Dictation Typing Test

Press Start: a voice reads the passage a few words at a time, you type what you hear, then read your accuracy and WPM.

Press Start, then type what you hear. A voice reads a few words at a time. Each word shows here once you have typed it. Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting-place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But in a larger sense we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it far above our power to add or detract. The world will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us, the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us; that from these honoured dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion; that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain; that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom; and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

More options
seconds

Listening uses a voice that is built into your device, a few words at a time. Nothing is sent anywhere.

How the text reaches you

–This run

–Your best

–Last run

60 seconds of typing. Words per minute is correct characters divided by five; accuracy is correct keystrokes out of all keystrokes.

No runs yet. Your last ten will show up here.

Saved in this browser

Next step Hold your pace for three minutesCompare with a 60-second copy test

How it works

This dictation typing test reads a passage aloud and you type what you hear. Choose one of 20 passages from the speeches and letters of Abraham Lincoln, 49 to 266 words long. Press Start. A run lasts 60 seconds at most. Each word stays hidden until you have typed it, then shows as right or wrong. The result is WPM and accuracy.

Read the full guide

How the dictation runs

Pick a text in the Passage menu. The page opens set to listen. Set Speed to Slow, Normal or Fast, then press Start. The voice reads a few words, twelve at most. Type them in the box and press the space bar after each word. When you have typed that many words, the voice reads the next few. Press Say it again to hear the current words once more. The clock starts with your first key and keeps running while you listen.

How a run is marked

You cannot see a word until you have typed it. After the space it appears, marked right or wrong, and you cannot go back to it. WPM is your correct characters divided by five, per minute. Accuracy is correct keystrokes out of all keystrokes. Capitals and punctuation count, and no voice can say a comma, so expect some words marked wrong for a missing mark. Their letters still score. A run lasts 15, 30 or 60 seconds, set under Test length, and the page opens on 60. Most runs stop before the passage ends, and the score covers what you typed.

One book, written for the ear

Every passage comes from Speeches and Letters of Abraham Lincoln, 1832-1865, edited by Merwin Roe and first issued in London in 1907. Speeches such as Farewell to Springfield were made to be heard. Letters such as Nanny Goat Is Lost carry the names and numbers that catch a typist out. A London edition brings London spellings: neighbours, honours, to-day.

  • Start with The Way for a Young Man to Rise: 96 words with no names, no numbers and no old spellings.
  • Missed a word? Press Say it again. Every word is checked in order, so a word you skip throws the ones after it out of line.
  • Read a passage's note under All 20 passages before you press Start, so that Vicksburg and Yazoo Pass do not arrive as a surprise.
  • Start on Slow. Holding a few words in your head while you type them is more work than copying from a screen.
  • Take a short passage first. Right Makes Might is 55 words. The Gettysburg Address is 266, and 60 seconds covers only its opening.

Questions and answers

What is a dictation typing test?

A test in which you type from speech, not from a page. A reader, here a voice on your device, says a few words at a time and you type them as they come. Say it again repeats them, as a teacher would in a school dictation.

How fast does the voice read?

As fast as you type. The voice reads a few words, waits until you have typed that many, then reads the next few. Speed changes how quickly the words are spoken: Slow, Normal or Fast. It is not a words per minute setting, because a web page cannot hold a voice to an exact pace. Compare scores only on the same passage at the same speed.

Whose voice is it, and does anything leave my device?

The voice belongs to your browser or operating system, so it sounds different from one device to the next. Nothing leaves the page. The test uses only a voice that is built into the device, because an online voice would mean sending the passage text to a speech service. Your typing is compared on the page and then thrown away.

Why does the Gettysburg Address here say upon this continent?

Five copies in Lincoln's own hand survive, and they differ in small ways. The 1907 book used on this page prints "upon this continent". The best-known copy, the one carved at the Lincoln Memorial, has "on this continent". In a dictation, type what you hear, not what you remember.

Are old spellings marked wrong?

No, but the modern form is. The page compares your typing with the text as the 1907 book prints it, letter by letter. So to-day and neighbours are right, and today and neighbors are marked wrong. Each word appears as soon as you finish it, so you can see the printed spelling and carry on.

What if my browser has no voice?

The page says so and shows the text to read, and Listen to it under More options is switched off. That happens when a device has no built-in English voice. Read it still works, as an ordinary copy-typing test with the text on screen. Adding an English voice in your system's speech settings brings dictation back.

All 20 passages

Short: under 90 words 6

  • The Better Angels of Our Nature The closing paragraph of the First Inaugural Address, 4 March 1861. Two traps for the ear: "loath" has no e on the end, and the mystic "chords" are spelt the musical way, with an h.
  • Discourage Litigation From his notes for a law lecture, written about 1 July 1850. Five short sentences, so it suits a first try at a faster speed. The London edition spells "neighbours" with a u and gives "peace-maker" a hyphen.
  • Right Makes Might The last two sentences of a speech of more than 7,000 words, given in New York City on 27 February 1860. People often turn the phrase round. He says right makes might, not might makes right.
  • Six Feet Four Inches, Nearly The last lines of the short account of his own life that he sent to J. W. Fell on 20 December 1859. The shortest passage on the page, and every number in it is printed as a word: six, four, one hundred and eighty.
  • Whiskers: the Letter to Grace Bedell The whole letter. Grace Bedell, aged 11, of Westfield, New York, had written on 15 October 1860 to say whiskers would suit him. He replied four days later and had a full beard within a month. "The 15th" is the only numeral in it.
  • With Malice Toward None The last sentence of the Second Inaugural Address, 4 March 1865: one sentence of 74 words, held together by four semicolons and a colon. The voice gives you no full stop to rest on until "all nations".
Show all 20 passages (14 more)

