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DevelopmentKeyboardstyping

What are the best keyboard layouts for programming?

28

Options
Considered

634

User
Recs.

Sep 17, 2023

Last
Updated

Here’s the Deal

The Best 1 of 27 OptionsWhy?

Best keyboard layouts for programming	Price	Bottom Row Key Freq.	Consecutive Same-Hand Keystrokes (L/R)
91 Colemak	FREE	8.8%	40.2%/59.8%
80 Programmer Dvorak	FREE	7.5%	38.6%/61.4%
-- Workman	FREE	12.0%	46.5%/53.5%
77 QWERTY	FREE	13.9%	65.5%/34.5%
-- Colemak Mod-DH	FREE	13.5%	40.2%/59.8%

Colemak

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Top Pro

Much more comfortable than QWERTY when touch typing

Top Con

Bad for Vim users

Vim was designed on QWERTY. The HJKL "arrow" keys still work in Dvorak, but their positions make less sense in Colemak. See More

Specs

Bottom Row Key Freq.:8.8%

Consecutive Same-Hand Keystrokes (L/R):40.2%/59.8%

Home Row Key Freq.:59.8%

Left Index Finger Travel:34.4%

Top Pro

Highly ergonomic

Top Con

Overrated

People think Colemak is great because it is easier to learn, but in reality they are deluding themselves thinking that it is better than more advanced alternative layouts. See More

Top Pro

You can type faster

Because the home row contains more high used frequency characters. See More

Top Con

Designed for English

Like Dvorak, this layout privileges English letter frequency, and lacks accented letters. Since the topic is about programming, the argument is weak as most code is written in English, yet you don't want to learn a layout to type code, and another to type in your native language... But the problem isn't specific to Colemak, it is tied to all "ergonomic" layouts, and might have no solution. See More

Top Pro

AZXCV don't move compared to QWERTY

If you rely on the Control-A/X/C/V shortcuts (select all, cut, copy, paste), these keys don't move from their QWERTY locations. See More

Top Con

The "HE" bigram is awkward

For all of Colemak's focus on optimizing English bigrams, the second-most used English bigram, "HE", is still kind of awkward due to same-hand lateral motion. This bigram is much easier in both QWERTY and Dvorak. If your concern is RSI, Colemak isn't good enough. See More

Top Pro

Relatively quick to learn

If coming from QWERTY, only a couple of keys move between hands. See More

Top Con

AZXCV don't move compared to QWERTY

This will allow one to intuitively access popular shortcuts, but the truth is that the placement of these keys is a compromise in terms of actual typing ergonomics. See More

Top Pro

Optimized for quick two-letter bigrams

Not only are the most common English letters on home row under your fingers, but many common two-letter combinations are placed next to each other as well allowing for a fluid "inward roll" motion of letter combos (a-r, r-s, s-t, n-e, e-i, and i-o combos). The inward roll motion is debatably speedier than optimizing finger alternation like Dvorak offers. See More

Top Pro

Backspace is closer

While the uncommonly used caps lock is further away. May be problematic if you previously developed muscle memory of using caps lock as some other key. See More

Top Pro

Possibly faster

Most people like the common home row and believes it improves speed in comparison to QWERTY. See More

Top Pro

Multilingual support

Although it‘s optimized for English, the support for a wide range of special characters enables occasional use of other languages. Still, the Carpalx research shows that a significant improvement is also present in Dutch compared to Qwerty. http://mkweb.bcgsc.ca/carpalx/?de_correspondent See More

26 Other Options Considered

Programmer Dvorak

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Top Pro

Vim keybindings still make sense

J and K are where C and V are on QWERTY. H is still left of L. See More

Top Con

Other people can't use your computer unless you switch it to QWERTY for them

VigorousSeaxneat's Experience

Java / C / C++ programmer for 6 years. See More

Specs

Bottom Row Key Freq.:7.5%

Consecutive Same-Hand Keystrokes (L/R):38.6%/61.4%

Home Row Key Freq.:56.0%

Left Index Finger Travel:26.8%

Top Pro

Made for programming

This keyboard took a stand and optimized the Dvorak standard for programming. See More

