Practice

Practice modes

Five modes, each training something different. Clicking one takes you to the test with that mode and length already selected.

  • Words

    The 300 most common English words, shuffled.

    Best for: Benchmarking, and any session where you want a clean number to compare against other sites.

  • Quotes

    Real sentences with punctuation and natural rhythm.

    Best for: Rhythm, capitals and punctuation — the parts of real writing that plain word lists never train.

  • Code

    Symbol-heavy snippets in JS, Python, Go and more.

    Best for: Brackets, operators and underscores. Expect a sharp drop from your prose speed; that is the point.

  • Custom Topic

    Name any topic and a passage about it is built on your device.

    Best for: Staying interested. Name a subject and the passage is built around it, so practice stops feeling like a word list.

  • Weakness DoctorAdaptive

    Drills built from the exact keys you keep missing.

    Best for: The fastest route to a higher ceiling, because it drills the transitions your own history says you keep missing.

Test lengths

Any length from five seconds to ten minutes can be set on the test itself. These are the five worth knowing about.

  • 15 seconds

    A warm-up. Too short to be a real measurement — one lucky stretch carries it.

  • 30 seconds

    The right length for drill repetitions, where you want many quick runs.

  • 1 minute

    The standard WPM benchmark. This is the number to track week to week.

  • 3 minutes

    The length hiring and transcription tests use, because stamina starts to show.

  • 5 minutes

    An endurance run. Consistency matters more than peak speed over this long.

How to choose, in one paragraph

If you do not know where to start, take a one minute words test and look at the two numbers that are not speed. Accuracy below 95% means your problem is errors, so spend a week on accuracy ladders and weak-key drills. A low consistency score with decent accuracy means you are stalling on particular keys, which is exactly what the Weakness Doctor is for. Good on both and still slower than you want? You need stamina and reach practice — longer runs, and code mode for the symbols.

Practice is not the same as testing

A test measures; a drill changes something. The quickest way to waste a month is to take a one minute test every day, watch the number move around by five WPM for reasons that have nothing to do with typing, and conclude that practice does not work.

Keep the ratio at roughly three drill sessions to one measurement. The drills page sets out what each drill is for and how to build a week from them.

Where the clever bit actually is

Two modes do more than shuffle a word list, and neither of them calls a server. Custom Topic matches what you type to a subject area and assembles a passage from sentence banks that came with the page. Weakness Doctor scores every word against your own error history and samples the worst offenders.

Both run entirely in your browser, which is why they are instant, free, and work with the network switched off. Nothing you type is sent anywhere — see the privacy policy.

Frequently asked questions

Which typing practice mode should I use?
Words mode for a clean benchmark, quotes for punctuation and rhythm, code for symbols, custom topics for variety, and the Weakness Doctor when you want to fix the specific keys you keep missing.
Can I set a custom test length?
Yes. Any length from five seconds to ten minutes can be set in the configuration bar above the test, alongside the fifteen, thirty, sixty and one hundred and twenty second presets.
Does typing practice work on a phone?
Yes. The test accepts input from a mobile soft keyboard, including backspace, so a phone or tablet works. A physical keyboard is still better for building technique.
Is any of this behind a sign-up?
No. Every mode and every length is free with no account, and your results stay in your own browser.