How does the mouse accuracy test work?
30 round targets appear one after another, each in a new place at least a few target-widths away from the last. Click or tap each one. You get three numbers: your average time per target, your accuracy (the share of your clicks that hit), and how far from the center your hits landed. It works with a mouse, a trackpad, a pen or a finger.
How is your result calculated?
- Time per target runs from the animation frame that draws the target to the moment the button or finger goes down on it, using the timestamp your browser gives the press. Missed clicks in between don't stop the clock. Your result is the average over all 30 targets.
- Accuracy is hits divided by all your clicks. A click counts as a hit only if it lands inside the target's circle, so a near miss is a miss.
- Off center is how far from the middle your hits landed, on average, as a share of the target's radius: 0% would be dead center every time, 100% would be the very edge.
Target sizes
Pick a size before you start. Results are only comparable between runs at the same size.
| Size | Diameter |
|---|---|
| Large | 56 pixels |
| Medium | 40 pixels |
| Small | 26 pixels |
Why small, far targets take longer
The time it takes to point at something grows with how far away it is and shrinks with how big it is. The psychologist Paul Fitts described this in 1954, and "Fitts's law" is still used to design buttons and menus: it is why the most-used controls on a screen tend to be large or sit at its edges. Here, smaller targets mean you have to slow down at the end of each movement to land inside them, which is why time and accuracy trade against each other.
Speed or accuracy?
You can nearly always go faster by being less careful, and the result shows it: time per target drops and misses rise. For runs you want to compare, decide on an approach and keep it. Aiming for no misses first and speed second gives the steadiest numbers.
How to improve your mouse accuracy
Make every movement repeatable: a setup that doesn't change, a pointer speed you can control, and practice with feedback.
- Turn off pointer acceleration. On Windows it is called "Enhance pointer precision". Without it, the same hand movement always moves the pointer the same distance, so your hand can learn it.
- Lower the sensitivity if you overshoot. A lower DPI or pointer speed makes small hand movements into small pointer movements.
- Use your arm for distance, your fingers for detail. Long moves from the elbow or shoulder, the last small correction from the wrist and fingers.
- Keep the surface even. A clean mouse pad gives the same glide everywhere.
- Practice small. Runs with small targets train the final correction that decides a hit.
What can change your result
- Pointer speed and acceleration. Your operating system's mouse settings change how far the pointer moves for a given hand movement.
- Mouse, trackpad or touch. On a touchscreen there is no pointer to steer: your finger goes straight to the target, but a fingertip is less precise than a cursor.
- Screen size. Targets keep their size in pixels, but on a bigger screen they can appear farther apart.
- Your setup. A worn mouse pad, an awkward desk height or a phone held in one hand all add time and misses.
This is a pointing game, not a test of anyone's hand health, and results from different devices aren't directly comparable. For a test of a steady hand, try Draw a Perfect Circle; for pure speed, the Reaction Time Test.