Top Con

Keyboard controls for video games and other applications are all made for QWERTY

If you want to game, the WASD keys are completely unusable. You either need to switch to QWERTY (and then switch to Dvorak every time you want to use in game chat) or spend time remaping every key, because games don't come with Dvorak keymaps. Sufficiently popular games might have Dvorak mods. See More

JovialJupiter's Experience

Python programmer using Programmer Dvorak for 5+ years See More

Top Pro

Easy to learn if you're already used to Dvorak

The letter keys are the same, so it's not nearly the same mental jump as Qwerty to Dvorak. See More

Top Con

It takes a couple weeks before you're back to a usable speed when switching from QWERTY

Achieving your old QWERTY speed can take a month or more. See More

ChattyMinthe's Experience

So far the layout is pretty excellent. It's easier to type braces or parens without shifting or breaking flow. See More

Top Pro

Keyboards are designed for human comfort

Top Con

Dvorak users usually still use QWERTY on their smartphones

Dvorak is made for ten fingers. Its main ideas, such as maximizing the number of "finger rolls" and alternating hands, don't make much sense when you're typing with your thumbs. See More

Top Pro

Programmer punctuation without shifting on the top row

The top row is hardest to reach, and shifting doesn't make this easier. Programmers uses punctuation far more than numerals, so it makes sense to shift for the numerals instead of the punctuation. See More

Top Con

SHORTCUTS nightmare

Shortcuts, Shortcuts, Shortcuts, it is a total nightmare for users even used it for years. See More

Top Pro

Preinstalled on Linux

You can enable it systemwide when you're installing Ubuntu. See More

Top Con

Typing numbers is hard

Numbers are arranged for their characters, not in ascending order. You also have to shift. See More

Top Pro

Open source

The keyboard layout is open source and available for edition. See More

Top Con

It probably won't make you type much faster, if at all

Top Pro

Typing feels more comfortable

Completely subjective of course. See More

Top Con

Punctuation moved, not just letters

Punctuation moved in addition to letters, meaning that the learning curve is that much harder coming from QWERTY because nearly every key is in a different place. See More

Top Pro

Easily switch between Standard Dvorak and Programmer's one

Dvorak Simplified Layout is more general and available on all OS, if we need to type on other's computer, we can still use the Dvorak Simplified Layout for typing. See More

Top Pro

Better number arrangement

The smallest numerals are the most frequently used, so why should they be on the weak fingers of the left hand? The order still makes sense too. Odd numbers on the left, even numbers on the right, ascending from the inside out (with the least used numeral '9' in the middle). See More

Top Pro

Don't need to buy another keyboard or move keycaps around

Having the original QWERTY labels is useful for other people using your computer or if you ever need QWERTY. Not having keycaps labeled in Dvorak forces you to learn to touch type. All QWERTY keyboards can be remapped to Dvorak in your operating system settings, so you don't need a physical Dvorak keyboards. See More

Top Pro

Number arrangement is the same as the original Dvorak keyboards

Top Pro

More use means more usage

If an individual uses this and tells other people or they try it, the layout will be more popular, and those people will tell people and the world will change. See More

Top Pro

Other people can't use your computer unless you switch it to QWERTY for them

Workman

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Top Pro

Less lateral motion than Colemak

Colemak's focus on the home row is flawed. Due to differing finger lengths and the natural range of human hand motion, the center columns (even on the home row) take more effort to reach than the top row with the longer middle fingers. Workman takes this into account. See More

Top Con

Certain Keybindings don't work in certain applications

In certain apps (like kitty terminal emulator), keyboard shortcuts like Control+C do not work. See More

