Average Typing Speed: WPM on Computers and Phones

The average typing speed is about 52 words per minute (WPM) on a computer keyboard and about 36 WPM on a phone. Those figures come from two of the largest typing studies ever run: one with 168,000 volunteers on physical keyboards and one with 37,000 volunteers on mobile phones. Most people sit roughly between 30 and 70 WPM.

A “word” in these numbers is not a real word. Typing speed is counted in standard words of five characters, spaces and punctuation included, so a sentence full of short words does not give you an easier score than one with long words. Everything on this page uses that definition, and so do the typing tests on Click Tester.

Average typing speed on a computer keyboard

On a computer, the average typing speed is 51.56 WPM, usually rounded to 52. That is the result of a 2018 study by researchers at Aalto University and the University of Cambridge, which logged 136 million keystrokes from 168,960 people who completed an online typing test of 15 English sentences (Dhakal et al., CHI 2018).

The spread was wide. The standard deviation was 20.2 WPM, so a large share of ordinary typists sit anywhere from the low 30s to the low 70s. The slowest 10% typed below about 26 WPM, the fastest 10% above about 78 WPM, and the quickest people in the data reached 120 WPM or more.

SpeedWhere it sits in the 2018 study
Under 26 WPMSlowest 10%
26 to 51 WPMBelow the average
About 52 WPMThe average participant
52 to 78 WPMAbove the average
Over 78 WPMFastest 10%
120 WPM or moreThe very top

Two details help you read those numbers fairly. The volunteers chose to take a typing test, and 72% said they had taken a typing course, so they are probably a little faster than the population as a whole. They were also young: the mean age was 24.5, and 75% were between 11 and 30. About 54% typed on a laptop keyboard and about 44% on a separate physical keyboard.

How today’s average compares with professional typists

People who typed for a living in the typewriter era were faster than today’s average user. The Cambridge summary of the study says professionally trained typists in the 1970s and 1980s typically reached 60 to 90 WPM (University of Cambridge). The paper itself notes that earlier lab studies of professional touch typists observed around 60 to 75 WPM.

So if you type at 60 WPM or more, you are at or above the level that older research treated as professional speed. That is a useful target for anyone whose job involves a lot of writing.

Average typing speed on a phone

The average typing speed on a phone is 36.17 WPM, about 15 WPM slower than on a full keyboard. That figure comes from a 2019 follow-up study of 37,370 volunteers who typed English sentences on their own phones (Palin et al., MobileHCI 2019). Three quarters of the participants typed below 44 WPM, and the fastest went over 80 WPM.

How you hold the phone makes a large difference. In the same study, 74% of people reported typing with both thumbs, and that was the fastest method:

Typing posture on a phoneAverage WPM
Both thumbs38.0
Both index fingers32.6
Left thumb only30.8
Right thumb only30.2
Right index finger only26.7
Left index finger only25.0

Keyboard features matter as well. People who let autocorrect fix their words typed faster, while people who often tapped suggested words in the prediction bar typed slower. Picking a word from a list takes a glance and a tap, which is often slower than finishing the word yourself. The researchers also point out that with only one or two fingers, people type about 70% as fast on a phone as on a desktop keyboard, a smaller gap than most people expect.

Average typing speed by age

Younger people type faster on phones, and speed falls steadily with age. The mobile study is the clearest published source for this, because it broke its results down by age group:

Age groupAverage WPM on a phone
Under 1024.3
10 to 1939.6
20 to 2936.5
30 to 3932.2
40 to 4928.9
50 to 5926.3

Teenagers were the fastest group even though they did not report the most time spent typing on their phones; people in their 20s and 30s did. That suggests familiarity with phone keyboards plays a part, not only practice time.

For computer keyboards there is no equally large age breakdown. The desktop study was dominated by people aged 11 to 30, so its 52 WPM average mostly describes teenagers and young adults. Be careful with charts of the average typing speed for a 13 year old or a 40 year old on other sites: many give no source at all. If you are older and type at 40 WPM on a computer, you are not slow; you are close to what the data shows for ordinary typists.

What is a good typing speed?

A good typing speed is anything above the average of about 52 WPM on a computer, with 95% accuracy or better. Here is a practical scale based on the study figures above. It is a guide, not an official standard, because no official scale exists.

WPM on a computerWhat it means
Under 30Beginner, or looking at the keys
30 to 50Below average to average
50 to 60Average, fine for everyday use
60 to 80Above average, near older professional levels
80 to 100Fast, in the top 10% of the large study
Over 100Very fast

Accuracy changes how a score should be read. A 70 WPM result full of mistakes is less useful than 60 WPM with almost none, because every error has to be found and fixed later. The 2018 study found that people left 1.17% of their errors uncorrected on average, and that faster typists made fewer mistakes, not more. Speed and accuracy go together.

Is 40, 60 or 100 WPM good?

  • 40 WPM is a little below the computer average but perfectly usable. It is also the minimum many US federal clerk jobs ask for.
  • 60 WPM is comfortably above average and matches what older research found for professional typists.
  • 70 WPM puts you well into the upper part of the range, close to the top 10% cut-off of about 78 WPM.
  • 100 WPM is far above average. Only a small share of typists reach it on a full sentence test.

