Google Docs

Auto type in Google Docs at your own pace

Typist is a Chrome side panel that enters text you have already written into a Google Docs document, one character at a time, at a speed you set. You watch it arrive rather than typing it out.

The two usual options, and where they fall short

Getting a long piece of text into a Doc normally means one of two things. You paste it, and the whole block lands on a single keystroke. Or you type it, and a 1,200-word draft costs you twenty minutes reproducing keystrokes you already made somewhere else.

Paste is the right answer most of the time, and nobody needs a tool for it. It stops being the right answer when you want the text to arrive progressively: when you are recording the screen and a block appearing in one frame is useless footage, or when you want to read the text as it lands and be able to stop partway.

Docs needs dedicated support, and it has it

A Google Doc is not an ordinary text box. The document body is a custom editor with its own event handling, so a tool that only knows how to push characters into a plain field does nothing at all there. Typist recognises a docs.google.com/document page and aims its key events at the editor's own text target and lets Docs build the document from them.

Docs is one of four places Typist can type. The others are ordinary text boxes, text areas, and rich-text editors built on editable page elements. Click somewhere it cannot work with and it asks you to click into a text field rather than failing quietly. The auto typer overview lists the whole set.

Step by step

Open the document in a normal Chrome tab.
Click into the document body where the text should start. Typist types into the one field you have focused and nowhere else.
Open the side panel and sign in with Google, which is required before typing and asks only for your account identifier and email address.
Put your text in the panel — paste it, type it, or load a saved snippet.
Choose a speed in words per minute, and a pacing mode.
Press Start. A progress indicator shows how far through the run you are.

Picking a speed

The range is 20 to 400 words per minute, with presets at 40, 60, 100, 150, 250 and 400, and 60 as the default. Two pacing modes decide the feel: a varied pace with short pauses at punctuation, and a fast steady mode with no pauses that runs roughly eight times quicker. For a long document the fast mode is usually what you want — 1,000 words at 400 wpm is about two and a half minutes. For a screen recording, a slower varied pace is easier to follow. Typing speed control goes through the trade-off.

Pause, resume and stop all work mid-run. Pausing is useful in a Doc: stop between sections, add a heading or a page break by hand, then resume.

What the free allowance means for a long draft

The free plan covers 300 words a day, resetting at 00:00 UTC. Words are counted the moment you press Start, and a run you stop early still spends what it set aside — so starting a 2,000-word block and stopping after a paragraph does not give the words back. For a longer draft, plan on spreading it over several days or moving to Pro, which is $4.99 a month with no daily limit and cancels whenever you like. See the pricing page.

Text you will use again

A snippet is a titled block of text saved to your account and synced to your other signed-in devices — free accounts hold three, Pro holds as many as you want, and editing one you own never counts against the limit. For a section you put into a Doc more than once, saving it beats finding the source file every time. See saved typing snippets.

Add Typist to Chrome

Free plan: 300 words a day. A Google sign-in is required before typing.

Questions

Does this work in a Google Doc, really?: Yes. Docs has purpose-built support in the extension rather than being something that happens to work. Ordinary text boxes, text areas and rich-text editors are supported too; anything else is refused with a message asking you to click into a text field.
Can I keep working while it types?: Not in the same document — clicking elsewhere moves the cursor out from under the run. Pause it, do what you need, and resume.
Does my text get uploaded anywhere?: No. The text in the panel stays on your device and is sent only to the page being typed into. The single exception is a snippet you deliberately save, which is stored so it can sync. The privacy page is specific about this.
Can it fill several fields, or move between documents?: No. One field at a time, the one you focused. Typist does not click, navigate, or switch tabs.
What if the draft is long?: Run it in pieces. Entering a longer piece into Docs covers how to break one up sensibly.