Does Speed Reading Actually Work?

Speed reading courses promise several thousand words a minute with full comprehension. The research does not support it. Beyond a certain rate, the gains come out of comprehension rather than efficiency, and the trade is rarely worth making.

The methods that hold up are slower and plainer. SQ3R, for example, has you survey the text and write questions before reading, then finish with recall and review. It is slower per page and better per hour.

Our research team went through the claims and the evidence behind them, and set out what a realistic reading system looks like when it is built from techniques that actually replicate.

Read the full research: Does Speed Reading Actually Work? on Speed Learning Research.