Typing Speed for Legal Secretaries

Why speed matters for a legal secretary

Legal documents are unforgiving of small mistakes in a way most business writing is not: a wrong figure, date or name can change what a document means. The typing itself is also harder than ordinary prose, dense with citations, unfamiliar terms and precise punctuation that cannot be approximated. Speed matters, but the accuracy floor is what distinguishes the role.

What the typing actually looks like

Long formal documents, citation formats, and heavy use of punctuation and capitalisation. Numbers and symbols appear far more often than in general correspondence.

Proving it to an employer

A number on a CV is a claim. TypeCred’s evaluation is invigilated in the browser — pasting is blocked, the window must stay in focus, and the keystroke stream is checked for machine-generated timing — and it issues a signed PDF whose QR code resolves to a page that detects any edit to the name, speed or date. That is something a recruiter can check in a few seconds without taking your word for it.

Common questions

What typing speed do law firms ask for?

Commonly 55 to 75 WPM for secretarial and paralegal support roles, though the accuracy expectation is what tends to be emphasised in practice.

Is legal typing harder than normal typing?

Usually, yes — the vocabulary is unfamiliar and the punctuation is exacting, so most people type legal text slower than they type ordinary prose. Practising on business correspondence rather than casual text gives a more honest measure.

Requirements for other roles

• Data Entry Jobs45–60
• Administrative Assistants50–65
• Medical Transcription65–90
• Customer Service and Live Chat40–60
• Virtual Assistants50–70