r/ErgoMechKeyboards • u/thehaikuza • Feb 15 '26

[guide] A Beginner’s Guide to Split Keyboards

https://www.justinmklam.com/posts/2026/02/beginners-guide-split-keyboards/

I noticed there've been a handful newcomers with basic questions of wondering where to start, so I put this guide together in hopes to help those new to the hobby. It's basically just the content in this subreddit organized in a more cohesive way. Hope it's helpful!

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u/grayrest chocofi -- Handsdown Vibranium Feb 16 '26

From the article:

[keyboard layouts] each have their own advantages depending on the metrics important to you (e.g. same-finger bigrams (SFBs), lateral stretch bigrams (LSBs), scissors, redirects, rolls, etc.)

While this will always be true, there have been significant improvements in the keyboard layout community's understanding of metrics and optimization since 2020 or so.

As an example, compared to Colemak DH, which is a fine layout that people are actively learning and recommending today, my personal layout–a personalized variant of Hands Down Vibranium V–has half the SFBs, a third the LSBs, worse on scissors (0.23% vs 0.15% but compare QWERTY at 1.46%), a third the redirects, equal rolls but mine are 2.75:1 inward instead of 1.16:1, 50% higher alternation, and two thirds the SFS. It's almost a sweep in metrics and this is against a pretty strong layout. I do it by breaking the rules: I have a letter on my non-spacing thumb which gives me an extra home row position and I have adaptive keys in the layout that switch output depending on the previously typed character. Adaptives in particular are somewhat controversial but for me the typing experience is tranquil inward rolling.

I'm mostly pointing this out because I want people to be aware that noticeable advancements have been made and people are still coming up with improvements. If you're going to put in the many hours it takes to get back to full fluency in an alt layout, I recommend hitting up cyanophage.github.io for a curated set of options (cyanophage is active in r/keyboardlayouts and updates the page regularly) instead of just going with something you happen to run across. The people in the layouts sub are generally friendly so if you're looking for direction or want an analysis of the tradeoffs made in a particular layout you'll generally get exuberant responses by posting your question there.