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Maltron Letter Layout vs Neo2 (Classic Neo)

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When comparing Maltron Letter Layout vs Neo2 (Classic Neo), the Slant community recommends Neo2 (Classic Neo) for most people. In the question“What are the best keyboard layouts for programming?” Neo2 (Classic Neo) is ranked 7th while Maltron Letter Layout is ranked 14th. The most important reason people chose Neo2 (Classic Neo) is:

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

Specs

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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 Travel33.5%

Left Index Finger Usage24.1%

Left Little Finger Travel0.6%

Left Little Finger Usage2.8%

Left Middle Finger Travel11.2%

Left Middle Finger Usage10.5%

Left Ring Finger Travel2.9%

Left Ring Finger Usage6.6%

Right Index Finger Travel35.3%

Right Index Finger Usage18.3%

Right Little Finger Travel6.7%

Right Little Finger Usage5.9%

Right Middle Finger Travel5.8%

Right Middle Finger Usage8.2%

Right Ring Finger Travel4.1%

Right Ring Finger Usage8.3%

Spacebar Row Key Freq.15.3%

Thumb Usage15.3%

Top Row Key Freq.17.5%

Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking

Common Questions

What are the best keyboard layouts for programming?

Maltron Letter Layout

Neo2 (Classic Neo)

Pros

Pro
Punctuation is also optimized

The comma and period are more frequent than KVJZXQ.

Pro
E on the thumb

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

Pro
Highly optimized for frequency of use

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

Pro
Best for programming

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

Pro
Type mathematical symbols natively

Pro
Many layers

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

Pro
Its possible to type letters from the International Phonetic Alphabet

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Cons

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.