Microsoft SwiftKey

What hackers pick instead

• GboardPeople recommend it for multilingual typing, adaptive swipe typing and prediction that beats default keyboards. Critics most often cite weak suggestions for smaller languages.59recommend
• FUTO KeyboardRecommended as a private, offline Android keyboard with on-device voice typing and many tweakable options. Critics note it is source-available, not open source.51recommend
• FUTO SwipePeople recommend it as a free, privacy-respecting swipe keyboard that performs about as well as Gboard. Common caveats are limited language support and a confusing license.40recommend
• Keybee keyboardA phone keyboard layout built for faster typing, with open-source code. Critics doubt it beats QWERTY and say it lacks swipe typing and autocorrect.8recommend
• Thumb-KeyFree two-row, 16-key smartphone keyboard that people recommend for fast thumb typing, including on very small devices.6recommend

Every quote

The 40 most detailed of 59 comments. Each links to the original.

1. replacing the OS keyboard with Swiftkey (for which I have a data folder with over a decade of training in it)

   Recommends · Dec 2025 · in “iPhone Typos? It's Not Just You – The iOS Keyboard Is Broken [video]”

2. logging into my SwiftKey account ensures my typing experience doesn't change almost at all

   Recommends · Dec 2025 · in “iPhone Typos? It's Not Just You – The iOS Keyboard Is Broken [video]”

3. I've been using swiftkey on android since before MS bought it so I kept using it on ipad.

   Recommends · Feb 2026 · in “Apple, fix my keyboard before the timer ends or I'm leaving iPhone”

4. they added a "Ask Bing" context menu item to all my selections after an update

   Mixed · Dec 2025 · in “iPhone Typos? It's Not Just You – The iOS Keyboard Is Broken [video]”

5. has dictionaries for languages that the native keyboard doesn't have

   Mixed · Jun 2026 · in “FUTO Swipe – A new swipe typing model”

6. SwiftKey lets you swipe left to delete a word, which is very useful

   Recommends · Jun 2026 · in “FUTO Swipe – A new swipe typing model”

7. how good (at least SwiftKey's) autocomplete and swipe typing is

   Recommends · Feb 2026 · in “Apple, fix my keyboard before the timer ends or I'm leaving iPhone”

8. SwiftKey's suggestions are still a lot better in my opinion.

   Recommends · Jun 2026 · in “FUTO Swipe – A new swipe typing model”

9. If you are multilingual, you can also try SwiftKey

   Recommends · Dec 2025 · in “iPhone Typos? It's Not Just You – The iOS Keyboard Is Broken [video]”

10. It's sooooo much better than the stock keyboard.

    Recommends · Feb 2026 · in “Apple, fix my keyboard before the timer ends or I'm leaving iPhone”

11. In SwiftKey you can mix languages.

    Recommends · Jun 2026 · in “FUTO Swipe – A new swipe typing model”

12. they introduced a requirement to be logged in "for data backup", you get a banner on top of the keyboard that cannot be permanently turned off

    Criticizes · Jun 2026 · in “Windows 11 users are tired of MS account requirements creeping into everything”

13. it will often autocorrect my correctly spelled, correctly used, words, to words that probably don't exist in any language

    Criticizes · Apr 2026 · in “NSA is using Anthropic's Mythos despite blacklist”

14. Swiftkey likes to open a full soft keyboard interface for no reason no matter how many ways I try to disable it.

    Criticizes · Jan 2026 · in “Clicks Communicator”

15. a mash of all four, which makes the default swiped word and the suggestions exactly useless

    Criticizes · Feb 2026 · in “Apple, fix my keyboard before the timer ends or I'm leaving iPhone”

16. it reads like MS is interested in consolidating all digital accounts data to onedrive

    Criticizes · Mar 2026 · in “Swiftkey will soon require a Microsoft account – data to be moved to OneDrive”

17. sabotages the use of a competing search engine (DuckDuckGo) in Firefox in Android

    Criticizes · May 2026 · in “VS Code inserting 'Co-Authored-by Copilot' into commits regardless of usage”