Adrian Lopez's Experience

It took me about 1 month to reach 60wpm. Considering I didn't know how to touch type, it's been easier than I expected. It's VERY ergonomic. I don't intend to move to other layout anytime soon. See More

Specs

Bottom Row Key Freq.:12.0%

Consecutive Same-Hand Keystrokes (L/R):46.5%/53.5%

Home Row Key Freq.:53.7%

Left Index Finger Travel:27.9%

Top Pro

Common English bigrams are optimized

This is an emphasis shared with Colemak, but Workman focuses on the easiest keys instead of the home row. See More

Top Con

Designed to be used on a matrix style keyboard

This keyboard layout wan't designed to be used on a normal keyboard. See More

Top Pro

Finger travel is very low overall

This is good for preventing RSI. See More

Top Pro

Very comfortable for Vim

Works so well out of the box that I can only think the creator thought about it beforehand. See More

Top Pro

Good for programming

Common characters {} [] <> () / ' " are easily accessible by the right hand on the right of the keyboard. Combinations ( { + } for example) are placed side by side on the keyboard which is useful as well. See More

Top Pro

Works on any keyboard, but additional benefits from Matrix style keyboards

Someone mentioned a CON because it was designed for Matrix style keyboards, but it was designed on a standard keyboard. However, matrix style keyboards adds additional benefits on top of this key layout. For those who don't know matrix keyboards are those where the key rows are not offset, but are directly above one another. See More

Top Pro

Ctrl- AZXCV shortcuts are still accessible with one hand

AZX are in the QWERTY positions, and CV have only shifted one key right. This lets you use the mouse with the right hand and the shortcuts with the left, unlike Dvorak. See More

Top Pro

Mac version has Dead Keys version

The macOS version of Workman has the comma (,) key as a dead key, which allows you to access harder keys on a secondary layer. See More

Top Pro

Most symbols and shortcuts are the same as QWERTY

QWERTY

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Top Pro

Popular

You don't have to carry your own keyboard everywhere, QWERTY is pretty popular. See More

Top Con

Not an easy to gain speed on QWERTY

Learning to touch type using traditional touch typing methods, you would not be as fast as others on Dvorak and you would be making quite a few mistakes. The reasons that most of record holders have placing in typing speeds is because they do not use traditional typing methods. See More

FlexibleHumbaba's Experience

Specs

Bottom Row Key Freq.:13.9%

Consecutive Same-Hand Keystrokes (L/R):65.5%/34.5%

Home Row Key Freq.:27.0%

Left Index Finger Travel:28.5%

Top Pro

Default keyboard shortcuts

The keyboard shortcuts for most applications were designed with QWERTY in mind. See More

Top Con

Made for typewriters, not computers

It was created before computers got popular. This layout was created for typing machines, so as to prevent collision between character hammers from slowing down the typist. See More

Peter J. Mello's Experience

It's awful to get trapped by the bad decisions of the past after they've been proven to be flawed in so many ways. QWERTY wasn't even a good layout for typewriters, in fact quite the opposite. (And intentionally so!) With computers and the fact that we can reassign key mappings in just a few seconds with a couple of clicks, why shouldn't we switch to something that makes typing easier, faster and more accurate? See More

Top Pro

Good for Vim users

Vim is most natural in QWERTY, since this is the layout it was designed on. Learning a good editor will help with your programming a lot more than learning a new layout. See More

Top Con

Very unintuitive

Why QWERTY? See More

Top Pro

Easy access to important keys

Some of the most used keys in programming such as ; . / " | ' < > * are very easily accessible because they either have their own keys or are "shift options". People who grew up using alternative layouts, such as Belgian AZERTY, know from experience this shouldn't be taken for granted. See More