Medium: 90 to 149 words 8

  • A Trial of a Thousand Years From the Lyceum address in Springfield, given when he was 28. This edition dates it January 27, 1837; it was delivered on that day in 1838. Four questions, a one-word answer, then a single sentence of 54 words.
  • A Wizard in the Neighbourhood His schooling in Indiana, from the same 1859 letter to J. W. Fell. The hardest spelling on the page sits in the middle: "readin', writin', and cipherin'" is printed with each g dropped, and a voice may or may not drop it too.
  • The Election Was a Necessity From his reply to a crowd that came to serenade him on 10 November 1864, after he had been re-elected in the middle of a war. "Forego" is this edition's spelling of the word now more often written "forgo".
  • Every One Likes a Compliment To the New York newspaper publisher Thurlow Weed on 15 March 1865, eleven days after the Second Inaugural Address, which is "the latter" he expects to wear well. The edition prints "Every one" as two words.
  • Nanny Goat Is Lost A family letter of 8 August 1863 with news for Tad, his youngest son. The goat was last seen chewing her cud in the middle of the boy's bed. "Per cent." is two words with a full stop, the older way of writing it.
  • Not President, but Only a Friend A father asks General Grant, on 19 January 1865, whether his eldest son might join the staff, and offers to pay for it himself. Grant agreed: Robert Lincoln was made a captain on 11 February and served the last weeks of the war.
  • Resolve to Be Honest The close of the same law lecture notes. "Knave" starts with a silent k, "judgment" is printed without a middle e, and the London edition gives "honours" its u.
  • The Way for a Young Man to Rise Advice sent from Washington on 10 July 1848 to William H. Herndon, his law partner since 1844. No names, no numbers and no odd spellings, which makes it the fairest first run on the page.

Long: 150 words or more 6

  • An Open Field and a Fair Chance To the soldiers of the 166th Ohio Regiment on 22 August 1864. It holds the line "any one of your children may look to come here as my father's child has". "To-day" carries its old hyphen, and "any one" is two words.
  • Farewell to Springfield Spoken in the rain at the Springfield railway depot on 11 February 1861. Three versions from the time survive: one written out on the train afterwards and two printed in the press. This is the wording the 1907 edition chose.
  • The Gettysburg Address All of it, as this edition prints it. Five copies in his own hand survive and they differ in small ways: this text says "upon this continent" where the copy carved at the Lincoln Memorial says "on this continent". Type what you hear.
  • My Peculiar Ambition The end of his first address to voters, dated 9 March 1832, when he was 23 and standing for the legislature. He lost, "the only time I ever have been beaten by the people", as he wrote in 1859. "Favour" and "labours" keep the London u.
  • You Are Not Lazy, and Still You Are an Idler To his stepbrother John D. Johnston on 2 January 1851, turning down a request for eighty dollars. The letter goes on to offer a deal instead: for every dollar Johnston earns by his own work before the first of May, Lincoln will add another.
  • You Were Right and I Was Wrong To General Grant on 13 July 1863, nine days after Vicksburg surrendered. The hardest passage for names: Vicksburg, Yazoo Pass, Port Gibson, Grand Gulf, General Banks and the Big Black. Look these names over before you start.

How this list was compiled: Twenty passages chosen from "Speeches & Letters of Abraham Lincoln, 1832-1865", edited by Merwin Roe (Everyman's Library; London: J. M. Dent & Sons, and New York: E. P. Dutton & Co.). The title page reads "First issue of this Edition 1907; Reprinted 1909, 1910, 1912", and says the text was taken by permission from the Complete Works edited by Nicolay and Hay (Century Co., 1894). Transcribed as Project Gutenberg ebook 14721, which Project Gutenberg marks "Public domain in the USA": https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/14721 (plain text at https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/14721/pg14721.txt). The year given for each passage is the year Lincoln wrote or spoke the words; every one is 1865 or earlier, and the edition itself is from 1907, so both are before 1931. The work named for each passage is the heading the edition prints. Each passage is one unbroken run of the edition's text, with three changes only: hard-wrapped lines were joined, the underscores that mark italics were removed, and the double hyphen that stands for a dash was set as a comma. The London spellings (favour, labours, honoured, neighbours) and old hyphens (to-day, battle-field) are the edition's own; the other spelling to accept for each is listed with its passage, and so are the capitalised names worth showing before a run. Each passage is marked in phrases to read aloud: every pause is at a break in the sense, no phrase is longer than ten words, and the marked copy rebuilds the edition's text letter for letter. Characters and words were counted, characters divided by five give standard words (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Words_per_minute), and no sentence appears in two passages. Facts in the notes were checked against https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grace_Bedell, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gettysburg_Address, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Lincoln%27s_Lyceum_address (delivered 27 January 1838, which the edition prints as 1837), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Lincoln%27s_Farewell_Address, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooper_Union_speech, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Herndon_(lawyer), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thurlow_Weed, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tad_Lincoln, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Todd_Lincoln, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Bush_Lincoln (John Johnston was her son) and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Vicksburg (surrendered 4 July 1863). Ages and sentence lengths in the notes were worked out from the edition itself, which gives his birth date as February 12, 1809. How a dictation is read, in short phrases that are repeated and then read through once more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dictation_(exercise). The browser voice: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/SpeechSynthesis (Baseline, widely available since September 2018), https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/SpeechSynthesisUtterance/rate (rate 0.1 to 10, where 1 is the normal rate of the chosen voice and a voice may narrow the range) and https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/SpeechSynthesisVoice/localService (a voice is either on the device or a remote service). All checked 2026-09-19. Licence: Public domain in the USA (Project Gutenberg ebook 14721, an edition first issued in 1907): https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/14721. Passage names, notes and phrase marks are own work.

More tests

Show 8 more

Browse Keyboard and Typing