The keyboard app that comes with Android 4.2 includes strong text prediction, gesture-based typing, and voice typing support. Now Google’s making it easy to install the same keyboard on any device running Android 4.0 or later.

You can download the official Google Keyboard app from the Play Store.

Google Keyboard

Offering the keyboard app through the Play Store also gives Google a way to update the keyboard without updating the entire operating system. So we could start to see improvements, bug fixes, and other changes more frequently.

Google has been taking a similar approach with some of its other core Android apps recently. Since the official Gmail, Google Calendar, Hangouts, and other apps are all available from the Play Store, Google can push out new features for individual apps without waiting until the next major operating system update is due out — and that means users won’t have to worry about their device makers or wireless carriers dragging their feet on updates. As soon as a new Calendar or Keyboard update is available, you’ll get it from the Play Store.

Up until now if you’ve wanted to use the Android 4.2 keyboard on a device running an older version of Google’s operating system (or one where the device maker replaced it with a custom keyboard), you’ve had to download an unofficial app from elsewhere on the internet.

Google Keyboard for Android includes dictionaries for 26 languages, and supports both phones and tablets.

via Droid Life

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10 replies on “Google’s Android 4.2 keyboard now available from the Play Store”

  2. Gingerbread is still the most widespread Android version, but… Even the simplest I have ever seen notebook app Google Keep is for Android 4.0+

    1. I hear that. My Droid 3 runs Gingerbread, and I’ve had to take a pass on a lot of good apps lately: Google Keep, Google Calendar, Vine, and this keyboard, to name several.

    1. Should work. I have it installed now on both a 4.0 and a 4.1 device.

  4. So far it seems like a viable replacement for Swype.
    It’s much more accurate than Swype on my Droid Bionic.

  5. Ok, this is weird. I have two devices registered on play. And one of them says it can’t get the keyboard installed because of a country block?

    1. have you tried market enabler or using a VPN client to get around that yet?

      1. The issue seems to have sorted itself. It just seemed weird as they are both in the same geographical location (my home office).

        1. ok, just a fluke then. i don’t know how involved you are with custom roms, but sometimes frankensteined roms with root methods involving foreign market models boot partitions and some such can lead to weird behavior on country locked apps, even if multiple devices try to download them from the same location/ip sometimes.

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