Data Reveals Which US States Have The Quickest & Slowest Typists
- Utah has America’s fastest typists followed by Arizona, South Dakota and then Montana
- Kansas ranked as America’s slowest typing state followed by Delaware, Iowa and Arkansas
- Increased smartphone use sees keyboard skills declining amongst Gen Z typists.
- Our expert gives one tip to improve your typing speed
With the world of work in a truly digital age, there are very few positions that don’t rely on typing to some degree. Indeed, it’s a skill that many employees consider important, as well. One report from Skillsarena indicates that typing at around 50-70 words per minute (WPM) is desirable for most office-based roles. For jobs like data entry, higher speeds (60-80 WPM) are preferred, and for specialized roles like transcription, speeds of 80-100+ WPM with high accuracy are often required.
However, with social media and other digital tools, such as auto-complete as a feature on most smartphones, there are concerns that people might be getting slower at typing in general. A study from ScienceDaily shows that smartphone typing speeds have increased lately while keyboard typing speeds have stalled at best. This could be, in part, due to a lack of keyboard skills being taught in schools. According to data from the US Department of Education, as reported in the Wall Street Journal, in 2000, 44% of high school graduates took a keyboarding course. By 2019, that number had dropped to 2.5%.
In order to highlight the issue the team at 247 Games have put together a study using Google search data to identify areas that have the quickest typists. Using keywords relevant to fast typing, he was able to find the cities where these skills are a priority. The results are as follows
Quickest Typing States In The US
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Utah
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Arizona
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South Dakota
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Montana
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Michigan
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Ohio
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Rhode Island
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Washington
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Oklahoma
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Virginia
Slowest Typing States In The US
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Arkansas
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Iowa
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Delaware
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Kansas
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Tennessee
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Alabama
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New York
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New Mexico
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Florida
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Nebraska
John Battagline, a technology expert with remarkable typing speed shares his top tips for improving your typing speed:
“I recommend doing 2-5 minutes of daily typing tests and really trying to focus on quality over quantity if you want to improve your typing speed. By quality, I mean hand position and ensuring you’re spelling words correctly. Over time it becomes a fun game that you constantly want to improve at and before you know it your typing speed has improved drastically,”
story credit 247 Games
Methodology
The above study was carried out using Google Keywords Planner. A total of 37 context-rich keywords, such as “typing tests” and “learn to touch type” were used, and location-specific data was gathered on the rates of use per city, indicating the average monthly search volumes for these keywords over the past year (September 2023 – October 2024). The data was then normalized based on the population size of each state or city to ensure comparability.
About 247 Games:
247 Games is a fun, free, classic games platform that allows people to play classic games such as Solitaire, Chess or Checkers anywhere, anytime, and on any device with anyone on the planet.
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Author: David Keech
David Keech is a retired teacher and works as a sportswriter, sports official and as an educational consultant. He has reported on amateur sports since 2011, known as 'KeechDaVoice.' David can be reached at [email protected]
