WPM benchmarks

Average Typing Speed

So you have a WPM number from the typing test, now what does it actually mean? This page breaks down typing speed benchmarks by skill level, age group and job type, using the same WPM scoring convention (5 characters per word) that the test itself uses, so your result compares directly. If you have not taken the test yet, the typing test takes under a minute and gives you the exact number to compare against everything below.

WPM by skill level

These bands describe typical touch-typing speed for an English-language QWERTY keyboard, based on widely cited typing benchmarks from typing education and workplace assessment sources. They describe sustained, accurate typing, not a single lucky 15-second burst.

Level	WPM range	What it typically looks like
Beginner	0 to 20 WPM	Still learning key positions, often looking at the keyboard while typing, or using fewer than ten fingers
Average	21 to 40 WPM	Comfortable touch typing without looking down, roughly matches typical adult typing speed for everyday tasks
Above average	41 to 60 WPM	Regular computer use, often from years of typing at work, school or gaming
Fast	61 to 80 WPM	Meets or exceeds most professional typing job requirements
Professional	81 to 100 WPM	Typical for experienced data entry clerks, transcriptionists and court reporters using standard keyboards
Expert	101 WPM and above	Competitive typing territory; Guinness once listed Barbara Blackburn's sustained speed at 150 WPM (Dvorak keyboard, sustained for 50 minutes, 1976 to 1986 editions) before withdrawing the typing-speed record category in 1987 over verification concerns, and a much higher burst speed has been self-reported but never independently verified

If your result was close to a boundary between two bands, that is normal. WPM naturally varies 5 to 10 points between attempts, so a single test putting you at 39 or 42 WPM does not meaningfully separate "average" from "above average," a few repeated tests will settle it.

Average typing speed by age

Typing speed tends to follow a predictable arc: it climbs through school and early adulthood as touch-typing habits solidify, plateaus through the core working years, and eases down gradually later in life, mostly due to reduced day-to-day typing volume rather than any hard physical limit.

Age group	Typical average WPM	Notes
Under 13	15 to 25 WPM	Wide range depending on how much keyboard-based schoolwork or gaming a child does
13 to 17	30 to 45 WPM	Rises quickly with regular school computer use and messaging
18 to 34	40 to 55 WPM	Peak typical range: this group grew up with keyboards and uses them daily for work, study or communication
35 to 54	35 to 50 WPM	Slightly below the youngest adult group on average, largely due to typing volume rather than ability
55 and older	25 to 40 WPM	Still capable of high speeds with regular practice; the drop is mostly about frequency of typing, not typing skill itself

These are population averages, not ceilings. Plenty of people in every age group type well above their group's typical range, especially anyone with a job or hobby that involves heavy daily typing.

Average typing speed by job

Many roles specify a minimum WPM requirement, usually measured at 60 seconds and often requiring 95%, sometimes 98%, accuracy to count. These are commonly cited ranges, not universal rules, actual requirements vary by employer.

Role	Typical required WPM	Why
General office / admin	35 to 45 WPM	Baseline for comfortable email, documents and data entry
Customer support (chat/email)	45 to 60 WPM	Faster typing directly reduces response time in live chat roles
Data entry clerk	60 to 80 WPM	Volume-based role where typing speed is a core productivity metric
Transcriptionist	70 to 90 WPM	Needs to keep pace with natural speech, roughly 120 to 150 spoken words per minute, while pausing and rewinding audio
Court reporter / captioner	180 to 225 WPM	Uses stenotype machines, not standard keyboards; not directly comparable to a QWERTY typing test
Software developer	No fixed requirement	Coding speed is bottlenecked by thinking and reading far more than by raw typing speed, though 50+ WPM removes typing as a bottleneck entirely

WPM vs GWAM: are they the same thing?

GWAM (Gross Words A Minute) is an older scoring method still used in some school and certification typing tests, and it is close enough to WPM that the two are often used interchangeably, but they are not calculated identically. Standard WPM (used on this site) divides correct characters by 5 to estimate word count. Classic GWAM divides the total characters typed (correct and incorrect together) by 5, then subtracts a penalty for errors, typically a fixed number of words per error rather than a per-character deduction. In practice, for a typist with reasonably high accuracy, the two numbers land within a few points of each other. If a school or employer specifically asks for a GWAM score, treat this test's net WPM as a close, slightly more error-strict approximation, not an exact substitute for a certified GWAM assessment.

None of the figures on this page are drawn from your own results specifically, they are general benchmarks; your personal WPM and accuracy are only ever stored in your own browser, see the privacy policy for details.

How fast can typing speed realistically improve?

With regular, focused practice, most people see meaningful gains within a few weeks, not months. A rough, commonly observed pattern for someone starting from an average 35 to 40 WPM baseline:

Week 1 to 2: small, sometimes inconsistent gains, often 2 to 5 WPM, as bad habits like looking at the keyboard get identified.
Week 3 to 6: the steepest improvement window for most people, commonly 10 to 15 WPM total gain, as touch-typing muscle memory solidifies.
After 2 to 3 months: gains slow down noticeably; further improvement usually comes from targeted accuracy work rather than general practice volume.

Plateaus are normal and do not mean progress has stopped for good, they usually mean the easy gains from fixing obvious habits are used up, and further improvement needs more deliberate practice, like the difficulty-based drills on the typing practice page, rather than repeated full-speed tests.

Frequently asked questions

What is considered a fast typing speed?

60 WPM and above is generally considered fast for everyday typing. 80 WPM and above is professional-level, and sustained speeds above 100 WPM are relatively rare even among experienced typists.

Is 40 WPM a good typing speed?

Yes, 40 WPM sits right around the average for adult typists and comfortably covers most everyday typing needs, though it falls short of the 60 to 80 WPM many dedicated typing jobs require.

Does typing speed really matter for most jobs?

For high-volume typing roles like data entry or transcription, yes, directly. For most office and knowledge-work roles, typing speed matters less once you are above roughly 40 WPM, since thinking and reading speed become the bigger bottleneck.

Why do court reporters type so much faster than everyone else?

Court reporters and captioners use stenotype machines, which let them press multiple keys at once to represent whole syllables or phrases instead of one letter per keystroke. That is a fundamentally different input method from a standard QWERTY keyboard, which is why their WPM figures are not directly comparable to a typing test result.

Can I realistically reach 100 WPM?

It is achievable with sustained, deliberate practice, but it takes most people many months of consistent typing to get there, and a meaningful minority of typists never do regardless of practice, due to natural variation in reaction time and motor coordination.

Does typing speed decline with age?

There is a gradual population-level decline in older age groups, but it correlates more strongly with reduced day-to-day typing volume than with age itself. Typists who keep typing regularly tend to retain speed much better than the general averages suggest.

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