Setup guide
Make it your keyboard.
Get the essentials in place, then use Inkboard in your everyday writing. The more it learns your words, the more familiar it can feel.
First, let Android know.
These steps are for an installed copy of the Android app. Inkboard is not yet listed on Google Play; this website does not install the keyboard. The current Android build requires Android 8.0 or later.
Open Inkboard and tap Enable.
This opens Android’s keyboard settings. Turn on Inkboard and read the system’s keyboard-access notice before confirming. Then return to Inkboard.
Tap Choose and select Inkboard.
Enabling a keyboard makes it available; choosing it makes it the one Android uses. You can switch back to another enabled keyboard whenever you like.
Allow the microphone only if you want Speak.
Tap Allow in the setup checklist to grant microphone access for dictation. This step is optional: Type and Write work without it.
Choose your writing language.
In Inkboard settings, find Language → Writing language and choose the available option that matches your writing. It gives spelling and recognition the right starting point.
Android settings vary by device. Using Enable and Choose inside Inkboard is the simplest way to reach the right screens.
Try a few words.
Tap the Try handwriting field in Inkboard settings, or open a note and tap a text field. Inkboard opens with its letter keys. The controls on the action bar let you change how you enter text.
- Type
- Tap the keys, or glide across letters to form a word. Check the suggestion strip and choose another word if the first suggestion isn’t right. Hold a key for its alternative character.
- Write
- Tap Write, write a short line, then tap Read ink. Check the editable preview and tap Insert when it says what you mean. The first use needs an internet connection to download the handwriting language pack; recognition then runs on the device.
- Speak
- Tap Speak, say a short phrase and stop listening when you’re done. Check the transcript, make any corrections and tap Insert. Availability and offline use depend on your device’s speech service.
For a comfortable starting point, try Appearance → Theme → Light on an e-paper display. You can return to settings from the sliders control, or from More on narrow screens.
It gets to know your writing.
Inkboard starts with general language knowledge. As you type, it builds a personal picture of the words you use, the short sequences they appear in, and the corrections you make. Those signals help it rank future suggestions for you.
There’s no separate training session. Write normally, choose suggestions that are right and correct the ones that aren’t. Repeated choices carry more weight than a one-off occurrence.
- Days
Your first useful signals.
Regular typing starts giving Inkboard examples of your vocabulary. Familiar names, recurring terms and corrections begin building evidence. An unfamiliar word may need to appear several times before it is treated as learned.
- Weeks
More of your everyday language.
With repeated use, common word combinations and spelling preferences can have more influence on suggestions. Correcting a word consistently helps reinforce what you intended instead.
- Months
A more established personal vocabulary.
Continued use gives the keyboard more examples of your regular writing. Your well-used words and patterns can become better represented, while new vocabulary still needs evidence. Learning continues; it doesn’t switch off after a milestone.
These are expectations, not deadlines.Improvement depends on how much and what you write, and on the corrections you make—not simply how long the app has been installed. Suggestions won’t always be right, and progress isn’t a guaranteed day-by-day increase.
For example
“Dinner with Tayla”
If Inkboard offers “Taylor”, correct it to “Tayla”. Using the name again and repeating that correction gives it evidence to favour your spelling in future suggestions. One correction isn’t a promise that it will get every later suggestion right.
Inkboard learns cautiously: a new token is provisional until repeated, and correcting a word can reduce its standing. Some once-seen words fade out over time. This helps keep a stray typo from becoming lasting vocabulary.
This is on-device personal learning, not an AI chat model training on your messages. The personal dictionary is stored encrypted on your device. Optional AI-generated output is excluded from the normal personal-learning model.
Give important words a head start.
Open settings and find Personal dictionary. The learned-word and saved-phrase counts help you see that it is building up. The learned vocabulary is not presented as a browsable history of your writing.
- Add something deliberately. Enter a word, name or phrase in the dictionary’s entry field and tap Add. This is useful for something you need immediately instead of waiting for repeated use.
- Keep correcting naturally. Choose or type the word you meant. There’s no need to repeatedly type practice sentences just to train the keyboard.
- Reset only when you mean to. Clear everything Inkboard has learned removes learned words and saved phrases. It cannot be undone, and the keyboard starts learning again from scratch.
If suggestions suddenly seem less personal, check whether you cleared the dictionary, cleared the app’s data, reinstalled it or moved to a different device. Don’t reset your dictionary as a first troubleshooting step.
The extras can wait.
You do not need to configure AI writing tools to type, glide, recognise handwriting or build your personal dictionary. Start with the keyboard and add optional tools only if you want them.
AI writing assistance is a separate action that sends text to your chosen provider. Focused-field context sharing is a separate setting, off by default. Dictation is handled by the device’s configured speech service, which may use online processing.
Ready for everyday writing.
Open a message or a note and start with your own words. If something gets in the way, we’ve put the common fixes in one place.
Find a fix →