Top Con

Correct typographic letters and symbols not easily reachable

Colemak Mod-DH

Top Pro

Much less lateral hand movement compared with regular Colemak

Some people find moving D and H to the bottom row much more comfortable (especially with flat keyboards). Curved keyboards like the Kinesis Advantage also help with lateral motion. Regular Colemak on these keyboards might be the ideal solution since then you help resolve some of the cons of regular Colemak without adding on the ones from Mod DH. See More

Top Con

Regular Colemak is more standard

Mac and Linux have regular Colemak keyboard options. This isn't an issue if your keyboard is programmable through QMK, VIA, etc. See More

DazzlingEurybia's Experience

I switched from QWERTY to Colemak. It was amazing! I wasn't constantly bending my right index down to the QWERTY N key and so on. But after 80 wpm, I started to feel strain. I discovered a layout called Workman to fix. I YOLO'd in and got to 100 wpm, but then realized all of the SFBs it came with (PO, LY, RH, DS, ...). I also missed R being on the home row, F on the left middle, etc. I started to learn DH yesterday and it has all of Colemak's advantages, and fixes it's flaws. I can type around 40 wpm so far because of my Colemak muscle memory. I typed this whole thing in DH and it felt great! See More

Specs

Consecutive Same-Hand Keystrokes (L/R):40.2%/59.8%

Home Row Key Freq.:56.0%

Left Index Finger Travel:34.3%

Left Index Finger Usage:16.8%

Top Pro

Easy to learn from Colemak

No keys change fingers from Colemak (with the possible exception of Z , which is rarely used, in one variant). See More

Top Con

Breaks up ZXCV slightly

Breaks up ZXCV (moves V over one space). Could cause copy paste confusion if also using other layouts like QWERTY. For ANSI layouts the Z is also moved to a new position. See More

Peter J. Mello's Experience

This needs to be near the top of most everyone's New Year's Resolution list as a habit (QWERTY typing) in desperate need of abandonment. I resisted alternate keyboard layouts steadfastly throughout more than two decades in IT, and now that I finally did it I feel humiliated because my obstinance probably cost me as many life-years in slower typing as 13 years of being a pack-a-day cigarette smoker. I was a comfortable 60WPM typist with QWERTY and now I hit 100WPM with ease using Colemak Mod-DH. It feels more natural, cuts down on fatigue and reinforces my self-determination since I chose rather than inherited it. I even have a Bluetooth/WiFi portable model that eliminated the concern that if I ever needed to use QWERTY again I'd embarrass myself. Seriously, don't ponder, just do this for a month and then evaluate; you won't be sorry. See More

Top Pro

'HE' easier to type compared with regular Colemak

Top Con

No Innate Layout Configuration In Keybr

Keybr supports Standard Colemak but in order to adjust to DH Mod you must use an extension like tampermonkey and run a Script like this one and adjust to fit whichever variant. See More

IntuitiveDaphne's Experience

This needs to be near the top of most everyone's New Year's Resolution list as a habit (QWERTY typing) in desperate need of abandonment. I resisted alternate keyboard layouts steadfastly throughout more than two decades in IT, and now that I finally did it I feel humiliated because my obstinance probably cost me as many life-years in slower typing as 13 years of being a pack-a-day cigarette smoker. I was a comfortable 60WPM typist with QWERTY and now I hit 100WPM with ease using Colemak Mod-DH. It feels more natural, cuts down on fatigue and reinforces my self-determination since I chose rather than inherited it. I even have a Bluetooth/WiFi portable model that eliminated the concern that if I ever needed to use QWERTY again I'd embarrass myself. Seriously, don't ponder, just do this for a month and then evaluate; you won't be sorry. See More

Top Pro

Letter G goes back to its original QWERTY position

This puts ING all on the middle row. Regular Colemak has G in the top row. See More

Top Con

H, M, V, B change from original QWERTY position

Regular Colemak has these in their original QWERTY position. The learning curve increases somewhat in Mod-DH. See More