Typing speed requirements for jobs

Most jobs do not set a typing speed, but office and data roles sometimes do, and 40 WPM is a common minimum. US federal clerk positions are a clear example. A Department of the Air Force advert for a Clerk (Office Automation) role states that applicants need “a minimum of 40 WPM proficiency” (USAJOBS). A Bureau of Indian Affairs qualification standard for clerk positions defines that as 40 WPM in a five minute performance test with three or fewer errors (BIA clerk standard).

The five minute length matters. A short burst is easier than holding a pace, so if a job asks for 40 WPM, practise with a 5 minute typing test rather than a 15 second one. Employers that test you usually count errors too, so keep accuracy high.

What makes some people type faster?

Fast typists are not just pressing keys sooner; they type in a different way. The 2018 study compared the fastest 10% of participants with the slowest 10%:

HabitFast typists (89.6 WPM)Slow typists (20.9 WPM)
Rollover share of key presses49.9%7.6%
Fingers used (self-reported)8.45.3
Time between key pressesabout 122 msabout 481 ms
Uncorrected errors0.71%1.78%

Rollover means pressing the next key before releasing the last one, and it was the strongest single predictor of speed in the study. Fast typists overlap their key presses, so their fingers are already moving to the next letter. How long a key is held down barely changed between groups: about 116 ms on average.

Training helped, but less than you might think. People who had taken a typing course averaged 54.35 WPM, compared with 49.00 WPM for those who had not. The authors put it this way: untrained typists can be as fast as trained typists, but trained typists are faster in general. A separate Aalto study found that self-taught typists using fewer than ten fingers can match touch typists, although every world record has been set with touch typing (Feit, Weir and Oulasvirta, How We Type).

Language matters on phones too. Native English speakers typed English sentences at 37.8 WPM, while people who never type in English managed 25.6 WPM. If English is not your first language, your English typing score will usually sit below your speed in your own language.

If you want to move up the table, our guide on typing faster covers touch typing, rollover practice and a weekly plan.

How typing speed is measured

Typing speed is measured in words per minute, where one word equals five characters. You take the number of characters typed, divide by five, then divide by the minutes taken. A York University note on text entry research explains that this five character “word” includes spaces and punctuation, and that the convention dates back to typing competitions in the early 1900s (MacKenzie, York University).

Different tests still give different numbers for the same person, for three main reasons:

  1. Gross or net WPM. Some tests count every character you typed (gross WPM). Others count only correct words (net WPM). Our tests count only correct words, which gives a lower but more honest number.
  2. Test length. Short tests usually give higher scores, because you can hold full speed for 15 seconds but not for 5 minutes.
  3. The text. Lower case common words are easier than sentences with capitals, numbers and punctuation. The studies on this page used real sentences; the tests on Click Tester use random common words in lower case.

That last point means your Click Tester score and the study averages are close relatives, not an exact match. Compare yourself with the averages as a rough guide, and compare your own results only with tests of the same length.

Check your own typing speed

The quickest way to see where you stand is to take a test and compare the result with the tables above.

Typing speed is only one kind of speed. To check how quickly you respond rather than how quickly you type, try the reaction time test. For keyboard and mouse speed in games, the APM test counts your actions per minute.

Frequently asked questions

What is the average typing speed?

The average typing speed is about 52 WPM on a computer keyboard and about 36 WPM on a phone. Those figures come from studies of 168,960 and 37,370 volunteers run by Aalto University and the University of Cambridge. Most people type roughly between 30 and 70 WPM on a computer.

What is the average WPM for adults?

For adults typing on a computer, around 50 WPM is a fair average, based on the 2018 study where most participants were teenagers and young adults. On phones, adults in their 20s averaged 36.5 WPM and adults in their 40s 28.9 WPM. Speed on phones drops steadily with age.

Is 50 WPM a good typing speed?

Yes. 50 WPM is right at the average for computer typing, and it is fast enough for school, office work and everyday writing. Pushing it to 60 WPM or more puts you at the level older research found for professional typists.

Is typing on a phone slower than on a keyboard?

Yes, by about 15 WPM on average: 36 WPM on phones against 52 WPM on computer keyboards. Typing with both thumbs and letting autocorrect fix words were linked to faster phone typing.

What typing speed do jobs require?

Jobs that set a requirement often ask for 40 WPM. US federal clerk roles, for example, ask for 40 WPM, and one federal standard measures it with a five minute test and no more than three errors. Many other jobs have no formal requirement, but faster typing still saves time.

Does typing speed change with age?

On phones it clearly does. People aged 10 to 19 averaged 39.6 WPM, while people aged 50 to 59 averaged 26.3 WPM. For computer keyboards no study of the same size has published an age breakdown.

Does accuracy matter more than speed?

Accuracy and speed matter together. Most tests, including ours, count only correct words, so every error lowers your score, and fast typists in the research made fewer mistakes than slow ones. Aim for 95% accuracy or better before trying to type faster.

Sources