“Good” by purpose — the honest table
| Purpose | Good enough | Genuinely strong | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Everyday personal use | 35–40 | 50+ | Above 40, typing is simply not a limitation in daily life |
| School / university | 35–45 | 55+ | Essay deadlines are where speed quietly pays off |
| General office work | 50 | 65+ | Email, docs, chat — 50 keeps pace with thought |
| Writing / journalism | 55 | 70+ | Draft speed follows typing speed more than writers admit |
| Data entry | 50–60 | 70+ | Postings also quote KPH; accuracy is contractually measured |
| Transcription | 70 | 85+ | Audio runs at 130–160 spoken WPM; the gap is the workload |
| Programming | 40 | 60+ | Thinking is the bottleneck — but 60+ makes refactoring frictionless |
Find out which column you’re in
Click the words and start typing — the timer starts on your first keystroke. space next word · Esc restart
Why accuracy beats raw speed — the arithmetic
Every error costs more than the character: you notice it, backspace, retype, and re-find your rhythm — typically two to four seconds per mistake. Run the numbers: a 70 WPM typist at 88% accuracy loses so much time to corrections that their effective output falls below a 55 WPM typist at 98%. This is why net WPM (correct words only) is the number this site reports, why employers test accuracy alongside speed, and why the fastest improvement path for most people is not typing faster — it’s stopping the errors. Get accuracy to 95%+ first; the speed follows on its own.
Good vs average vs fast — placing the words on the scale
The words people use map onto the percentile ladder cleanly: average is the low 40s (the middle of the population), good begins where you’re comfortably above it (50+, roughly the top third), fast starts around 60 (top ~13%), and professional at 80+ (top few percent). If you want the one-number answer for a resume or a job application: 60 WPM with 97% accuracy is the figure that satisfies essentially every “good typist” requirement in practice.
What employers actually ask for
Typing requirements in job postings cluster tightly by role: customer support 40–50, administrative 55–65, data entry 50–70, transcription 70–90. Our test above checks your result against these bands automatically, and our jobs research — compiled from live postings — tracks how the requirements shift over time.
If your number isn’t “good” yet
Three moves, in order of return: fix accuracy to 95%+ (biggest gain, least effort); learn proper touch typing if you’re hunt-and-pecking (doubles most people within months); then 10–15 minutes of daily practice, retesting weekly with the same test length. Speed built this way holds — cramming doesn’t. Progress is visible on the percentile bar every time you retake the test.
Sources
- Population averages: Ostrach and Aalto studies — full citations on the methodology page.
- Job bands: compiled from live postings; running dataset on the jobs page.
- Spoken-speech rate (transcription context): standard conversational English, 130–160 WPM.
FAQ
Is 50 WPM good?
Yes — comfortably above the 40–44 average, and enough for almost any office job. It sits around the top third of all typists.
Is 60 WPM good?
Genuinely fast — faster than roughly 87% of people, and past the threshold most typing-relevant job postings set.
Is 30 WPM too slow?
Below average, but entirely fixable: 30 WPM hunt-and-peckers who learn touch typing routinely reach 50+ within a few months.
What typing speed should I put on my resume?
Your tested net WPM with accuracy — “65 WPM, 97% accuracy” reads far stronger than a bare number, and employers who care will verify with a test anyway.