Top Con

Index fingers jump rows more often

Top Con

More optimized for ISO and ortholinear style keyboards, not ANSI

Dvorak Simplified Keyboard

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Top Pro

More ergonomic

Designed with comfort in mind. See More

Top Con

Inconvenient for common key-shortcuts

Key bindings common to most applications, such as Ctrl+Z/C/V, can't be done on the left hand while mousing with the right. Shortcuts for other applications are out of the QWERTY positions they were designed for and aren't so convenient to access. See More

Specs

Bottom Row Key Freq.:7.3%

Consecutive Same-Hand Keystrokes (L/R):36.7%/63.3%

Home Row Key Freq.:56.0%

Left Index Finger Travel:26.8%

Top Pro

Standard on all operating systems

You can find this layout on all operating systems. See More

Top Con

The U is directly under your finger while the I is far away

I is used more--by about 2.5 times. In fact, U is the least used vowel after Y. The consonants TNSHRDLC all appear more often. So why is U directly under your finger? And why should you have to stretch for I? See More

Top Pro

Opportunity to learn proper touch typing

Most people passively learn and use QWERTY-based layouts before switching to Dvorak. The switch gives them an opportunity to completely relearn 10-finger typing, which is where a significant portion of the speedup comes from. Coupled with more ergonomic key placement, this makes for a more enjoyable typing experience. See More

Top Con

F is too hard to reach

F is not an especially common letter, but it's used much more than the rare letters JQZ. Why is it on one of the most difficult spots on the keyboard? It's also used in OF, one of the more common bigrams, ranked at #13. Maybe some other languages use Z more than English, but why is F harder to reach than Q? See More

Top Pro

Useful keys in home row

70% of more useful keys are placed in the home row. See More

Top Con

L is too hard to reach

L is not a rare letter. It's used even more than U is in English. Why put it in a difficult spot for use with the weak pinky finger? See More

Top Pro

You can reuse qwerty layout

Since letters and symbols only change place, but not key, you can change the keys on your keyboard and get a full comfortable Dvorak layout, without having to buy a new keyboard. See More

Top Con

Not the standard keyboard layout

It will be difficult to frequently switch between computers. See More

Top Pro

Vowels all on one hand making it easy to teach to kids

Top Con

The "ls" command is uncomfortable to type

This is a very common command programmers have to type often when working with the shell. It's pretty awkward in Dvorak, especially when you add common options. Try typing "ls ‐latr", and see how that feels. See More

Top Con

Difficult for occasional moments when you have only one hand free

Hand-alternation is good for touch-typing with both hands, but problematic (a lot of horizontal movement) when typing with one. Can be avoided by temporarily switching to another layout. See More

Top Con

Not easy on the right pinky finger

Most useful symbols for programming are on the right pinky finger, which is not very comfortable. See More

Top Con

Doesn't account for finger length

The keyboard layout doesn't account for E being easier to press than C for example on a QWERTY layout, this can be seen for example using the workman key cap scores done here. See More

Top Con

Not actually faster than QWERTY

Maybe it's more ergonomic, but that's debatable. You'll certainly get more benefit from an ergonomic keyboard than a change in layout. Dvorak's reputation for speed is due to a typo in the initial press report, and a biased (and since discredited) study run by Dvorak himself. Dvorak is all hype and no substance. See More

Norman

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Top Pro

Uses the same fingers as QWERTY for most letters

Norman keeps 22/26 letters in their original QWERTY finger, making the transition easier, and, according to many tests, does so without much loss in ergonomics. See More

Top Con

Bad on SFBs

Lots of same finger bigrams (when 2 keys are hit simultaneously by one finger like the qwerty "ed". See More

Specs

Top Row Key Freq.:20.8%

Bottom Row Key Freq.:10.3%

Consecutive Same-Hand Keystrokes (L/R):54.3%/45.7%

Home Row Key Freq.:53.7%

Top Pro

Keeps many common QWERTY shortcuts intact

Common shortcuts, such as ctrl + z, ctrl + x, etc., are kept in their original positions without much loss in ergonomics, making the transition easier. See More

