with 8 wrong words. For another one: Testing for typing purposes even less. I am not happy with this results and I would like speed up my typing. The question is how to do this and what am I doing wrong Do I need just to keep practise or something else I do not thing my long break affect me too much with my speed…….I’ve noticed also if I stick my fingers very close to keyboard I can speed up little bit but I am doing more mistakes/errors.

Any answers will be appreciated.

[toddhicks209]

I find that the closer your fingers are to the keyboard, the better. Stretch your fingers to hit keys that are not on the home row and avoid lifting your fingers more than a little after hitting keys on the home row.

[kalway]

Thank you for quick respond I'll try to keep my fingers closer to keyboard and stretch when are not to the home row. I've just noticed that I moving hand when I use keys which are not on the home row. Thanks for the advice.

[dinsa4u]

hey can anyone tell me how to increase tying speed i stuck in 35 wpm speed .no growth is happening .when i try to type fast my finger got pain n i leave .plz guide proper .

[ethereal]

hey can anyone tell me how to increase tying speed i stuck in 35 wpm speed .no growth is happening .when i try to type fast my finger got pain n i leave .plz guide proper .

The only way to truly improve typing speed is to practice frequently. If your fingers are hurting, you may be using improper technique, and you can learn how to type properly by reading the tips posted in this thread.

[RooScoe]

Hi, as I've said, I only use 5 fingers: left ring for A, left middle for S, thumb for the space and indexes for the rest. I usually peak up to 120 words per min. But I'm here because I'm trying to break this bad habbit I've been having since I was 8 years old by learning the standard layout. Any tips?

[toddhicks209]

It would help to use more fingers and use the proper finger for each key. For example, you should go from using your middle finger to hit the S key to using your fourth finger to type an "S".

[jace888]

Hi, as I've said, I only use 5 fingers: left ring for A, left middle for S, thumb for the space and indexes for the rest. I usually peak up to 120 words per min. But I'm here because I'm trying to break this bad habbit I've been having since I was 8 years old by learning the standard layout. Any tips?

I was posting this in the other thread on tips and I actually realised even though I learnt to touch type properly from a young age, I do have bad habits like the one you described whereby my left middle does tend to be used for S, and my fourth finger used for A. This is because I need quick access to the modifier keys (eg SHIFT and CTRL) for most things so it made the most sense that my fifth finger gets stretched for those. I don't think your layout would hinder your speed that much given I'm able to average >145wpm with 97%+ accuracy using this. It's whatever makes you comfortable. But practice definitely helps.

[Cthulhu]

Hello! I am wondering how do you memorize non-latin alphabets on keyboards? Do you get the stickers? when I first started typing in English I looked down until I had comfortable muscle memory. Also how do I prevent carpal tunnel without changing my hand position? do wrist rests do that for me? thank you!