Using smart punctuation on Android keyboards just like iOS—is it possible?

Question

I’m struggling to find a keyboard app for Android that offers smart punctuation features similar to those available on iOS. Specifically, I’m looking for a keyboard that can automatically use curly quotes (‘’ “”) and other smart punctuation marks. I’ve tried several keyboard apps including Gboard, SwiftKey, and Fleksy, but I haven’t been able to find the exact feature I’m looking for.

Does anyone know of an Android keyboard that supports smart punctuation in the way iOS does? Alternatively, is there a way to enable this feature in any of the major keyboard apps through settings or additional tools?

Any suggestions or solutions would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

Answer 1

I found an app that does so! It’s called Text Expander and works alongside your keyboard rather than replaces it. You can set -- to automatically become —. For curly quotes, you can set " (a space followed by a quotation mark) to become “ (a space and an opening quote) and set " (a quotation mark followed by a space) to become ” (a closing quote followed by a space). This works because a space before a quotation mark indicates a new word is beginning, while a space after the quotation mark indicates the word is ending.

For apostrophes, I just have ' (a straight apostrophe) automatically convert to ’. This makes a straight apostrophe always become curly. The only problem is this prevents me from making ' automatically become an opening quote, ‘. In the rare event that I, an American, need to use the ‘ symbol (as opposed to the ’ symbol), I can just long press the ' button on the onscreen keyboard.

When using Text Expander to automatically have smart punctuation, be mindful of the following:

(1) Ensure Text Expander has accessibility permissions. I don’t think the current version automatically prompts you about this.

(2) For smart opening and closing quotes, ensure the input prompt and the corresponding output each have a space, and in the same place.