We’re just days from “celebrating” the World Emoji Day (yes, there’s such a thing). One thing it proved, according to the metrics being bandied around on that day by various parties, is that emojis are very popular. There are reportedly 6 billion emoji shared daily. An emoji was even selected by the Oxford University as the English word of the year 2015.
Hands up if you usually have to tap the emoji button on whatever keyboard you use on your smartphone then flip through tens of emojis before landing on the one you intended to use in whatever it is you were typing.
It is safe to assume that we’ve all been there at one time or another. For most of us, since emoji use is at unprecedented levels at the moment, that’s about every other damn time. It’s tiring and, honestly, not worth it. For the devices we use that call themselves smartphones, there should be a really smart way of doing that, right?
For a while, the main SwiftKey keyboard app has provided an option to also predict emoji which, when turned on in the settings part of the app, does just that. But its functionality is rather limited. Which is why its makers went ahead to unveil a new app several hours ago that has been in testing for the last few months: Swiftmoji.
Available on both Android and iOS, Swiftmoji is an app that acts as an add-on on the latter and a full-fledged keyboard replacement on the former.
For longtime SwiftKey keyboard users, Swiftmoji’s functionality is pretty much similar. The app predicts both text and emoji and allows users to add a number row on top, just below the emoji prediction row, the ability to learn from your social accounts, email and Evernote as well as an account to make sure all that it has learned about your typing habits does not get lost upon switching devices.
Swiftmoji goes on record as the first major product announcement from SwiftKey since it announced that it was being acquired by Microsoft five months ago.
For Android users, Swiftmoji appears to be restricted to certain regions at the moment so you may need to head first to places like APKMirror instead of our usual hangout zone, the Play Store.
