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Change Keyboard Repeat Delay and Rate in Windows 10

How to Change Keyboard Character Repeat Delay and Rate in Windows 10

The repeat delay and the character repeat rate are two important parameters of the hardware keyboard. Using them, the user can make typing more comfortable. Let's review them.

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Recent Windows 10 builds two new Settings pages, Time & Language > Language and Devices > Typing. They are designed to replace the classic "Language" applet of Control Panel, which is hidden starting with Windows 10 Build 17063. However, using these new Settings pages, you can't adjust the keyboard character repeat delay and rate. Today we will see how to access the option.

If you type a lot, changing these parameters will allow you to type much faster. The repeat delay defines the pause between pressing a key and when it starts repeating while you are holding that key. The repeat rate sets the speed at which Windows repeats the character of the key you are holding pressed.

To Change Keyboard Repeat Delay and Rate in Windows 10,

  1. Open the classic Control Panel app.
  2. Switch its view to either "Large icons" or "Small icons" as shown below.Control Panel Large Icons View
  3. Click on the Keyboard applet.Control Panel Keyboard Icon
  4. In the keyboard dialog, change the position of the Repeat delay slider on the Speed tab to set a longer or shorter delay.Control Panel Keyboard Applet
  5. Now, change the Repeat rate slider value to be slow or fast for what you want.
  6. Click on the Apply button.
  7. Use the Click here and hold down a key to test repeat rate text box to test the changes you made.Control Panel Keyboard Test Field
  8. Click on OK to close the dialog.

Alternatively, the options can be configured in the Registry. Here's how.

Change Keyboard Repeat Delay and Rate in the Registry

  1. Open the Registry Editor app.
  2. Go to the following Registry key. HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Keyboard
    See how to go to a Registry key with one click.
  3. On the right, modify or create a new string (REG_SZ) value KeyboardDelay.
  4. Set its value data in the range of 3 and 0, i.e. set it to 3, 2, 1, or 0. The value data of 3 is for the long delay, 0 is for short.Control Panel Keyboard Delay Tweak
  5. Now, modify the KeyboardSpeed string value. Set its value data to a number between 0 (slow) and 31 (fast) for the repeat rate you want.Control Panel Keyboard Repeat Speed Tweak
  6. To make the changes done by the Registry tweak take effect, you need to sign out and sign in to your user account. Alternatively, you can restart the Explorer shell.

You are done.

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Author: Sergey Tkachenko

Sergey Tkachenko is a software developer who started Winaero back in 2011. On this blog, Sergey is writing about everything connected to Microsoft, Windows and popular software. Follow him on Telegram, Twitter, and YouTube.

5 thoughts on “Change Keyboard Repeat Delay and Rate in Windows 10”

  1. This provides no help. Why would Microsoft hide this setting? There is no good reason.

    Secondly, the repeat rate as set in the Control Panel, does nothing.

  2. None of this works to the desired effect. ;/
    Was hopeful about editing the registry, but it doesn’t seem to register values above 31. Shame.
    My 5 year old laptop has a much faster repeat speed, but I can’t seem to replicate it with my new PC. :S

  3. Neither of these worked and my key repetition is still super slow and i have had it on the fastest settings already, i know that this isn’t as fast as it can go so why does it not work

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