Why has typing on a phone not improved in ~20 years?

Question

Typing on an iPhone today is just as error-prone as it was when the phone launched in 2007.Next token predictors have largely solved this for day-to-day use.Swipe + a more modern prediction model would mean we'd be able to type one-handed without looking at the screen at all, and have perfect accuracy.We have the tech today. For whatever reason, nobody is using it. Why?

k310 · Accepted Answer

Do you want neuralink? I really don't like the invasive aspect of it.
I turned off all assists to typing on this iPhone. They kept giving me maddening substitites for my words.
Going to fire up the computer now. The one with the giant lighted keyboard. And the FORWARD DELETE KEY, the single greatest efficiency booster since the invention of the "vi" editor. The "dot" command alone has saved years of work (slight hyperbole there)
And no AI. EVER. I speak for myself. Otherwise no point in living.
Note to Apple: why can't I get a lighted keyboard from you for any amount of money, unless I buy a laptop, where it drains battery, rather than the power grid?

JohnFen · Answer

I just want physical keyboards back.

PaulHoule · Answer

There is dictation.

runjake · Answer

iOS already has swipe entry by default. I use it for most of my text entry. It is wonderful.
For me, typing on an iPhone worked well until iOS 26. Now I get jumbled AutoCorrect which acts like it's LLM-driven.
When I turn off Apple Intelligence on iOS 26, I get the old, properly-functioning AutoCorrect back. So that's a potential workaround.