How to use Apple’s QuickPath on iPhones, iPads (and iPod touch

by Jonny Evans · August 26, 2019

Apple’s QuickPath Swipe keyboard debuts with iOS 13 and iPadOS.

It lets you type by swiping between characters, rather than using traditional typing gestures. This should make typing more fluid, more accurate, and may help reduce RSI-like symptoms.

What is the QuickPath Swipe keyboard?

Some platforms have enjoyed gesture-based typing for some time. Apple’s implementation of this is slightly more elegant, very accurate, and relies only on machine intelligence hosted on the device – no one else can access the words you type.

The idea is that rather than raising and lowering your fingers onto specific characters as you type, you just need to swipe your finger between the letters you want to use. Apple’s AI will figure out the word you want to use.

This should make typing faster, help prevent the fat finger-inspired poor word “choices”, and reduce incidents of repetitive strain injury (RSI), by making gestures more fluid and less repetitive. Maybe.

How to I enable QuickPath on iOS/iPad?

QuickPath is enabled by default. If it isn’t, or you need to reenable it having switched it off, follow these steps:

Open Settings>General>Keyboard.
Enable Slide to Type. It’s a checkbox you should switch to On (Green).
Any app that supports the iOS keyboard should support QuickPath.

That’s it!

How do I use QuickPath on iOS?

Or iPod touch. Perhaps you want to write the word ‘vacation’. Usually you’ll manually type each letter of the word, raising and lowering your fingers as you do.

With QuickPath, you’ll just tap and hold on the letter v, and then swipe between the other letters.
Once you’ve swiped on each letter, you’ll see that the word is written.
You then raise your finger from the keyboard.
(You may see the word appear in QuickType before you finish.)
You don’t need to be terribly precise as the operating system will work to predict what you are writing.
The AI will also learn your movements and become more accurate as you make use of QuickPath over time.

The overall impact is that the number of gestures and movements required to type whatever it is you wish to type should be reduced. You just need to raise your finger from the keyboard in between words.

How do I use the QuickPath Keyboard on iPad OS?

Things work a little differently on iPads. With these you must enable the following settings:

General>Keyboard> and set Slide on Floating Keyboard to Type to On (green).

The full-sized keyboard on iPad isn’t really good for QuickPath – you need to move your finger too far to make each word. That’s why in order to use QuickPath on iPad you must remember to pinch the full iPad keyboard together in order to enable the iPhone-sized one-handed keyboard. This is useful as you can move that tiny keyboard to the most convenient part of the display, maximizing usable screen space while still being able to type with as little physical repetition as possible.