You might not ever hit the speed of a full-sized physical keyboard, but if you use these iPhone keyboard shortcuts, you'll definitely be tapping out essays a lot faster. Let's face it, while the iPhone's on-screen keyboard is one of the best, it still doesn't really beat a physical keyboard. And the biggest pain is getting at those punctuation marks and special letters. But these keyboard shortcuts will teach you how to get at them quick.
iPhone keyboard shortcuts
- At the end of a sentence? Tap the space key twice and you'll get a period, a space and the caps lock key turned on for your next key press. This is the most popular of the iPhone keyboard shortcuts.
- Get at a comma quickly! You can tap and hold the ?123 key and then slide your finger to the comma. When you release your finger, a comma appears and the on-screen keyboard automatically returns to letters. This works with any keys accessable through the ?123 screen.
- You can use the same tap and hold trick to capitalize letter. Just tap and hold the shift key then slide to the letter you want to capitalize.
- Need a letter with an accent mark? Just tap and hold any letter and any variations available will appear on the screen. Try it with the letter 'E' and see what happens.
- Need something besides ".com"? If you tap and hold the .com key, a list of alternatives like ".net" and ".org" will appear.
- How about email addresses? You can tap and hold the "." key to get a list of domain suffixes like ".com" and ".net".
- Don't stumble over contractions! If you type a contraction without the apostrophe, the iPhone will almost always auto-correct for you. (If you do run across one that isn't in the auto-correct dictionary, it should learn from you typing it in once.)
- Did you know there is a keyboard replacement in the app store? While you can't truly replace the keyboard, you can use it as an alternative and then copy-and-paste the text. The app is called ShapeWriter, and there is a free version, so you can try before you buy.
More iPhone tips and useful settings
Tips for using the iPhone Home Button
The iPhone Guide
iPhone apps:
14 must-have iPhone apps
15 great iPhone travel apps for under $5
The best iPhone music apps
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