Touch typing is typing without looking, using all eight fingers, with each key owned by exactly one of them. It takes a few weeks to become usable and it is the last time you will ever have to think about it.
Rest your left fingers on A, S, D and F, and your right on J, K, L and the semicolon. Both thumbs sit on the space bar. F and J carry raised bumps so you can find the position without looking — that is the entire purpose of those bumps, and most people use a keyboard for years without knowing it.
This is the base position. Every other key is defined as a departure from it, and every finger returns to it afterwards. That return is what lets you type without looking: you are not remembering where the keys are in space, you are remembering how far each one is from home.
Each finger covers a diagonal column running up and down from its home key. The index fingers cover two columns each, which is why they do the most work and pick up the most errors.
| Finger | Home key | Also covers |
|---|---|---|
| Left little | A | Q, Z, Shift, Tab, Caps |
| Left ring | S | W, X |
| Left middle | D | E, C |
| Left index | F | R, T, G, V, B |
| Right index | J | Y, U, H, N, M |
| Right middle | K | I, comma |
| Right ring | L | O, full stop |
| Right little | Semicolon | P, slash, Enter, Shift |
Learning this map is most of the battle, and the reason a structured course beats free practice at the start: a wrong finger assignment drilled for three weeks is much harder to remove than to have avoided.
Feet flat, back supported, forearms roughly level with the keyboard, wrists floating rather than resting on the desk. Screen at eye level so your head is not tipped forward.
This is worth doing for a practical reason as much as a health one: a wrist resting on the desk anchors the hand, which turns every reach into a stretch from a fixed point instead of a movement of the whole hand. It caps your speed and it is where most repetitive strain complaints among typists start.
The hardest part is week one, and specifically the moment your old hunt-and-peck speed is faster than your new correct technique. It is, and it will be for a fortnight. Pushing through that fortnight is the whole decision.
Typepace's touch-typing curriculum runs ten modules, built in the tradition of a professional typing school: each one assumes mastery of the last, states what it expects of you on the way out, and makes you prove it before the next opens. It starts with eight fingers on the home row and finishes with a timed certification test at 60+ WPM and 95% accuracy.
It is free, all of it, and there is no gated tier anywhere in the catalogue.
Start on the home row with your fingers on A, S, D, F and J, K, L, semicolon, learn which finger owns which key, and practise without looking down. Add the upper row, then the lower, then capitals and punctuation. Structured lessons matter most at the start, because a wrong finger habit is much harder to unlearn than to avoid.
The middle row of letter keys where your fingers rest between keystrokes: A, S, D, F for the left hand and J, K, L, semicolon for the right. F and J have raised bumps so you can find the position by touch.
Most people reach usable touch typing — no looking down, around 30 WPM — in three to six weeks of daily practice. Getting to 60 WPM at high accuracy generally takes a few months more.
No. Motor learning slows with age but does not stop, and adults have an advantage children do not: they can follow a structured method deliberately instead of absorbing it. The main obstacle is tolerating being slower than your existing bad habit for a fortnight.
Yes, and it is the least popular advice in typing. Every glance down makes the keystroke wait on a visual search, which caps your speed permanently. Cover your hands if you have to.