Typing Tutor

About the Typing Tutor

Learn to type without looking at the keys, one small step at a time. The lessons start with the home row — the keys your fingers rest on — and add two keys at a time: the top row, the bottom row, capital letters and punctuation, then numbers and symbols, and finally real sentences. Every drill is made from the keys you have learned so far: first each new key against the home key of its finger, then groups mixing new and known keys, then real words.

While you type, the on-screen keyboard lights up the next key (and the Shift key when one is needed) in the colour of the finger that should press it, and the finger guide names that finger. Each lesson has a speed and accuracy goal you can change; your best results are saved in this browser. Practise on US or UK QWERTY, Dvorak or Colemak — even if your computer is set to QWERTY.

Common uses

• Learning to touch type from scratch, at your own pace.
• Breaking the habit of looking at the keyboard or typing with two fingers.
• Switching to Dvorak or Colemak before changing your computer’s layout.
• Practising numbers and symbols for data entry, coding or exams.

Which finger presses which key

Each finger has a column of keys that slants up and to the left from its home key, as on most touch-typing charts:

• Left little finger: ` 1 Q A Z and left Shift · left ring: 2 W S X · left middle: 3 E D C · left index: 4 5 R T F G V B
• Right index: 6 7 Y U H J N M · right middle: 8 I K , · right ring: 9 O L . · right little: 0 - = P [ ] \ ; ' / and right Shift
• Thumbs: the space bar.

For a capital letter or a symbol, hold Shift with the little finger of the other hand. The keys are named by their QWERTY position; on Dvorak and Colemak the same positions type other letters, and the on-screen keyboard shows them.

Layouts, and practising one your computer is not set to

US QWERTY, UK QWERTY (with " on Shift+2, @ beside Enter and £ on Shift+3), Dvorak and Colemak are built in. Normally the tutor checks the characters your computer types, so set your system to the layout you practise. To try Dvorak or Colemak first, tick Type it on my QWERTY keys: the tutor then reads which physical key you pressed and types the letter that key has on the chosen layout. This needs a physical keyboard; phone keyboards do not tell web pages which key was pressed.

Getting better faster

• Accuracy first: slow down until you make almost no mistakes, and the speed follows.
• Keep Stop on a wrong key on while learning — you have to find the right key before you can go on.
• Practise little and often: ten minutes a day beats an hour once a week.
• Sit straight with your wrists level, and return to the home row after each reach.
• Repeat a lesson until you reach its goal; the drills change with New drill, so you learn the keys, not the text.

Limitations

• Made for physical keyboards: phone and tablet on-screen keyboards work for practice but are not touch typing.
• It does not watch your hands: it can only tell whether the right character arrived, not which finger pressed the key.
• Lessons are in English; for Hindi, use the Hindi Typing Test with its Remington (GAIL) and InScript keyboards.
• Progress is saved in this browser only and is lost if you clear its data.

Privacy

Everything happens in your browser. What you enter or open here is not uploaded or stored by MySmartCoPilot.