i still remember the feeling I had when I first tried the SwiftKey keyboard over 10 years ago. It was of course on an Android smartphone (I think I remember an HTC, but I’m not so sure) and I saw how to slide your finger across the screen without picking it up, on the keys that represented the letters you wanted to use, It meant that what I wanted was automatically typed… in short, it was an incredible feeling and one of the reasons why, as an iPhone user, I considered the option (which I ultimately ruled out) of switching to Android.

Over the years, more keyboards have appeared, both for Android and iOS, that use this typing system, but despite having more competition, both the prestige cultivated in its early days and its development, have made it continue to be the benchmark application in this regard. I don’t have the absolute data of the most used keyboards on Android and iOS, but I know that SwiftKey is in the leading positions on both platforms.

Well, it seems like yesterday, but It’s been eight years since SwiftKey made the much, much anticipated jump to iOS.. Needless to say, I didn’t get around to installing it on my iPhone at the time, and since then it’s been the keyboard I use the most (although not the only one, I also want to clarify). And when it was acquired by Microsoft two years later, many of us understood that it was another way for Microsoft to improve its presence on Android and iOS, which I think is a very smart move.

However, Microsoft hasn’t updated SwiftKey for iOS in a little over a year, despite doing so for Android, which has raised suspicions for some time that Microsoft might be thinking about getting your smartphone. non-iOS keyboards. And what had been theories and rumors until now was unfortunately confirmed. And it is as we can read in Softpedia, As of October 5th, support for SwiftKey iOS ends and will be removed from the Apple App Store.

Reasons? They certainly exist, but at least for now they haven’t happened and it is surprising that Microsoft is giving up the quota of iOS presence that SwiftKey has provided until now. Granted, of course, by its very nature, the keyboard can have full access to the data entered by the user (like any other keyboard, after all), so it begs the question whether the decision could be made with Apple’s security and privacy policies. However, the fact that other keyboards, such as Google’s Gboard, remain on iOS makes this possibility a little more distant.

Be that as it may, users who already have SwiftKey on iOS or download it before October 5th they can still use it after that date. However, we must not forget that we are talking about an application that has not been updated for more than a year, which does not sound very beneficial in terms of security. And it’s a shame, because it’s not only one of the most used keyboards, but also one of the highest rated in the App Store.