Top Con

A very small user base and community

Top Pro

Feels fast and comfy

Top Con

Designed for right handed use

The Norman was designed with right handed use in mind, making it a less attractive choice for left handed users. However, tests done by some users (can be found in the comments) suggests that the Norman layout might be balanced. See More

Top Pro

Focuses on the keys easiest to reach for the human hand

Like Workman, Norman takes human anatomy into account. See More

Top Con

Scores worse in ergonomics using the Carpalx test

Norman, although scoring better in travel distance, generally scores worse in the Carpalx test than layouts such as Colemak. See the source here. See More

Top Pro

Designed using normal keyboards in mind

Unlike keyboard layouts such as workman that are desgined to be used by matrix keyboards, norman is made to be used by a standard keyboard. See More

Top Pro

Favours the right hand

Unlike other layouts, such as workman, norman favours the right hand due to it usually being stronger than the left. See More

Neo2 (Classic Neo)

Top Pro

Best for programming

Easily reachable programming relevant symbols, like {}'()|~"_[]<>, on the third layer. See More

Top Con

Developed primarly for the German language

English is considered a major target, but the homepage and docs are mostly in German. See More

JollyXmucane's Experience

Very convenient to write and to programm with. But the screenshot shows NEO 2, with some swapped keys. This shoudl be your choice over NEO 1. See More

Specs

Bottom Row Key Freq.:6.1%

Consecutive Same-Hand Keystrokes (L/R):76.7%/23.3%

Home Row Key Freq.:61.1%

Left Index Finger Travel:33.5%

Top Pro

Type mathematical symbols natively

Top Con

Harder to learn

Top Pro

Many layers

You can type more symbols and letters, that do not even exist on other keyboard layouts. See More

Top Pro

Its possible to type letters from the International Phonetic Alphabet

Arensito

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Top Pro

Reduces load on pinkies

Top Con

Pointing stick is no longer on the home row

Most keyboards don't have one, but if you use it a lot it becomes a bit of a stretch. On the plus side, a keyboard with a pointing stick will have mouse buttons you could remap to thumb keys instead. See More

DetailedAnnona's Experience

I find that I can maintain (with some effort), 2 layouts easier with ARENSITO than other layouts. I am currently retraining to use QWERTY and ARENSITO, as I find that it takes less effort for me to switch back and forth from these two layouts than others. See More

Specs

Bottom Row Key Freq.:15.4%

Consecutive Same-Hand Keystrokes (L/R):50.2%/49.8%

Home Row Key Freq.:12.9%

Left Index Finger Travel:20.5%

Top Pro

Emphasizes adjacent finger bigrams

Common bigrams are a fast rolling motion, like Colemak. See More

Top Con

Hard to orient in a new position by feel

Most keyboards have bumps on two of the keys to orient touch-typists. On QWERTY, this is usually F and J, but sometimes D and K. On some keyboards you can fix this by swapping keycaps. You could also try adding small stickers with enough thickness. See More

Top Pro

Minimizes same-finger bigrams

Top Con

Letter keys as modifiers may cause jamming or ghosting

Cheap keyboards designed for QWERTY might struggle with the use of Arensito's letter keys as modifiers. Gaming keyboards with n-key rollover don't have this problem. And any keyboard with proper thumb keys (Kinesis, Ergodox, Maltron) works properly. There is an older version of the layout that keeps QWERTY's home row that you can use on cheap keyboards, but it's not quite as nice. See More

Top Pro

Puts your thumbs to good use

Your strongest fingers are your thumbs. In this layout (unless you have a keyboard with thumb keys) you shift your hands up one row, and you use your thumbs on the bottom row. (Put your index fingers on QWERTY's T and I keys, and rest your thumbs on VB and NM) The Ctrl and Shift modifier keys now use your strong thumbs instead of your weak pinkies. (Ctrl shortcuts are especially important for programmers.) The modifiers may contribute more to RSI than letters. See More

