3 Tips for Improving Your Typing Speed and Comfort

Typing speed is a skill essential for many jobs and activities, from content writing to data entry. The faster you get things done, the more time you have for other important tasks or perhaps some well-deserved relaxation.

Although practice can help you push beyond your typing limits, having the right equipment, like an ergonomic keyboard, can significantly enhance your speed and comfort. Some additional tools and strategies, like learning keyboard shortcuts and minimising looking at the keyboard, can also help you type faster.

Did you know that the fastest typist can type 305 words per minute? Although reaching world-record speeds is a whole different level, these strategies will help you improve your typing speed and comfort. So, if you’re up for the challenge, here’s how you could aim for that goal.

Enhance Keyboard Ergonomics

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Typing might appear straightforward, but it’s a complex activity that involves multiple muscles across your hands, wrists, arms, and shoulders. That’s why focusing on proper ergonomics such as having an ergonomic keyboard made with the human body in mind, can play a crucial role in ensuring comfort and reducing the risk of strain or injury during prolonged typing sessions.

Ergonomically designed keyboards provide comfortable positioning for your hands and wrists by placing them in a neutral position. When your wrists, forearms and fingers are better aligned, you can improve overall typing efficiency and lessen physical strain on your body.

Traditional keyboards are often too wide for the average user (coming in at a width of about 45cm). As a result, the mouse is pushed further away from the body creating an uncomfortable working set-up. Thankfully, compact ergonomic options are considerably shorter, eliminating the need for the mouse to be far from the keyboard. Having all inputs within a comfortable reach zone reduces shoulder and arm strain.

Besides compact keyboards, split keyboards are another popular ergonomic option designed to improve comfort and reduce strain during typing. These input devices have a split in the middle to separate the two halves of the keyboard. These sections can either be physically separate or attached at an angle. You can position each half of the keyboard at a distance that matches your shoulder width for a more natural typing posture.

Split keyboards eliminate the awkward wrist positioning and twisting that traditional keyboards often cause and adapt to the specific needs of each individual. By improving typing posture, reducing discomfort, and allowing for a more efficient hand and finger movement they can help boost your typing speed.

Design-wise, split keyboards can have a fixed split or an adjustable split. The adjustable ones can be positioned freely, giving you more placement opportunities, while fixed ones are permanently angled or curved to promote a natural typing posture.

Learn and Use Keyboard Shortcuts

Learning and using keyboard shortcuts is one of the easiest and most effective ways to speed up your work. That’s because it saves time and keeps your hands in one place, maintaining your typing flow. Using common shortcuts like Ctrl+C (copy), Ctrl+V (paste), Ctrl+Z (undo), Ctrl + Y (redo), eliminates the need to navigate menus or right-click, cutting down on wasted seconds that add up over time.

Other keyboard shortcuts you should know about are Alt + Tab (helps you switch between windows), Ctrl + A (selects all text or content within the window in which you are working), and Ctrl + Backspace (deletes the whole word you just typed, so you don’t have to hit backspace multiple times).

With consistent practice and intentional use, these and other shortcuts will become second nature, significantly boosting your typing speed and productivity.

Minimise Looking at the Keyboard

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Another effective strategy to increase typing speed and accuracy is to avoid looking at the keyboard. This is because looking at the keyboard while typing breaks your focus. It interrupts the natural flow of your thought process and shifts your attention away from the content you’re working on.

Furthermore, looking at the keyboard disrupts your visual flow. It forces your eyes to shift between the keyboard and the screen. This constant back-and-forth movement breaks the rhythm of your thought process and makes it harder to stay engaged with the content you’re typing.

You can figure out how to type without looking at the keyboard once you master touch typing. This is actually a skill in which all your fingers are used, relying on your muscle memory to locate the keys rather than looking at the keyboard.

You can use software programs such as TypingClub, Keybr, and Ratatype to learn touch typing because they have structured lessons and several engaging activities that help in building this essential skill. The regular practice and guide provided by these tools will get you through mastering touch typing in no time.