A lot of laptops, Dell for example, offset the touch pad to the left even though there is no keypad. You might be right that these are technically centered on the q to p span of the keyboard.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b4/De...

https://i.pcmag.com/imagery/reviews/05RhNkV9HnULG0LW4YRfKzZ-...

https://www.tec-int.com/media/catalog/product/cache/2/image/...

Good eye! I had never noticed those before. Yes I think those are centred to j and f. on the Macbook Pro I'm using right now, if you look carefully, the touchpad is centred relative to the body but it is slightly off centre relative to the home row.

I use my laptop on my lap, and usually when I sit with my hands folded in my lap, my hands fall along the center axis of my body. We are bilaterally symmetrical beings (with some internal asymmetries).

So unless I scoot the laptop off-axis or I have to move my hands off axis to type.

I'm unsure how this isn't unergonomic. It's not something to get used to. It's bad design. Period.

If you're using a laptop on your lap you've already given away any chance of ergonomic comfort.

Yes this has always annoyed me; having it centred under the keyboard makes no sense except in some weird universe where everybody uses only their thumbs to operate the trackpad. Trackpad alignment was one of the major causes of my RSI due to the horrible bend in the wrist it causes.

I haven't used a Mac in years but the one thing they always nailed was the trackpad. It's big and actually centred on the laptop body.

I think it depends on how much you type. If you type most of the time, your hands will tend to stay centred on the keyboard. Of course this is highly variable based on so many factors...

Yes this is true, I see your point, with a laptop on your lap, in order to balance its weight optimally, you need to centre it relative to its mass, not relative to the hands rest position (F and J keys) so then when you have to type you need to move your hands sideways and it's not very ergonomic.

But you want to align the keyboard and the touchpad with the vertical axis of your body so you end up with 2/3 of the screen to your right. That's why I'm advocating no number pads on laptops.

I’d rather align myself with the screen, otherwise I’m mostly constantly looking towards a slight right, which is a terrible twist for the spine.

It’s much easier and more comfortable to adjust my hands over a slightly offset keyboard.

Is this what you're actually doing?

I gave it a try for one minute when I unpacked my new laptop in 2014 and I immediately shifted it to the right: typing as you suggest was terrible for wrists, shoulders and probably the spine.

My workaround: I move the windows I work more often (eg: the editor) to the left part of the screen.

To be fair: there is no way to fix an ergonomically broken design. There are only mitigations and those a probably subjective: everybody is a little different and muscles/skeletons/etc can accommodate different twists.