Pulse vs TypingClub

TypingClub is a structured, gamified typing course with lessons and stars, popular in schools. Pulse is a macOS app that measures how you actually type — automatically, across every app, all day.

Use TypingClub to…

Absolute beginners following a curriculum to learn the keyboard.

Use Pulse to…

See your real, everyday speed and accuracy with a keyboard heatmap, per-app breakdown, leaderboard and streaks — privately, on-device. TypingClub can't track your genuine day-to-day speed once you already type fluently.

The honest take

Reach for TypingClub when you want absolute beginners following a curriculum to learn the keyboard. Reach for Pulse when you want to know — and improve — your genuine typing over time. Prefer a quick test in our own style? Try the Pulse typing test.

Where a course stops and your real typing begins

A typing course is a closed loop. You read prompted text, the lesson scores it, you earn a star, you move on. That loop teaches finger placement well, and for a true beginner it is the right tool. But the words are chosen for you, the pace is set for you, and the moment you close the tab the measuring stops. What it never sees is the typing that actually fills your day: code, chat, email, the same fumbled bracket a hundred times a week.

Pulse starts where the course ends. It doesn't hand you a passage to retype — it watches the real thing, across every app, and reports back. You learn that you're fast in your editor and slow in Slack, or that one key you fumble 6% of the time drags a whole sentence. A finger heatmap shows which hand is doing the work. That's the gap between practicing typing and knowing how you type, and you can close it in Practice.

The division of labor is simple: a course builds the habit, Pulse audits it. A lesson can tell you that you hit 70 words per minute on its script today. Only your own keystrokes, day after day, tell you whether that number holds up. Check where you stand against a good typing speed, then watch it move in your statistics.