CPS KING

Touch typing: where each finger goes on the keyboard

Touch typing is typing without looking at the keys. Rest your left fingers on A, S, D and F and your right fingers on J, K, L and the semicolon key: that is the home row. Your thumbs rest on the space bar. Each finger presses the keys straight above and below its home key, the index fingers also take the column next to them, and after every key the finger goes back home. Look at the screen, not at your hands.

Typing lessons

  • Little fingers
  • Ring fingers
  • Middle fingers
  • Index fingers
  • Thumbs
  • Home keys

Press any key on your keyboard: it lights up here, with the finger that types it.On a computer, press any key to light it up here and see which finger types it.

A US keyboard with each key in the colour of the finger that presses it. The outlined keys are the home row, and the marks on F and J are the bumps you feel with your index fingers.

Which finger presses which key

Which finger presses which key
FingerKeys it presses
Left little fingerA`1QZ
Left ring fingerS2WX
Left middle fingerD3EC
Left index fingerF45RTGVB
Right index fingerJ67YUHNM
Right middle fingerK8I,
Right ring fingerL9O.
Right little finger;0-=P[]\'/
ThumbsSpace bar

The little fingers also press Tab, Caps Lock, Shift, Enter and Backspace on their side of the keyboard. For a capital letter, hold Shift with the other hand: the left Shift for letters typed with the right hand, the right Shift for letters typed with the left.

Why F and J have bumps

The small ridges on F and J let your index fingers find the home row without looking. Slide your hands until you feel them, and your other fingers fall onto their home keys beside them. When you lose your place, feel for the bumps again rather than looking down.

Touch typing or hunt and peck?

Hunt and peck means looking down for each key and pressing it with one or two fingers of each hand. It works, and many self-taught typists are quick with fewer than ten fingers: in a 2016 study that tracked the finger movements of 30 everyday typists, people who used fewer fingers reached speeds comparable to touch typists.

What made typists fast in that study was not the number of fingers. It was pressing each letter with the same finger every time, getting ready for the next keys early, and keeping the hands still. Touch typing builds exactly those habits, and it keeps your eyes on the text, so you catch mistakes as you make them. The study's authors still point to touch typing for the highest speeds.

How to start

  1. Sit with your forearms level with the keyboard and your wrists straight, hovering rather than bent up on the desk edge.
  2. Find the bumps on F and J and rest all eight fingers on the home row, lightly curved.
  3. Type slowly, without looking. Accuracy comes first: speed grows from repeating the right movement, not from rushing the wrong one.
  4. Go back to the home row after every key. Each finger reaches out and returns.
  5. Add one row at a time: the home row, then the top row, then the bottom row, then numbers and symbols.
  6. Practise a little most days. Short, regular sessions build the habit better than an occasional long one.

Our typing lessons follow this order, adding one pair of keys at a time and bringing back the keys you miss. Once you know every letter, the typing test shows your speed and accuracy.

On other keyboard layouts

Your fingers rest on the same physical keys on every common layout; only the printed letters change. On a French AZERTY keyboard the home row reads Q, S, D, F and J, K, L, M; on a German QWERTZ keyboard, A, S, D, F and J, K, L, Ö. The bumps stay on the F and J keys. Dvorak and Colemak move the letters themselves: see keyboard layouts compared.

Ready to measure yourself? Take the typing test, then read how to type faster and what a good typing speed is.

Source: Feit, Weir and Oulasvirta, How We Type: Movement Strategies and Performance in Everyday Typing, CHI 2016.