[formerly_proven]

> A machine learning algorithm then decodes the brain patterns associated with each letter, and a computer displays the letters on a screen. The participant was able to communicate at about 90 characters, or 18 words, per minute.

> By comparison, able-bodied people close in age to the study participant can type on a smartphone at about 23 words per minute, the authors say. Adults can type on a full keyboard at an average of about 40 words per minute.

I had no idea average typing speed is this slow, though the extreme slowness of touchscreen typing is no surprise.

[alpaca128]

I'm curious about the WPM test methodology; for example if all those studies use a standardised method or not. Because at least the various WPM testing tools and websites are extremely inconsistent in different aspects.

My own typing speed ranges from ~40WPM to ~110WPM depending on what tool or test method I'm using. For example some tests just use any random word from the dictionary, which of course includes very long and complicated ones, others go as far as to limit themselves to the 100 most common English words. And even with those factors being identical I can still get different speeds depending on the UI; the cursor movement, presentation of the text and input latency all have a measurable impact on the end result.

[gxs]

My average typing speed is 80-110, but I can max out at 121. This is for standard english words, not the crazy blocks of letters and special characters used for competition, which IMO isn't practical for the average user.

I actually spend a few minutes every few weeks taking typing tests etc, as it's a valuable skill to me.

I figure if the average typing speed is somewhere between 50-80 WPM, if I can type 50% faster, in theory, I'm responding to emails and commenting in general 50% faster.

It's just a nicer experience using a computer if you can type fast. Sometimes it's easier to command-backspace and retype an entire line/word than it is to move the cursor and correct the error. It's also just plain nice to have only your thoughts to worry about when typing and not have the cognitive overhead of trying to keep track of where all the letters on the keyboard are.

All in all, I would recommend improving your typing speed if you spend any type of meaningful time on a computer.

A fun 1-minute test that is somewhat practical here: 10fastfingers.com

[j7ake]

Are tasks like responding to emails and adding comments limited by typing speed ? I would have guessed most typing tasks aside from copying text are limited by knowing what to type.

[sellyme]

Pretty much all of the time I'm typing natural language (chat apps, emails, writing this comment here) I'm going to be limited more by my typing speed (~120WPM) than by the speed at which I can think of the words I want to type.

A pretty trivial demonstration of this is that I can talk much faster than I can type, and I would expect that you can too.

[Oreb]

I can talk much faster than I can type, but I have much higher standards for precision and language quality when writing. When I write in natural language, I almost always carefully read through my message once or twice before sending. I don’t think doubling my typing speed (currently around 80 wpm, I guess) would save much time.

[gxs]

There's a time and place for everything. Sometimes that level of precision is required, sometimes it's not.

[snet0]

I think it's frequently the case that you determine what you're going to type in a block-wise fashion. You know roughly what the next paragraph/sentence should look like, and then "speak" through your typing. If you type faster, you will almost certainly "speak" faster in this way.

[toast0]

Sometimes, yes. If your brain gets too far ahead of your writing, then you need to pause thinking or you miss stuff.

If this happens to you a lot, you might benefit from training your typing speed up. (or writing, or dictating, or whatever)

[vgeek]

I feel obligated to mention https://typeracer.com

[Egrodo]

https://monkeytype.com is much cleaner IMO if you're not trying to battle anyone.

[l8nite]

Cool site! 113 wpm at 95% accuracy... I can live with that.

[rgoulter]

It's nicer for "pure" typing speed of letter-only words, but I appreciate that typeracer will include text with punctuation.

[hughrr]

Well there went the last 30 minutes of my life. Turns out I can sustain 86wpm which is better than I expected. Was fun. Thank you :)

[neosat]

Addictive. Thanks for sharing :)

[vmception]

65 year olds now had the same 30+ years as everyone else to get up to speed on computers but most still lean on the “hey you know I’m X-years old so you know me and computers don’t get along especially with the texting heh heh”

As there are also plenty of competent typists and computer users at that age, It’s all about the influences, wonder how I can avoid that and brain plasticity excuses

[Zancarius]

> It’s all about the influences

This is key. Everything else is an excuse.

