Is 70 WPM Fast?
Yes - well above the average typist, and squarely in trained touch-typist territory. Here's where 70 WPM actually sits and whether it's worth pushing further.
You've just scored 70 WPM on a typing test and you're wondering whether that's actually good, or just an average result inflated by an easy passage. Here's where it sits against real benchmarks, and what - if anything - is worth doing next.
Quick answer: Yes, 70 WPM is fast - well above the ~40 WPM adult average, and solidly within the 60-80 WPM range typical of a competent, trained touch typist. It comfortably exceeds almost every job's stated typing requirement, so further gains are a personal choice rather than a professional necessity.
Where Does 70 WPM Sit Compared to Other Typists?
The average adult typist reaches roughly 40 WPM - see what is the average typing speed for how that figure is derived. 70 WPM sits well above that, right in the middle of the 60-80 WPM band typical of someone who has deliberately trained touch typing rather than picked it up informally. It's fast enough to type a full sentence in a couple of seconds and fast enough that thinking, not typing, becomes the bottleneck for most writing tasks.
At 70 WPM you're producing around 350 characters per minute - roughly a short paragraph of business writing every 60-90 seconds.
Is 70 WPM Fast Enough for a Job?
For nearly every role, yes. Most job listings that state a typing requirement at all ask for somewhere between 35 and 50 WPM - see what typing speed do you need for a job for the full breakdown by role type. 70 WPM clears that bar with a comfortable margin, including roles like general administration, customer support, and most secretarial work.
The exception is numeric data entry roles - accounting, bookkeeping, invoice processing - which test KPH rather than WPM. A strong prose typing speed like 70 WPM says very little about numpad speed, since the two are separately trained skills.
Is It Worth Pushing Past 70 WPM?
For most people, no - not because 80 or 90 WPM isn't achievable, but because 70 WPM already exceeds what almost any job or daily writing task requires. The bigger practical gains happen earlier, going from 40 to 70; each additional 10 WPM after that delivers a smaller and smaller real-world benefit.
Where it's worth chasing further: competitive typing, high-volume transcription work, or roles where typing speed is a genuine day-to-day bottleneck. See is 80 WPM fast and is 90 WPM fast for what the next milestones actually buy you.
Does Accuracy Matter More at 70 WPM?
Somewhat. As speed increases, it gets easier to rush past a small error rather than pause and correct it, which widens the gap between your gross WPM (everything typed) and your net WPM (after the error penalty). A handful of uncorrected mistakes at this speed can turn a genuine 70 WPM gross result into a mid-50s net score - worth checking both figures rather than just the headline number.