5 Best iOS 8 Keyboards

We’ll show you where to find the best iOS 8 keyboards and help you learn to type faster with iOS 8 on your iPhone and iPad.

The recent iOS 8 update unlocked the ability to use a new iPhone keyboard without the need to jailbreak your phone. Apple announced the feature this summer and developers spent the last several months working on a collection of paid and free iOS 8 keyboards that work on the iPhone and iPad.

All of these iOS 8 keyboards work on any device that runs iOS 8. This includes the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, iPhone 5s, iPhone 5c, iPhone 5 and iPhone 4s. These also work on the iPad 2 and newer and the iPod touch 5th generation.

There are a variety of iOS 8 keyboards available and even users who don’t like to spend money on apps can enjoy the new iPhone keyboards thanks to several great free iOS 8 keyboard options.

To use an iOS 8 keyboard you need to download the new keyboard from the App Store. This works just like downloading an app, but you need to turn on the keyboard. You can install multiple iOS 8 keyboards, and you can even remove the default iOS 8 keyboard so that it’s not one you need to select.

There are many iOS 8 keyboards available and we’ll walk through a range of them aimed at helping you type faster, add some fun to your messages and one that simply lets you customize the iPhone keyboard color.

When you install some iOS 8 keyboards you may need to give the keyboard full access, with a scary warning, but as long as you install a trusted keyboard you should be ok. Apple uses a special limited keyboard for entering a password. You can see this in action while using a third-party iOS 8 keyboard. When you click on a password field the keyboard switches out and then back when you leave it.

One downside to using a third-party iOS 8 keyboard is that you lose access to dictation because Apples doesn’t let users tap into that area, even with full access.

How to Add an iOS 8 Keyboard

The first thing you need to do is download a new iOS 8 keyboard. After you do this you can go to settings and make the change. Check out our favorite iOS 8 keyboards below and then come back to these directions to get started.

Download the iOS 8 Keyboard you want.

Go to Settings -> General -> Keyboard -> Keyboards -> Add New Keyboard -> tap on the name of the keyboard. That’s all to the basic installation.

For some keyboards you need to go into the options to Allow Full Access. To do this tap on the keyboard name and then toggle it on. This lets the keyboard send data to servers to unlock features. On SwiftKey for iOS 8 this how it manages predictions.

For some of the iOS 8 keyboards you will need to open the app to change settings. With the SwiftKey keyboard this is where it can learn from your Gmail, Twitter, Facebook and Evernote accounts to deliver better predictions based on the way you type. You can also back up to the cloud so that your settings and predictions can sync to the iPad and always be available if you buy a new iPhone or restore.

Best iOS 8 Keyboards

Here are the best iOS 8 keyboards we could find. We’ll start with our two favorite iPhone keyboards and expand into some fun and specific use cases. Most of the iOS 8 keyboards are free to 99 cents, but if you want the

SwiftKey iOS 8 Keyboard

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The SwiftKey iOS 8 keyboard offers better predictions than the stock iPhone keyboard thanks to connectivity to your other online accounts. This is one of the best smartphone keyboards in gneral and it's a great experience on the iPhone.  If you choose this iOS 8 keyboard you can pick from a light or dark theme and link to accounts using hte app. You can tap out your words and pick from the predictive text or use the Flow option to slide your finger across words like on the biggest competitor.  Works on iPhone and iPad. Free on iTunes

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