My Mum is in her 70s and until she lost feeling in one of her hands (chemotherapy 23-ish years ago) she was an exceedingly fast touch typist. Even without feeling in her hands, she could still type at ~40 WPM, possibly higher depending on what she was typing. Arthritis means she now mostly uses a tablet.

But looking at other people in that age range, I can think of literally zero from church who even know how to touch type. It's probably the difference between someone who had to do secretarial work and someone who did not.

I do think your first statement is absolutely on the mark. e.g., "I'm old, and I don't understand it, so I won't try."

The old adage is still true: Whether you think you can or you can't you're probably right.

[throwawayboise]

As someone who is older, I'd phrase it slightly differently. "I'm old, my time on earth will be gone in less time than you've been alive, this thing you're all excited about seems silly and pointless and doesn't solve any problem I have, so I won't waste any of my precious time on it."

This is part of why I've never used Facebook, Twitter, or any of the rest of it.

[elmomle]

Makes sense, though I think the same reasoning is often used to excuse obviously inefficient habits. Spending a week to learn to competently use a computer would likely save most people much more than a week over the following ten or even five years.

[Zancarius]

I agree with elmomle, but mostly because I've had a number of customers many years ago (back when I worked in tech support) who were older (70+, sometimes 80+) who were absolutely willing to learn new technologies and were generally sharp people.

The difference is definitely much less about not finding new technologies useful or irritating; it's a difference, I think, between people who are genuinely curious and interested in learning new things and those who aren't.

[wolverine876]

> wonder how I can avoid that and brain plasticity excuses

I've worked on this question personally. I decided that the obvious first step to gaining the mental flexibility of youth, is to mimic youth:

* Explore: When we're young, we constantly try new things, even when there isn't an apparent ROI. We try new arts, new experiences, new ideas, new hobbies, etc. We are not afraid to ignore the established way and invest in something new - often for the novelty (or rebellion) of it. We give the new things time; we play. We are curious, not critical - we wonder why and explore the idea instead of criticizing it and shutting it down. When we are old, we often stick to what we know well and criticize the rest.

* Push yourself: In school or as a junior employee, you can't say 'I've always done it this way' or 'I'm not interested in learning something new'. You have to learn and adapt. When we're old, power corrupts - most people make those excuses and they are generally accepted. Nobody else will push you, as a rule.

There are limits in life; I don't have as much free time now as when I was young, but that's not a deal-breaker (and I use time much more efficiently now, including by prioritizing and by knowing myself much better). Also, I don't 'play' like a 6 year old or even a 25 year old; I do it my way.

I also saw it as an interesting experiment: How much of mental changes were due to changes in practice and how much due to biology. I can't provide empirical data but especially Exploration seems to have changed my life, not only mentally but significantly, emotionally: I'm much more optimistic, less jaded, and more emotionally connected than I was. Life is invigorating. A warning though: I'm challenging some norms of age and therefore peers don't grasp and sometimes reject me. I wish I could get through to them.

[Aerroon]

I can do about 45-50 wpm on my phone with swype typing. It would probably be faster, but words like "our" and "off" are hard because it seems like it's luck whether the keyboard picks "or" or "our", of/off.

Swype is pretty great for writing with a phone. I kind of wish there was an improved Swype though.

[Noumenon72]

Did you know that Swype stopped being available on Android in 2018?[1] I just learned this, and I still haven't found a keyboard that lets you do Ctrl+C and Ctrl+Z like Swype did. Tried SwiftKey and Gboard.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swype

[thaumasiotes]

I use swipe-style input (don't know whether it's actually swype) for most things. It's somewhat annoying that it can't tell the difference between words with identical swipe patterns.

I find it more annoying that it can't even attempt to render words that it doesn't know. The reason is exactly the same as its inability to distinguish "isn't" from "orange" -- there just isn't enough information in a swipe to identify any intended letters. But a failure to recognize a novel word means you can't correct the IME - you have no other option but to switch input methods.

