How to type faster
Typing. The act of pressing your fingers onto rectangular pieces of plastic which represent letters. In the 21st century, typing is not only just a valuable skill, it is a prerequisite.
Step 01 - Touch Typing
Touch typing is the act of typing without looking at the keyboard
If you are new to typing, you probably don’t know how to touch type. To learn touch typing, I recommend using Monkeytype with a keymap mode of next. This will show you a keyboard and the next key to type highlighted on it. Also turn the language to English 450k. You can access these settings by pressing Esc.
Now, you will notice that there are a bunch of strange words. The reason we are practicing with these words is because English words are written a specific way, and this prepares you better for that than practicing typing “around” five thousand times.
Now start typing. When you feel ready, it will be time to memorize the keyboard layout. Turn the keymap mode to off and start typing, but with a twist. You have to memorize exactly where the key is on the keyboard before typing it. This will be hard. You will probably go from 10 WPM to 3 WPM during this process. But you will learn much faster than by using standard f-j-f-j typing practice.
Step 02 - Chording
Chording in a typing context is quite similar to chording when it comes to playing an instrument. You press multiple keys at once. Well not really, its more like a mental idea. Where you try to type a word instead of typing every letter. You kind of want to figure out the letters and then press them in quick succession. When you begin, you will probably only be able to chord a few letters or more. But when you get faster and faster, you will start chording entire words. So instead of seeing the word “which” and typing the letters normally: w-h-i-c-h, you build a mental map of the letters, and then type them all. I recommend to start practicing chording when you have reached the 50 WPM mark.
Tips
Once you reach 100 WPM, it will be time to focus on accuracy. If you are not accurate, you will have to go back and correct your mistakes, which is just slow. Now you might notice, there are people who have good accuracy but still aren’t typing fast. The reason is in their consistency. They usually have a very high consistency. This means they type “it” about as fast as “everything.” You can see the problem. Because of this you want to speed up on easier words and then take the time to slow down for the harder and more complicated ones. You also want to be able to read ahead.
Alternate Fingerings
Think about it. Why do you automatically put your fingers on the home row when typing? Those letters aren’t the most common. What if you kept your fingers on more ergonomic places? What if you kept them on the most common keys: A-S-E-R-N-I-O-P. Its also better to use the index finger for c instead of the middle. It’s just more comfortable. In fact, I recommend not assigning fingers to keys at all. Just use which one is closest or more comfortable.
Sean Wrona, the best all around typist in the world, uses caps lock instead of shift. The idea is that he types so fast that shift becomes unreliable. It’s extremely prone to error, such as holding it down too long. Using shift is also painful if you hold it for too long.
Advanced Tips
These tips are for typists who are already very fast and are trying to reach that last 1%. First, you should improve your reading speed. The faster you read what you’re supposed to type, the faster you type it out. Second, it’s to get in the zone. If you get in the zone, you focus better and in turn type faster.
“The zone” is a state of mind in which you are completely focused on the task on hand, when everything else fades away and becomes background.
Third is to notice your weaknesses and fix them. When you are practicing, try to be mindful about your typing and notice where you are slower or make more mistakes. Then try to practice with text like such. Fourth, don’t try to push the limits of your speed. Try to keep your typing comfortable, because that improves accuracy and is more practical than just speeding through words and likely making mistakes and inventing new words(haha avian.muslimah).
Conclusion
I hope this article was helpful to you!