Average adults type around 40 words per minute. A speed-typing champion can do five times that. The world record on an old-fashioned electric typewriter was 216 words per minute, set by Stella Pajunas back in 1946. Modern champions on computer keyboards have hit even faster bursts above 250 wpm.
The trick is something called muscle memory. Top typists don’t think about each letter. Their fingers know where every key is, so their brain can think about the words instead. They train for years, often using practice software that flashes random sentences and times every keystroke.
There’s an even faster way to type: chord keyboards used by court reporters. Instead of one key at a time, you press several keys together that stand for whole syllables or words. Trained stenographers can type more than 300 words per minute that way - fast enough to keep up with the people talking in a courtroom.