18. I wasn getting a constant panel from them regarding using the backup feature

    Criticizes · Jun 2026 · in “FUTO Swipe – A new swipe typing model”

19. instead adds two words: the one you erased and the second attempt after it

    Criticizes · Dec 2025 · in “iPhone Typos? It's Not Just You – The iOS Keyboard Is Broken [video]”

20. Microsoft has started embedding ads and dark pattern redirects to Bing

    Criticizes · Jun 2026 · in “FUTO Swipe – A new swipe typing model”

21. SwiftKey got annoying with pushing Ai image Gen and sometimes pop-ups.

    Criticizes · Jun 2026 · in “FUTO Swipe – A new swipe typing model”

22. It's crazy that SwiftKey was terrible too, even though it's the one I use exclusively on Android.

    Mixed · Sep 2026 · in “iOS 27, iPadOS 27, and macOS 27”

23. the Dvorak layout in SwiftKey has the delete key on the left, which is super convenient

    Recommends · Jul 2026 · in “A bug which affected only left handed users”

24. have had very few issues compared to Android where it regularly crashed

    Recommends · Jan 2026 · in “Google confirms 'high-friction' sideloading flow is coming to Android”

25. swiftkey just gives me a few conveniences like emoji suggestions

    Recommends · Nov 2025 · in “Ask HN: Why has typing on a phone not improved in ~20 years?”

26. I just made a quick guide to migrate from Swiftkey to Heliboard

    Mixed · Mar 2026 · in “Swiftkey will soon require a Microsoft account – data to be moved to OneDrive”

27. I use the Microsoft SwiftKey on iOS and I am a fan!

    Recommends · Feb 2026 · in “Apple, fix my keyboard before the timer ends or I'm leaving iPhone”

28. SwiftKey cant do it either.

    Mixed · Jun 2026 · in “FUTO Swipe – A new swipe typing model”

29. Of course, it seems like Microsoft at one point bought it, so I don't even have to try it again to understand the current state of it.

    Criticizes · Dec 2025 · in “iPhone Typos? It's Not Just You – The iOS Keyboard Is Broken [video]”

30. When typing a multi-word quoted search phrase, it doesn't allow it to be typed correctly.

    Criticizes · May 2026 · in “Meta's Pyrefly sabotages competing Python extensions without telling you”

31. Try finding the backtick on a mobile phone keyboard in less than a minute, tho.

    Criticizes · Apr 2026 · in “Why the heck are we still using Markdown?”

32. I have no idea why SwiftKey isn’t absolutely amazing, but it isn’t.

    Criticizes · Sep 2026 · in “iOS 27, iPadOS 27, and macOS 27”

33. app got so bad and laggy and irresponsible that I had to remove it

    Criticizes · Dec 2025 · in “iPhone Typos? It's Not Just You – The iOS Keyboard Is Broken [video]”

34. I jumped from SwiftKey the moment I heard Microsoft bought it

    Criticizes · Jun 2026 · in “FUTO Swipe – A new swipe typing model”

35. SwiftKey itself became mostly a vector for ads for Microsoft

    Criticizes · Dec 2025 · in “iPhone Typos? It's Not Just You – The iOS Keyboard Is Broken [video]”

36. It just seems like Microsoft never got it to feature parity.

    Criticizes · Feb 2026 · in “Apple, fix my keyboard before the timer ends or I'm leaving iPhone”

37. I can't even search stuff in my local delivery with SwiftKey

    Criticizes · Feb 2026 · in “Apple, fix my keyboard before the timer ends or I'm leaving iPhone”

38. after their acquisition by Microsoft they've gone downhill

    Criticizes · Jun 2026 · in “FUTO Swipe – A new swipe typing model”

39. where it moves the keys and makes the thing inconsistent

    Criticizes · Feb 2026 · in “Apple, fix my keyboard before the timer ends or I'm leaving iPhone”

40. they pale in comparison to their Android counterparts

    Criticizes · Feb 2026 · in “Apple, fix my keyboard before the timer ends or I'm leaving iPhone”