AcademyTouch Typing: What It Is and How to Start Learning

Touch typing is typing without looking at the keyboard. Each finger owns a fixed set of keys, and you find them by feel from the home row: A, S, D and F under the left hand, J, K, L and the semicolon under the right. You learn it by practicing every reach slowly, with the right finger and your eyes on the screen, in short daily sessions, and by pushing through a dip in speed at the start.

The home row and the bumps on F and J

In the standard method for a QWERTY keyboard, your fingers rest on the home row and reach up and down from there, returning after every key. Many keyboards put a small raised dot or bar on the F and J keys so your index fingers can find the home position without looking, and your thumbs rest on the space bar.^{Source 1}

Home-row touch typing is often credited to Frank E. McGurrin, a court stenographer who reportedly used it to win a typing contest in Cincinnati in 1888, although whether he was the first is disputed.^{Source 1}

Which finger presses which key

In the standard chart, each column of keys slants down to the right and belongs to one finger. This is the chart TypeTrance’s keyboard heatmap and layout model use, shown here for a US QWERTY keyboard:

The index fingers each cover two columns: they rest on F and J, the keys with the bumps, and reach inward for G and H. The 6 key sits between two columns, and courses differ on which index finger takes it. Shift goes to the little finger of the hand that isn’t typing the letter.

Race it now

60secondsBootcampCommon words drill

Make the most frequent English words automatic to raise your everyday typing speed.

• 1-minute test
• 200 common words

Start the common words drill

Does touch typing make you faster?

The honest answer: it helps, but it isn’t the only way to be fast.

• Consistency matters more than the method. In a motion-capture study of everyday typists, self-taught typists who used fewer fingers reached performance comparable with touch typists. What predicted speed was pressing each letter consistently with the same finger, preparing upcoming keystrokes and keeping the hands still while the fingers moved.^{Source 2}
• Training and fingers help a little. In a study of 168,960 typists, those who had taken a typing course averaged about 5 WPM faster than those who hadn’t, and using more fingers went with more speed.^{Source 3}
• The clearest gain is not needing your eyes. In a study of 48 typists, people who used fewer fingers and less consistent key assignments were slower and less accurate than standard touch typists, especially when the letters were removed from the keys or the keyboard was hidden.^{Source 4} The university’s summary gives averages of 80 WPM for the touch typists and 72 for the others, notes that covering the keyboard slowed only the others, and adds that 14 of the 24 people who said they touch typed turned out not to use the standard fingering.^{Source 5}

The motion-capture researchers still recommend the touch-typing system to anyone who wants to consistently type sentences at over 100 WPM, the middle of the Surge class (90–109 WPM) among TypeTrance’s typing speed classes, while estimating that reaching the speed of their fast typists that way takes several hundred hours of deliberate practice.^{Source 2}

So if you already type fast and accurately without looking, relearning may gain you little. If you look at the keys, type with two fingers or stall early, touch typing is the most reliable way to build the consistent finger-to-key mapping that fast typing depends on.

The catch: slower before faster

Switching makes you slower at first: for people with typing experience, the starting level in touch typing is far lower than their hunt-and-peck speed.^{Source 1} That dip is where learners slide back. Researchers who study touch-typing courses note that success in training “does not ensure its continuation into everyday use”, and trace it to people choosing whatever works better in the moment, such as looking at the keys.^{Source 6}

Plan for the dip. Practice in short, focused sessions, keep your eyes on the screen, and use touch typing for everything once you have started, not only during practice.

A staged plan

The stages below are an outline, not a fixed curriculum. Move on when the current stage feels accurate, not when a set number of days has passed.

Stage 1: Set up and find home

• Sit with straight wrists and your elbows close to your body; the full checklist is in typing ergonomics.
• Rest your fingers on the home row, index fingers on the F and J bumps, thumbs on the space bar.
• Learn which finger owns each key, and return to the home row after every reach.

Stage 2: Accuracy without looking

• Keep your eyes on the screen. If you can’t help glancing down, cover your hands with a cloth.
• Practice the common words drill: the most frequent words, slowly, with every key pressed by its own finger.
• Then move to the accuracy drill, which won’t let you past a word until it’s right.
• Expect a low WPM. Consistency comes first.

Stage 3: Build speed deliberately

• Take the 1-minute test a few times a week and compare your typical result from week to week, not your best single run.
• Practice in short, concentrated bursts slightly faster than comfortable, then work on the slips that show up, the approach early typing studies recommended.^{Source 7}
• Keep sessions short and frequent. In a classic study, learners trained one hour a day progressed more efficiently than those trained in two 2-hour sessions a day.^{Source 8}

Stage 4: Capitals, punctuation and numbers

• Add capitals with the capital letters drill, pressing Shift with the opposite hand.
• Then add punctuation and numbers, each with its own BOOTCAMP drill.
• Move up to the 3-minute test, which uses punctuated text.

Signs you’re ready to move on

• You can type the stage’s text without looking down and without thinking about which finger to use.
• Your accuracy holds steady from session to session; our coach’s rule of thumb is about 97% before you push for speed.
• The slips listed after your tests no longer come from the keys you have just learned.

Common mistakes while learning

• Looking down “just once”. Every glance practices the habit you are replacing.
• Switching back for real work. Use touch typing everywhere once you have started, even while it is slower than your old way.
• Drifting off the home row. If your hands creep, every reach starts from the wrong place. Return to the F and J bumps after each word until it becomes automatic.
• Letting the strongest finger take over. Pressing a key with whichever finger is closest breaks the consistent mapping that touch typing is for.
• Pushing speed too early. Get the mapping right first, then speed it up. The accuracy drill keeps you honest while you do.
• Practicing in rare, long sessions. Short daily practice suits the evidence on learning to type better than a weekly marathon.
• Dropping the goal of speed. In a study of university students with years of typing experience, the fastest had taken a typing class and also tried to type quickly in their everyday typing; the class alone made no significant difference.^{Source 7}

What about other layouts?

If you are starting from scratch, you could learn touch typing on an alternative layout such as Dvorak or Colemak instead of QWERTY. Read keyboard layouts compared first: the evidence that switching makes typists faster is weak, and QWERTY is what nearly everyone around you uses. In the 168,960-typist study, 98.1% of participants typed on QWERTY.^{Source 3}

TypeTrance can emulate another layout on the keyboard you already have: in Settings, under Keyboard, pick it in “Practice another layout”, so you can try one without changing your system settings.