The Average Typing Speed in 2026 Is 37.8 WPM — and the Old Number Was Inflated

Published October 15, 2026 · 6-minute read

Ask the internet how fast the average person types and you will get a confident answer: about 52 words per minute. That number has been quoted for years, and it comes from a real study. The problem is who the study measured — people who voluntarily show up at typing-test websites.

In January 2026, researchers finally measured something closer to everyone. A study by Raymond Hernandez and colleagues, published in Scientific Reports, tested 10,613 U.S. adults drawn from the Understanding America Study, a national research panel — a broad cross-section of adults, not typing enthusiasts. The result resets the benchmark: the median U.S. adult types 37.8 WPM on a computer.

The new benchmark, in full

Among the study's 5,835 computer users, half typed faster than 37.8 accuracy-adjusted WPM and half typed slower. The middle half of typists — the 25th to 75th percentile — fell between 24.1 and 55.8 WPM. That spread is the most honest part of the study: "average" hides a very wide range of real people.

On smartphones, the same study found a median of 29.4 WPM, with the middle half between 20.0 and 42.6 WPM. The computer-versus-phone gap held even after the researchers adjusted for differences in who chose each device. Your thumbs are good; they are not ten fingers.

Where you stand, by the 2026 study: below 24.1 WPM puts you in the slowest quarter of U.S. adults. Between 24.1 and 55.8 WPM is the middle half — most people live here. Above 55.8 WPM puts you in the fastest quarter. Take a KeyK test and see which band you land in.

Why the old 52 WPM figure ran high

Nobody fabricated 52 WPM. The 2018 study behind it (Dhakal and colleagues, from Aalto University and the University of Cambridge) analyzed 168,960 volunteers on a typing website and reported a mean of 51.56 WPM. Three design choices pushed that number up:

Self-selection. People who seek out a typing test tend to care about typing — and many of them practice. A national panel includes everyone else: the hunt-and-peck typists, the two-finger typists, the people who type twice a week.
Mean vs. median. The 2018 figure is a mean, which a minority of very fast typists pulls upward. The 2026 figure is a median — the actual middle person — so a few 120 WPM outliers cannot move it.
Scoring. The 2026 speeds are adjusted for accuracy, the way net WPM works: mistakes drag the score down. Raw-speed scoring flatters everyone a little.

Independent data lands near the new number, not the old one. Ratatype reported in April 2026 that its median user score sat in a 30–40 WPM band across 506,024 tests — and its users are still self-selected test-takers. When even the volunteers' median sits under 40, a representative median of 37.8 looks right.

What else the study found

Two patterns are worth knowing before you compare yourself to anyone:

Speed declines steadily with age on both computers and phones. The researchers report this as a correlation, not a per-decade table — so treat the precise "WPM by age" charts floating around the internet with suspicion; many come from platforms that never explain their method.
Faster typing tracked with more education, higher income, and having a job. Read that as exposure, not destiny: people whose schooling and work put them at a keyboard all day get thousands of hours of incidental practice. Typing speed looks less like a talent and more like a by-product of how much of your life happens at a keyboard.

One honest caveat: the task was short

Each participant in the 2026 study copied a single sentence, and the score was adjusted for accuracy. A single sentence is a sprint: it cannot capture how you handle punctuation, numbers, editing, or your own thoughts getting in the way. A longer test — like KeyK's 60-second and 2-minute modes — will usually score you a bit lower than a one-sentence burst, because fatigue and harder words enter the picture. Compare like with like: the study tells you where the population stands, not a grade for your last test.

What to do with your number

First, recalibrate your expectations. If you type 40 WPM with clean accuracy, the old benchmark said you were below average; the 2026 data says you are right at the typical adult, and the much-quoted rule of thumb — "the average adult types about 40 WPM" — turns out to have been roughly right all along.

Second, pick a target that matters. For most office work, 50–60 WPM with high accuracy is a genuinely useful goal: comfortably inside the top quarter, fast enough that email and documents stop feeling like chores. Published hiring standards point the same way — U.S. federal clerk-typist positions, for example, require 40 WPM on a five-minute test with three or fewer errors, an accuracy bar above 99%.

Third, if you are below the median and want to move, the route is boring and proven: accuracy first, home row, eyes on the screen, a few minutes a day. Our typing tips lay out the fundamentals, and if you have been stuck at the same speed for months, read how to break the typing plateau — the research there explains why more hours of the same practice stop working.

Go deeper with AI

This article is the starting point. Copy any of these prompts into your favorite AI assistant to learn more about the 2026 average typing speed study:

🔎 Place your own score on the 2026 distribution

I type [your WPM] WPM at [your accuracy]% accuracy on a [30/60/120]-second test. The 2026 Scientific Reports study (Hernandez et al.) found a U.S. adult median of 37.8 accuracy-adjusted WPM, with the middle half between 24.1 and 55.8. Explain which quarter of that distribution I fall into, why my test's scoring method (gross vs. net vs. accuracy-adjusted) changes the comparison, and what a realistic 3-month target would be.

🧭 Learn to spot a cherry-picked typing statistic

Teach me to evaluate any "average typing speed" claim I see online. Give me a checklist of questions about who was tested (volunteers vs. a representative panel), whether the number is a mean or a median, how errors were scored, and how long the test was — then apply the checklist to two examples: 51.56 WPM (Dhakal et al. 2018, typing-site volunteers) and 37.8 WPM (Hernandez et al. 2026, national panel).

💡 Turn the benchmark into a practice plan

I currently type [your WPM] WPM and want to reach the top quarter of U.S. adults (above 55.8 WPM, per the 2026 Hernandez et al. study) without dropping below 97% accuracy. Build me a 6-week plan with 10-15 minutes of daily practice: which weeks focus on accuracy, which on speed, which drills target slow letter pairs, and how to use a weekly median of daily scores — not single tests — to judge progress.

Tip: replace the bracketed parts with your own situation — the more specific your prompt, the more useful the answer.

Summary: A January 2026 Scientific Reports study by Hernandez and colleagues measured 10,613 U.S. adults from a national panel and found a median typing speed of 37.8 accuracy-adjusted WPM on a computer (middle half: 24.1–55.8) and 29.4 WPM on a smartphone. The famous 52 WPM figure came from 168,960 self-selected typing-site volunteers in 2018, scored as a mean — a different population and a different statistic. The old rule of thumb that the average adult types about 40 WPM survives; the inflated benchmark does not.

The single most important takeaway: judge your score against the right crowd. If you type anywhere near 40 WPM with clean accuracy, you are already at or above the typical U.S. adult — the 52 WPM "average" was never the average person; it was the average person who shows up to typing tests.

Sources

Hernandez et al., Scientific Reports (January 2026): typing speeds of 10,613 U.S. adults from the Understanding America Study panel — median 37.8 accuracy-adjusted WPM on computer (5,835 users; middle half 24.1–55.8), 29.4 WPM on smartphone — as summarized with full figures by TextExpander, updated October 2026: textexpander.com/blog/average-typing-speed
Dhakal et al., CHI 2018 (Aalto University / University of Cambridge): mean 51.56 WPM across 168,960 typing-site volunteers — via the same summary above.
Ratatype, April 2026: median band of 30–40 WPM across 506,024 tests — via the same summary above.
U.S. Office of Personnel Management: 40 WPM on a five-minute test, three or fewer errors, for federal clerk-typist positions — via the same summary above.

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