[Aerroon]

I think Swype could rely more on repeatable patterns. Eg if you're swyping in a straight line and want a letter included from that you should do a little loop on it. Eg with "our" I do a little loop on "u" and it doesn't pick "or" anymore. But it does then also pick "out"...

It should be way more accurate on the starting and ending characters. If I'm starting with "i" I'm not going for "orange".

One thing that frequently trips me up are names. I'm swyping a regular word and it thinks I want to use a name I've never used before.

[lights0123]

SwiftKey definitely notices if you do an extra movement on a letter—it's quite easy to differentiate between "to" and "too" with that strategy, even when it doesn't have the rest of the sentence for context.

[thaumasiotes]

> It should be way more accurate on the starting and ending characters. If I'm starting with "i" I'm not going for "orange".

The whole point of using a very-low-fidelity input method is that it's faster. How much care and effort are you planning to put into entering each word?

[Cheetah26]

Swype is absolutely fantastic when it works right. I also agree that it would greatly benefit from having a better algorithm behind it.

Given how accurate search suggestion algorithms are becoming, I find it surprising that keyboard suggestions are as bad as they are. If swype could have the same predictive abilities as search engines it would be a major boost in speed and comfort.

[snet0]

I was with my previous girlfriend for ~5 years, and have basically been using Gboard the entire time. We communicated via various messaging services literally every single day. If I was to try swipe-type her name right now, there is a 50% chance that it will suggest a different but similar name that I think I have literally never accepted as a suggestion.

I was expecting this feature when I got my first Android phone over a decade ago, and I am still waiting for it. Is there some engineering step that I'm missing? Model my typing history and use that for prediction weightings. Is this unfeasible on my phone hardware?

[Noumenon72]

Swype lets you long-press a suggestion and choose to never suggest that again.

[HPsquared]

Google's Android keyboard (GBoard) has swiping capability. Still not great, I think the problem is the keyboard isn't able to go back and correct previously typed words based on subsequent contextual information.

[userbinator]

I suspect much of the population either doesn't type much, or doesn't make much of an effort to type faster. My average is in the 140-160WPM range (to try to type at 40WPM consistently I would have to be deliberately slow, as even one-handed I'll easily go over 60), although I never learned touch-typing formally; I attribute it to spending extensive amounts of time in using IM, which basically forces you to type quickly you want to keep a reasonably natural pace of conversation and not lose your thoughts. Then again, I've interacted with much younger coworkers, many of whom were surprised at the speed at which I could return a reply (in full sentences with punctuation, without abbreviations and such) in a chat, so I'm not sure if the motivation is still there today --- especially with audio/video calls being more common.

[herval]

How do you manage to sustain 140-160 WPM? I consider myself a very fast typist, and I don’t think I ever broke 100 WPM (it’s the maximum I ever got in one of those typing tests)

[userbinator]

I use a keyboard with a very light and springy feel, and low travel. It also helps to not think of individual letters but rather entire words, so you can be pressing multiple keys nearly simultaneously and "buffer" multiple words ahead.

(You'll know that you're buffering when you take a typing test and by the time you see that you've mistyped something you've already typed several more correct words, so it pays to be accurate before you try to buffer ahead.)

[airstrike]

Touchscreen typing on native keyboards always feels slow to me, but with apps like SwiftKey which remap the boundaries of the virtual keyboard to better match your intended keystrokes I can type significantly faster. Add swiping and completion to that and I'm pretty confident one can easily beat that 23wpm mark

[math-dev]

I thought Apple had a patent on this technology, interesting to see others do it

[Larrikin]

Apple was extremely late to the boat and it was one of first high profile features people said was blatantly copied from Android which had Swype and Swift Key for years

[airstrike]

Exactly. Importantly, SwiftKey was acquired by Microsoft after first being released as a standalone app following a couple rounds of VC funding.

[hansel_der]

> I had no idea average typing speed is this slow, though the extreme slowness of touchscreen typing is no surprise.

same same.

we had to type at least 60 wpm in middle school in order to pass the "typist class" (around 2000) thou i did not maintain that level.

edit: clarification downthread https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27423762

[bigdubs]

Keyboard wpm is about double; ~37-44wpm is P50. Still not super fast though.