Typing faster, and letting your phone help

Phone Skills for Work4 min readText and drawings only

If typing on a phone feels slow, applying for ten jobs feels impossible. These few settings can double your speed, and they are all already on your phone.

🎤 Dictation Speak, it types. Then always read it back. Swipe typing Slide between letters without lifting. Text shortcuts myem becomes your whole email address. Your dictionary Add your name so it stops correcting you.
Four things most people never discover on their own keyboard.

Dictation. Tap the microphone on your keyboard and speak. Your phone types it. Speak in short sentences and say the punctuation, for example "comma" and "full stop". Then read it back, because it will get some words wrong.

Swipe typing. Instead of tapping each letter, slide your finger from letter to letter without lifting. It feels wrong for about two minutes and then it is much faster.

Text shortcuts. In your keyboard settings you can set a short code to expand into long text. Set your email address to expand from "myem" and never type it again.

Autocorrect keeps changing my name and my town

Add them to your personal dictionary. Hold down the word when it is underlined and choose Add to dictionary, or find Personal dictionary in your keyboard settings. Once added, your phone stops fighting you.

Before you move on

  • Try dictation for one message
  • Try swipe typing for one message
  • Add your email address as a shortcut

Check what you know

2 questions. Have a look at what this lesson asks.

1. You dictate a message using the microphone. What must you always do next?

2. Your phone keeps autocorrecting your surname to something else. What fixes it permanently?

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