Most people trying to type faster attack the wrong number. Raw keystroke speed is not usually what limits you — correction time is. A typist at 70 words per minute with 92% accuracy is frequently slower in real work than one at 60 with 98%, because every error costs a backspace, a retype and a break in flow.
An error is not one wasted keystroke. It is noticing the error, moving to correct it, deleting, retyping, and finding your place again — typically several times the cost of the original character.
Above about 97% accuracy on continuous prose, corrections stop dominating your effective speed. Below 95%, nothing else you do matters much, because correction time swamps the gains.
The most reliable method is to deliberately type at the pace where you are accurate, hold it until it feels automatic, and let speed return on its own. It always does, and the accuracy generally stays.
The reverse — pushing speed and hoping accuracy follows — almost never works, because you are practising the error at the same time.
Most people have two or three keys responsible for a disproportionate share of their errors. General practice gives those keys the same attention as every other key, which is why it plateaus.
The Key Accuracy drill reports which keys are yours. Drilling those specifically is several times more productive than more general typing.
Looking at your hands. Every glance down loses your position on screen and costs more than the keystroke it was meant to help.
Resting your wrists. Anchored wrists force finger stretching to reach the outer keys, and stretching is where substitution errors come from. Wrists up, elbows at roughly a right angle.
A keyboard you are fighting. If you have to press hard or you routinely miss actuation, that is equipment, not technique.
In real work, yes — the error has to be fixed eventually and fixing it immediately is cheapest. For a raw speed measurement, corrections cost time, which is precisely why accuracy matters so much.
Above 97% on continuous prose. Below 95%, correction time dominates and raw speed stops mattering.
It is the single largest factor in both speed and accuracy for most people, and it is learnable at any age.
Accuracy responds within days of deliberate slow practice. Speed follows over a few weeks. Test weekly, not daily — daily testing mostly measures your mood.