Swype

Swype Review

by on July 3, 2010

Swype is the worst hidden secret of the app world. While still in closed beta – which has opened up from time to time – it has been available for Android since April 2010, and may well be the best way to ‘type’ on an Android phone.

The inverted commas around ‘type’ are there for a reason. Essentially, to type out words you glide your finger from one letter to the next, joining up words like you would dots.

It sounds like a rather clumsy way to type out a missive to a loved one, but it works – this is because it is so accurate. As long as you get pretty much near where the letter is you want, Swype seems to intuitively know what you are going to write. It’s as if Derren Brown is writing your texts a second or two before you do.

Swype is definitely what a touchscreen handset was built for. It feels better than getting haptic feedback every time you type and you can also make awesome patterns with the squiggle that the app leaves behind.

It’s not all good news though. To install on our Legend was a bit of a mare. If you don’t follow a step-by-step guide, you will get lost in the myriad menus that you have tick to get Swype to work. Hopefully this will be ironed out once the app goes legit.

For the moment, try and get yourself on to the beta, because once you do you will never want to type-tap again.

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