Why your WPM is lower here than on other typing sites
Typepace counts the characters you got right. Most sites count the characters you typed. The gap between those two numbers is the useful part.
If you have tested elsewhere and arrived here expecting the same figure, you will probably be disappointed by five to fifteen words per minute. That gap is not a bug and it is not modesty. It is a different question being answered.
Two numbers, not one#
Typepace records both. Raw WPM counts every character you entered, correct or not, at five characters to the word. Net WPM counts only the characters that were right on the first attempt. Most sites show you one number somewhere between the two, and few of them tell you which.
The reason we keep them apart is that the distance between them is diagnostic. A typist at 70 raw and 68 net is in control. A typist at 70 raw and 52 net is not typing at 70 — they are typing at 52 and spending the difference on repairs.
Corrections do not buy back accuracy#
Fix a wrong letter with backspace and the character ends up correct on screen. Typepace still remembers that the first attempt was wrong. First-try accuracy judges each position once, when you first reach it, and never revises that judgment.
This sounds harsh and it is deliberate. The habit you are trying to build is hitting the right key, not noticing quickly that you hit the wrong one. A metric that forgives repairs will happily report improvement while the underlying error rate stays flat.
The gap between raw and net is not a rounding artefact. It is the cost of your errors, stated in the same unit as your speed.
What to do with the gap#
Watch it rather than your headline speed. A week where net rises and raw stays put is a good week: you got more accurate at the same tempo. A week where raw climbs and the gap widens is speed you have not earned yet, and it usually collapses under any unfamiliar text.
The practical rule most people converge on: if your gap is above about eight words per minute, stop chasing speed for a fortnight. Slow to the pace where the gap closes to two or three, and let the speed come back on its own. It does, and it comes back with the accuracy attached.