SwiftKey gets its predictive keyboard onto iOS, with a little help from Evernote
The popular Android keyboard arrives on iPhone and iPad — Three and a half years after launching on Android, SwiftKey's popular predictive-software keyboard has finally come to iOS. iPhone and iPad users …
Context & Ripple Effects
SwiftKey spent three and a half years building its predictive engine on Android, where replacement keyboards are allowed; on Apple's locked-down platform it had no such lane, so it is shipping inside Evernote's app instead of as a standalone keyboard. The move lands weeks after rival Fleksy exited beta on Android and declared its intent to become an everywhere iOS keyboard, making early 2014 the moment predictive-typing startups began treating iOS as the next battleground.
For Evernote, the partnership arrives at a sensitive time: a widely read January 2014 critique by Jason Kincaid and long-time users complaining about bugs pushed CEO Phil Libin to publicly promise improved quality, stability, and simplicity this year. Bundling SwiftKey gives Evernote a visible product-quality win right as it tries to make that case.
First-order effects
- iPhone and iPad owners can now use SwiftKey's prediction engine inside Evernote's note-taking app, though not system-wide — Apple still reserves the default keyboard slot.
Second-order effects
- Fleksy's iOS ambitions now face the best-known Android keyboard brand competing for the same early-adopter audience, raising the bar for distribution deals like Evernote's.
- Evernote gains a differentiator against other note apps while demonstrating responsiveness to the quality criticism that surfaced earlier in January 2014.
Third-order effects
- If demand for third-party input keeps proving out on iOS through workarounds like this one, pressure builds on Apple to open keyboard APIs — the same shift Android already made when it moved to fully on-screen virtual buttons.
- Predictive typing is consolidating into a competitive software layer licensed across platforms rather than a fixed feature of each OS, with partnerships substituting for permissions where platforms stay closed.
The trend: Mobile input is becoming a contested software market of its own, with keyboard makers crossing platforms through whatever integration channels closed operating systems permit.