QWERTY

American  

[kwur-tee, kwer-] / ˈkwɜr ti, ˈkwɛr- /

adjective

1. of or relating to a keyboard having the keys in traditional typewriter arrangement, with the letters q, w, e, r, t, and y being the first six of the top row of alphabetic characters, starting from the left side.

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qwerty British  

/ ˈkwɜːtɪ /

noun

1. the standard English language typewriter keyboard layout with the characters q, w, e, r, t, and y positioned on the top row of alphabetic characters at the left side of the keyboard

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Etymology

Origin of QWERTY

First recorded in 1925–30

Example Sentences

A standard qwerty keyboard has 104 keys.

From Los Angeles Times

The study focused on the stubbornly persistent Qwerty keyboard, which was originally designed to minimize mechanical typing jams in typewriters.

From New York Times

Maybe those locks are as unbreakable as the qwerty standard once seemed.

From BBC

Many people think that qwerty is a bad one - in fact, that it was deliberately designed to be slow and awkward.

From BBC

Then again, if qwerty really was designed to be slow, how come the most popular pair of letters in English, T-H, are adjacent and right under the index fingers?

From BBC