Android users who want a more accurate virtual keyboard have a new
and improved choice today in SwiftKey 4. An update to the popular
SwiftKey keyboard, Swiftkey 4 adds gesture typing, the ability to type
blocks of words without hitting the spacebar, support for 60 languages
and enhanced next-word prediction. We had the opportunity to go hands-on
with SwiftKey 4 and came away impressed with its speed and accuracy.
Setup and Learning
After installing SwiftKey 4, we were prompted to select and download a
language pack. We chose U.S. English, but were able to choose from 59
other languages, including Australian and British English. SwiftKey does
not yet support major Asian languages like Mandarin, Korean and
Japanese.
SwiftKey’s main selling point is that it learns your writing patterns
and uses them to provide more accurate next-word predictions. However,
you don’t have to wait days or weeks for the software to learn. During
the setup process, SwiftKey invited us to provide it with our Facebook,
Gmail and Twitter credentials along with permission to learn from our
SMS and RSS feeds so that it could learn from things we’d typed before
installation. We gave it our Gmail and Facebook logins to help it
determine our patterns.
We also used the settings menu to change the look and feel of our
keyboard. We had a choice of six different themes, each in its own
color, from the electric blue on black Neon theme to the black on white
Light theme. After trying several of the themes, we decided on the white
on gray Holo theme, because it was easiest to see the separation
between the keys. However, we wish we had the ability to set custom
colors for the keys and writing.
We also used the settings menu to control the height of the keys in
both portrait and landscape mode, setting both to large. We also turned
on haptic feedback, which was disabled by default.
Predictions
While SwiftKey 4′s predictive text isn’t psychic, it’s pretty darn
close as it frequently offered us the next word we had in mind amongst
its three suggestions. For example, when we wrote an email with the
sentence “Can someone blog this in the morning,” the keyboard correctly
suggested the last few words and gave us “Can” and “someone” as
suggestions after we’d typed the first character or two. The second time
we wrote an email with the same sentence, SwiftKey 4 suggested every
word after “can” and “someone” before we even had to tap a word. It
suggested those first two words after we typed the first letter.
SwiftKey is also supposed to adjust to your typing style, helping
autocorrect your common typing errors, particularly when you’re trying
to type fast. This feature helped fix many of our errors, but was far
from perfect. When we tried typing the same sentence very quickly in
landscape mode, it inserted an extra word making our phrase “can someone
needs please blog this now.” Another time, it failed to pick up our
massive typo of the word ”someone,” leaving us with “vs om.”
Considering that it only got one or two words wrong most of the times
we typed this sentence quickly, Swiftkey was far superior to any other
Android keyboard autocorrect we’ve used before.
Flow Through Space
Don’t want to break up your rhythm by hitting the space bar between
words? SwiftKey 4 has a feature called “flow through space.” Indeed,
when we typed “cansomeonepleaseblogthisnow” into an email, Swiftkey
suggested “can someone please blog this now” as a choice. However, once
we exceeded six words, the app stopped offering suggestions of any kind.
SwiftKey Flow: Trace Typing
With version 4, SwiftKey offers trace typing for the first time. So,
if you liked Swype, another popular alternative keyboard that lets you
form words by drawing lines between keys, you’ll love SwiftKey 4 which
combines this functionality with its accurate prediction system and
calls it SwiftKey Flow.
Using Swiftkey Flow, we were able to enter words quickly, without
lifting our finger off of the screen. However, as we had with Swype, we
found it too easy to trace over the wrong letter and complete a word
before we realized we had made a typo. Slowing our tracing pace improved
our accuracy.
Final Thoughts and Availability
Because of its great next-word predictions, SwiftKey 4 is a huge step
up, both from the stock Android keyboard and from Swype. The app
certainly isn’t perfect — we wish it had more attractive keyboard themes
or let us make our own – but it is well worth its very reasonable
asking price.
Available today in the Google Play Market, SwiftKey 4 carries a
regular price of $3.99, but has a limited-time $1.99 promotional price.
Existing SwiftKey users can upgrade to Swiftkey 4 for free.
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