Computers and cell phones have become an integrated device in our professional and personal lives which may no longer be so popular in the original methods of using pen and paper.
While our old-school note-taking methods may not have left us entirely, technology is advancing with no intention to slow down; iPads are moving into service industries, video calls are taking the place of in-person interviews, and store receipts are making their way in to our email inbox – all of which requires the typing skills.
So, how to type faster?
It doesn’t have to be boring to learn a new talent and never had to be. Luckily some useful games and apps can help you learn to type quickly with quick accuracy and precision.
Why Typing Fast Matters?
Learning to type fast is a changer of the game. You can save 21 days a year by typing quickly!
While it may not appear that shaving several minutes from curating a long email or text paragraph in a text message is of significant importance, the minutes will gradually add up and the long list of tasks will then grow into annoyance. Time is lost by the end of the day, and the mountain of work is piled high above your head.
Why not alleviate some of those stresses through practicing and devote your free time to developing muscle memory?
Learning a basic skillset such as speed typing will significantly boost many critical life domains like time management and prioritization. This not only allows you to complete tasks effectively at work and in your personal life, but it also improves your productivity.
8 Most Popular Games and Apps
Everybody learns at differing levels, using various methods. While some work best under pressure and tight deadlines, others excel when adequate time is given for learning and soaking in the information being received. Given the number of opportunities available in the internet’s hollow corners, it’s all about discovering one source that can help you know to your fullest potential.
Whether you’re a keyboard ninja or not, here are some useful typing games and apps to test your speed, accuracy and even shoot some spaceships along the way.
For Beginners
1. Speed Typing Online
What’s more fun than typing Alice’s tale in Wonderland, or the “Hey Jude” lyrics? Speed Typing Online is an online typing game enabling you to immerse yourself in the imaginative and familiar world of popular novels, fables, songs and even refine your data entry skills.
The bright blue frame retains the document, which then turns green in precision keystrokes after punching. A statistics page appears to show you your typed words per minute, precision, correct and incorrect entries, and error rate, after the end of the personal timer.
2. Typing Trainer
Typing Trainer is another online platform suitable for inexperienced typists searching for step-by-step tutorials. Understanding the keys on a keyboard can confusing particularly for those who aren’t as comfortable or getting used to typing on a computer keyboard.
Typing Trainer has a series of step-by-step videos covering everything from sentence exercises to adding new keys as the lessons progress, and skills checking. Specifically, the Typing Trainer highlights specific features of each lesson including a warm-up segment where the student begins building muscle memory and learns to type without looking at the keyboard.
Additionally, the website is designed to recognize the difficulties faced by the user while typing certain words or sentences.
3. Tapping
There is the feeling of typing physically on a keyboard and then there’s the feeling of typing on a handheld computer on a touch screen.
Since the use of cell phones has become tightly incorporated into our daily lives, learning to type on a smartphone is a great deal of a skillset as it is typing on a keyboard. TapTyping – Typing Trainer, the mobile typing app helps users to practice while on-the-go making it ideal for commuters who want to practice typing during their downtime.
With TapTyping’s global leaderboard, the app lets you challenge other typists around the world and test your skills by taking advanced lessons. There’s always space for improvement and by watching a heat map of your finger strokes, you’ll find your errors with the app.
4. The Threatest Publishing App
The Most Dangerous Writing App is a website ideal for authors facing a creative block or on a tight-deadline that forces your fingers to type as quickly as your thoughts.
If you pause for more than 5 seconds everything you’ve written will gradually vanish from the screen.
Sessions are spaced from 3 minutes to 20 minutes or can range from 75 words to 1667. This online program is great for brain dumping thoughts, writing a chapter of a novel on which you’ve been stuck, or helping with procrastination.
Try hardcore mode if you’re up to the challenge – an alternate option where a single letter appears at the same time on the screen. This level prevents you from seeing the whole word, sentences or even fixing any errors in spelling or grammar before the timer is through.
Copying and pasting is not an option at each end of each session if you’re wondering.
5. The Typing Cat
Looking to improve your competencies in typing? The Typing Cat also acts as a personal mentor and has a list of daily typing courses with the option of trying out other lessons with more difficulty like HTML. A further useful skillset worth adding is learning to type code.
Also with disregarded interest in the coding world, the use of the code course improves your typing skills and allows your fingers to familiarize themselves with odd combinations of words and place punctuations on a keyboard.
Even typing whizzes will make the coding course challenging, but it’s all a part of muscle memory. According to Psychology Today[1], only a handful of people learn how to type by looking at an actual keyboard, while most people intuitively find specific keys by muscle memory.
Courses are available like EcmaScript 6, HTML 5, and CSS 3.
6. ZType — Webster Meets Space Invaders
Remember playing the iconic game of the ’70s that helped you to shoot tiny purple and green aliens with a two-bullet laser from one end of the screen to another? It’s hard to believe that Space Invaders has just turned 40 but with ZType, a typing game with the same shooting idea, you will still get the same adrenaline rush
Ztype operates in waves – levels that need to be cleaned but instead of monsters, you need to type the words in before the missiles kill your ship at the bottom of the screen. Longer and more complicated words will appear every so often and if the words are not written in the allotted time a sequence of letters would scatter like missiles.
The game is easy on the fingertips and will still be pounding your heart to the very end.
7. Epistory – Typing Chronicles
Although this game costs money to buy if you are looking for a refreshing and alternative way to learn how to type quickly it is worth the investment.
Epistory – Typing Chronicles is a role-playing action and adventure game of a young girl riding a fox in a mystical and imaginary realm; together they battle enemies in word-forms and shapes.
When you are off, you almost forget that you are playing a game of typing. The game’s aesthetics of papercraft art have you captivated by the vivid colors and plot of character while improving your typing skills.
8. Daily Quote Typing
Want inspiration? Neither says anymore.
Daily Quote Typing is one of several games available on Wordgames.com – a website that provides a range of typing games based on your skill, from various levels.
Users can be typing inspirational quotes from prominent leaders, inventors, and innovators such as Mark Twain and Albert Einstein with Daily Quote Typing.
Final Thoughts
Discipline and patience at the end of the day are what teaches people to type faster. It comes down to making the effort to not only develop your typing skills but to a lifelong talent that helps certain areas of life.
Through training daily and using innovative games and apps, it’s just a matter of time before keystrokes are second nature and the brain adapts quickly to learn other skills.
Also, See How to Type More Quickly: 12 Typing Tricks and Techniques