Top Con

Copy-paste shortcuts are right-handed

XCV are on the right side. This makes it difficult to cut/copy-paste with the mouse in the right hand. See More

Top Pro

Punctuation also optimized for programming

AltGr plane has accessible punctuation and numbers. The most used are directly under your fingers on the (new) home row, and all the bracket types are paired and in easy reach. See More

Top Pro

Balances load between hands

Statistically, the left and right hand are used about the same amount. See More

Top Pro

Easy access to common punctuation and numbers

Programmer punctuation and numbers are accessible without stretching on the AltGr plane. (AltGr is now on the spacebar). See More

Carpalx QGMLWB

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Top Con

Effort model is speculative

The quantitative effort model central to the optimization is based on armchair speculation, rather than a scientific biomedical study. The chosen metrics and weighting for them are likely partially correct. But no-one is really sure how correct. See More

Top Pro

Punctuation is in the same location as QWERTY

If you already know QWERTY you don't have to relearn the punctuation, with the single exception of the ;: key which is in QWERTY's P position, like Colemak. See More

Specs

Bottom Row Key Freq.:7.9%

Consecutive Same-Hand Keystrokes (L/R):47.4%/52.6%

Home Row Key Freq.:59.8%

Left Index Finger Travel:35.6%

Top Con

Doesn't take finger length into account

Unlike layouts such as norman and workman, QGMLWB doesn't take the length of fingers into account, for example on a standard QWERTY layout, it's easier to reach E than C. See More

Top Pro

ZXC don't move compared to QWERTY

Like Colemak, the common undo, cut and copy Ctrl-commands don't move from their QWERTY positions. The V (paste) key does though. See More

Top Con

Punctuation is not optimized

Programmers have to use punctuation a lot, but (except for the ;: key, like Colemak) punctuation hasn't been moved from their positions on QWERTY. In fact, the non-letter characters , . - " _ ' ) ( ; 0 1 = 2 : are used more than the least-frequent letter z in a reasonable English corpus. Not optimizing punctuation at all, especially for programmers, is nonsense. See More

Top Pro

Uses a colemak-like character layout

Uses the colemak character layout of moving P on a standard QWERTY keyboard layout one step down, extending the home row. See More

Top Con

V key has moved compared to QWERTY

The common paste shortcut used in for example windows has been moved to the right hand, making the layout harder to learn. This however is fixed in the QGMLWY variant of the carpalx series. See More

Top Pro

Has low consecutive finger use

See the source here. See More

Top Con

A very small user base and community

Top Pro

Letter positions optimized

Via a quantitative effort model. See More

Top Con

Doesn't favor the right hand

For right handed users, this keyboard layout doesn't use the usually stronger right hand more than the left, infact it sometimes favors the left hand more. See More

qwpr

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Top Con

Puts E on the pinky

'E' is the most used English letter by far, at almost 13%. That's almost as much as the spacebar. It needs to be on a strong finger. The pinky is the weakest finger and on the right side it is already overtaxed from Ctrl, Shift, and Enter. See More

Top Pro

Good for vim users

Qwpr is pretty close to QWERTY, and even the HJKL keys are in the same left-to-right order (though on different rows). Alternatively, the AltGr plane also has arrow keys in a sensible position under the right hand. See More

Top Con

P and E change fingers from QWERTY

Which makes it harder than necessary to learn from QWERTY. (And makes no sense. 'E' was arguably better in its QWERTY position on a strong finger.) This is due to using the flawed Carpalx effort model. See More

Top Pro

Common shortcuts don't move

A, Z, X, C, and V are in the same positions as QWERTY and Colemak. See More

Top Pro

As easy as Dvorak

It's 32% easier than QWERTY by the Carpalx metric, which is slightly better than Dvorak's 30%. This is probably within Carpalx's margin of error though. See More

