Practical test
Typing speed test
Sustained keyboard speed and accuracy on plain prose, reported as net words per minute.
Also free to take here. Anyone can run this one without an account, at the typing test page.
- Time to complete
- About 1 minute
- Test family
- Practical skill
- Included in
- All plans, plus free here
What a candidate actually does
- Retype a short passage of standard business prose against a one minute clock
- Accuracy is scored per character, so corrected mistakes cost time but not points
How it is scored
Net WPM, which is gross speed minus uncorrected errors, plus a separate character accuracy figure. Both are shown to the candidate.
Roles it suits
- Data entry
- Administrative assistant
- Customer support
- Medical records clerk
What it will not tell you
Speed on prose does not predict speed on forms, codes or numeric entry. Pair it with a data entry test when the job is form work.
Every test has a boundary like this. A test used outside it stops predicting anything, which is the usual reason a hiring team loses faith in testing altogether.