Changing the Key Repeat Rate in OSX

Mac OSX ships with very slow key repeat rates (how quickly a key repeats after it is first pressed, and how quickly a key input repeats after holding it down). Changing these effectively is not possible in System Settings, we instead use the command line.

First, read the two relevant values in case you want to go back:

defaults read -g InitialKeyRepeat

and

defaults read -g KeyRepeat

changing these values is similarly easy:

defaults write -g InitialKeyRepeat -int 12

and

defaults write -g KeyRepeat -int 2

That’s it!