Apple's support for third-party keyboards in iOS8 has opened up the much awaited opportunity for suppliers to bring Android keyboards to iOS.
One of many big announcements made at the Apple Worldwide Developer Conference 2014, Monday, was the launch of iOS8. The new mobile computing platform for iPhones and iPads opened doors for third-party keyboards, giving a new opportunity to companies to bring their Android keyboards to iOS for the first time ever. As soon as the announcement was made for third-party keyboard support, big players such as SwiftKey, Flesky and Swype confirmed their iPhone debut soon.
SwiftKey confirmed that the company had already started building a SwiftKey for iOS keyboard. The new keyboard will be an addition to Apple's own advanced keyboard called QuickType. Both keyboards predict what the user is going to type next and suggest words accordingly. Android users have already been able to use SwiftKey on their handsets, but with iOS, the company will potentially add a larger group of users.
"For more than four years, SwiftKey and our millions of users have pioneered faster, easier typing on touchscreens, leading the industry with next-word prediction and smarter autocorrection," the company's co-founders Ben Medlock and Jon Reynolds said in an official blog post, Monday. "Our technology features on more than 200 million devices to date and we can't wait to reach more."
"Are we going to build SwiftKey Keyboard for iOS 8? Of course we are. We've already started," they added.
Apple showed the popular Android-only keyboard Swype at the WWDC conference. As the name suggests, users can type on the alternate Android keyboard by sliding across the letters. The keyboard also does a prediction, which is helpful when a user mistakenly swipes on a wrong alphabet while forming a word.
On the other hand, the Flesky is generating interest with its new keyboard for the iOS8 platform. However, the keyboard app is already available on iTunes with compatibility only with 50 apps at the moment. With Apple's support for third-party keyboards, users will eventually be able to use it across board. It is not clear if the keyboard maker will release a new app, but it is likely to roll out an update to existing users for iOS8 optimization.
The availability of SwiftKey for iOS was not revealed in the blog post. It is safe to assume that the keyboard will be made available at the same time, if not earlier than the iOS8 release, which is expected in September alongside a new iPhone, Tech Radar reports.
