Why JavaScript is slow to type
Prose uses twenty-seven keys. JavaScript uses those and then asks your right pinky to reach the braces, your ring finger to find the underscore, and your left pinky to stretch up to the backtick. The language reads fast and types slowly.
The cost is almost never the letters. It is the modifier work around them: every opening brace is shift plus a bracket key, an arrow function is two unrelated characters, and a template literal costs three modifier presses before you have typed a single word.
The characters that cost you the most
- Curly braces — shift plus bracket, then a second reach to close it at the end of the block.
- The arrow operator — an equals sign followed by a shifted period, two different fingers in sequence.
- Backtick — top left, under Escape, where almost nobody trains.
- Dollar signs inside template literals — shift plus four, immediately followed by another brace.
- Semicolons — a right-pinky reach that breaks your rhythm at the end of every statement.
What a realistic score looks like
If you type prose at 90 WPM, expect your first JavaScript run to land between 40 and 60 WPM. That gap is symbol latency, not a lack of typing ability, and it is the same gap every developer has on their first run.
Practise one language for a week at roughly 90% of your maximum speed. Sprinting produces errors that teach your fingers the wrong pattern, and the errors cost more than the speed gains.