TIMED PRACTICE · Norsk
Norwegian typing speed test
Flow like a stream. Space commits a word, backspace fixes the last one. Tab or Esc restarts.
Testing your Norwegian typing speed
Norwegian uses the Latin alphabet you already have. The practice words here add 2 characters beyond a-z — å, ø.
Two modes, timed and word-count, plus the option to paste your own text. The words come at random from 48 common Norwegian words. What you get back is not just a number: net and raw WPM, accuracy, consistency across the run, and the keys you got wrong most often.
Of the 23 characters these 48 words use, one alone accounts for roughly 10%. Frequencies like that are why touch typing can be learned at all — you are not memorising 23 equally important characters, you are automating a handful and filling in the rest over time.
Norwegian sits on the same QWERTY keys as English, and these practice words then ask for 2 more: å and ø. 17% of the practice words here need one — a steady minority — which is often enough that reaching for them should be a trained motion rather than a hunt through a character map.
The temptation in Norwegian is to skip the accents while drilling and add them later. It does not work — the accent is part of the motion, and a hand that has practised the word without it has practised a different word. Drill them from the start, awkward as the first week is.
- Writing system
- Latin
- Keyboard layout
- Latin QWERTY family
- Direction
- left to right
- Practice words
- 48
- Distinct characters
- 23
- Average word
- 3.4 units
Characters beyond a-z in the Norwegian practice words
- å8
- ø1
Counted across the 48 practice words. 17% of them need at least one.
rolige hender finner hjemraden uten å se nedÆ, Ø, Å — and two written standards
Norwegian uses æ, ø and å, placed at the end of the alphabet after z, with their own keys to the right of the letter block. The layout is shared with Danish, which uses the same three letters.
Norway has two official written standards for the same spoken language: Bokmål, derived from Danish and used by the large majority, and Nynorsk, assembled in the nineteenth century from rural dialects. Both are taught in schools and both appear in official documents. These lessons use Bokmål.
The å is a relatively recent arrival in Norwegian and Danish — it replaced aa in the twentieth century — which is why Danish place names like Aalborg still appear both ways.
Questions about typing in Norwegian
Do I need a Norwegian keyboard?
No. The characters beyond a-z in these practice words — å and ø — are reachable on the keyboard you already own once the right layout is selected in your operating system's settings. Some layouts give them their own keys, others build them from a modifier; either way the hardware is unchanged.
Which Norwegian keyboard layout do these tests use?
Latin QWERTY family, plus the 2 characters beyond a-z that these practice words use. The 48 practice words between them use 23 of those 28, so 5 characters never come up in the practice text — these are the commonest words rather than an even sweep of the layout. The keyboard guide below the typing area shows the keys you actually press, which for an input method are the Latin ones already printed on them.
What will I actually be typing in Norwegian?
48 of the most common words in Norwegian, drawn at random. They use 23 distinct characters between them and average 3.4 written units each, with the longest running to about 8. Short, frequent words are used on purpose: they are the ones your hands will meet most often outside a lesson, so the practice transfers.
Is Norwegian hard to type?
Only slightly, if you already touch type. 17% of the practice words need a character outside a-z, 2 such characters appear in total, and the rest is a keyboard you already know. The difficulty is concentrated in a handful of positions rather than spread across the layout.
Is the Norwegian typing test the same every time?
No. Words are drawn at random from the Norwegian bank on every run, so there is nothing to memorise and a second attempt is a fresh test rather than a rehearsal. You can fix the duration or the word count, turn punctuation and numbers on, or paste your own text.
What is the difference between raw and net WPM?
Raw counts everything you typed; net subtracts what you got wrong and left wrong. A large gap between the two is the most useful signal on the results screen — it means the speed is there and the accuracy is not, which is a different problem from simply being slow, and a faster one to fix.
Does accuracy matter more than speed?
For a score, they are the same measurement — net WPM already penalises errors. For improving, accuracy matters more, because the fastest route to a higher number is almost always removing mistakes rather than moving your fingers faster.
Do I need an account, and is it free?
No, and it is free either way. Every lesson, drill, test and game works signed out, with your progress kept in this browser. An account adds three things only: your progress and settings follow you to another device, your streak survives clearing your browser data, and you can appear on the leaderboards under a name you choose.
Also in Norwegian: lessons and typing games.
Other languages written in Latin: Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Slovak, Slovenian, Somali. Or browse all 86 by writing system.
Further reading
- Keyboard layoutsQWERTY, Dvorak, Colemak, AZERTY, QWERTZ and the non-Latin layouts — what each one changes, and whether switching is worth it.
- Adding a keyboard layoutThe step before any of this works: turning on the layout in your operating system, switching to it, and what to do about the wrong letters on your keycaps.
- Which finger types which keyThe standard finger assignment for every key on a QWERTY keyboard, why the index fingers carry two columns each, and the keys people get wrong.