How To Calculate Typing Speed?

How to calculate typing speed

As we have entered the world of technology, typing has become an essential part of our lives. Whether it’s gaming or office work, no work can be done without typing. A good typing speed has become the need of the hour to get done with work efficiently and effectively. To know how well you can type, you’d need to calculate typing speed. How can you calculate your words per minute? Let’s see how you can do it. 

How To Calculate Typing Speed?

Some simple formulas are usually used to calculate the WPM which are explained below.

1. Gross WPM

The gross WPM is a measure of how fast you are able to type without any errors. This is calculated by counting the total number of words you typed and dividing it by the amount of time taken in minutes, to type those words. First, we divide the total number of entries by 5, because 5 is the number of characters for one word.

Taking an example, if you typed 250 keystrokes/characters in one minute, your typing speed will be calculated as 250 / 5 = 50 / 1 = 50 WPM. While this does measure your typing speed, it does not calculate the actual speed. 

2. Net WPM

The net WPM is a measure of your real typing speed as it calculates the words that your typed correctly, and removes the uncorrected typing errors. So, the net speed can be calculated by deducting by removing the errors from the gross wpm. 

Taking the example given above, if you had typed 50 words in a minute but two words were typed wrong, your net WPM will be 50 – 2 = 48 WPM. 

3. Accuracy

Accuracy represents a percentage ratio of the net and gross word speed. 

It is calculated as: Accuracy = (Net WPM/ Gross WPM) x 100 = 48 / 50 x 100 = 96%. 

Online Typing Speed Calculators

If you are interested in knowing about your typing speed and accuracy, you always have free access to online sites that allow you to check your typing speed. Just open the site and type the words in a given set of time. All these calculations are automatically performed by this site and the results are displayed in front of you. 

How Can Typing Speed Be Improved?

Typing is all about muscle memory, so there can be no better way to improve typing than to practice regularly. Multiple online tools can help you practice and learn touch efficiently and effectively. 

While the average typing speed is 40 WPM, you can always go beyond it with a little more practice. This speed is just the speed of an average person. Don’t forget, multiple professionals out there are experts in typing, and it isn’t as impossible as it seems. The more you will practice your typing, the better your speed will get.