Top Pro

Alternate plane with CapsLock key

CapsLock is pretty useless for most people, but qwpr layout uses it to shift to another plane with easy access to punctuation and arrow keys. This is especially useful for programmers. See More

Top Pro

Minimal retraining from QWERTY

11 keys move, but except for P and E, they don't change fingers. See More

Maltron Letter Layout

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Top Pro

Punctuation is also optimized

The comma and period are more frequent than KVJZXQ. See More

Top Con

Requires a physical keyboard

The Maltron layout requires an expensive physical Maltron keyboard. Most layout options are a simple change in software, to remap existing keys. (Touch typists mostly don't look at the labels anyway.) But there's no way to add the required thumb keys for this layout in software. See More

Top Pro

E on the thumb

E is the most used English letter by far at almost 13%. See More

Top Pro

Highly optimized for frequency of use

This includes di- and tri-graphs, as well as the individual letter frequency. See More

Carpalx QGMLWY

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Top Pro

Easier to learn than QGMLWB

Keeps the ZXCV key in the same place as the very common QWERTY keyboard layout. More familiar than even than QGMLWB. See More

Top Con

Very unpopular

Even rich on keyboard layouts variety Linux distros like Deepin, offering most of existing layouts, doesn't have this one. The situation on Android is not better, moreover if somebody get used to Swift-like keyboards, that do not have this layout, that person will be forced to have a second (e.g. qwerty) layout in mind. See More

HarmoniousNeith's Experience

Excellent layout where plenty of typing just feels effortless, it's surprisingly decent for a layout made by an algorithm. See More

Top Pro

The layout is basically good for most Latin languages

As vowels and consonants are mostly divided between 2 hands and most words in Latin languages are made of 2-letter (consonant+vowel) syllables, the layout keeps it efficiency not only in English, for which it was primarily created, but in other languages too. See More

Top Con

Not always worth trying

The layout is great only if somebody uses it daily and a lot, like journalists, bloggers, writers do. In this case inconvenience to install the layout is worth use it. If you primarily use your phone/tablet to write some comments in Internet and other tiny writing tasks having such an unpopular layout on just your PC/laptop could be not justified. See More

Top Pro

It takes much less effort to type than classical layout

The layout effectively combines not only changing hands methods, and rolling fingers as well, that makes typing a real pleasure. See More

Top Pro

About the same score on the carplax test as the QGMLWB variant

See the source here. See More

Dvorak for Programmers with European keys

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Single layout for all purposes

This layout is suitable for both programming in an IDE, and for civil life. No need to have another layout only because of several missing letters. See More

Top Con

Need to learn Dvorak for Programmers

In case you don't know it already See More

TactfulIdunn's Experience

I use Dvorak for Programmers as the most convenient layout for coding, but originally it only has the base latin letters of English. Therefore I had to use additional layout for the sake of using it outside of IDE, only because of several missing letters (üäöß for German in my case). This layout solves the issue and allows having a single layout for every purpose See More

Capewell-Dvorak

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AZERTY

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Top Con

Bad for programming

But you get used to it... :-) Characters very common in programming languages, like [] {} ~#|`@ are reachable only via the infamous AltGr key on Windows computers (and perhaps Linux ones; not sure for Macs). With practice, you type them without thinking, but it is still a rather impractical gymnastics. See More

Top Pro

Nearly unavoidable for French people

Most of us learned to type with this kind of keyboard, switching can be hard, and impractical to type French. See More

Top Con

CTRL + / is only accessible by numpad

Top Pro

HJKL intact for vim

Vim programmers are going to want their navigation keys to relate to each other in a sensible fashion. QWERTY and azerty seem to be the only games in town for this See More

MTGAP 3.5

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BÉPO

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Top Con

Programming hardly ever needs accented letters

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