I am sure many of you set your own image as your phone wallpaper. Have you ever thought about leaving it as your keyboard background? Perhaps, my dear friend. In fact, you can use any photo to set it as your keyboard background.
This is a fantastic way to personalize your phone and surprise everyone around you. This feature is usually present in the Themes section, but is not entirely obvious. But don't worry, here we will tell you how to do it in popular Android keyboard apps like Gboard, SwiftKey, Fleksy and Samsung Keyboard.
Let's dive in.
Why change the color on your phone?
In addition to your own preferences for the design of the gadget, energy saving can be another significant reason. Devices with AMOLED and SuperAMOLED matrices provide low battery consumption when there are many black elements on the screen.
Otherwise, there is no need to follow the steps of the instructions described in this article - you can do it as simply as you wish if you want to make the keyboard brighter or maintain a unified style.
Gboard
Gboard has many cool features and adding a background image is one of them. You can also change its appearance using different themes.
Here's how to add an image to Gboard.
Step 1: Open Gboard and tap the G icon to open options. Then click Settings.
Step 2 : Go to the topic. On the Themes screen, tap the theme with the Add icon under My Themes. This is usually the first topic.
Step 3 : You will be asked to select a background image. Navigate to the image you want to save. Then adjust the width, height and brightness of the image. Then click the "Done" button.
Step 4: Disable key borders if you don't like them. Finally, click Apply.
Step 5: Go back to your keyboard and you will find a new background waiting for you.
If you want to edit an existing background, go to Gboard Settings > Themes. Here you will find all the custom themes from the first section. Click on the one you want to edit again.
How to change the keyboard color on Android
There are a lot of text input programs available on Android, so the following are items that are relevant for popular software.
Samsung keyboard
This software is built into modern Samsung brand devices produced as part of the Galaxy line. The application cannot be downloaded to devices from other manufacturers. However, owners of smartphones from this South Korean brand should do the following to manage color design:
All AMOLED users are advised to enable the Dark Solid theme to ensure low power consumption of the display when writing text. This feature goes well with the dark theme on the device, which can also be enabled through the control panel.
As you can see from the screenshots, the number of styles is small. Perhaps by the time you read this text, the set of possible designs has changed. If you want more freedom in terms of choosing styles, it is recommended to pay attention to the availability of downloading other keyboards. For example, there is nothing stopping you from downloading GBoard, discussed below. Although if you are the owner of a Samsung smartphone, then you already know how to change the color of the keyboard on Android, and all the methods below simply change the text input program itself.
GBoard
The keyboard is present in all Android devices whose creators did not bother to add third-party software for writing texts. The program can also be downloaded to any Android phone.
Follow these steps:
A reboot is not required to apply the settings.
SwiftKey
The application was released by Microsoft and is provided as standard in smartphones with EMUI firmware. These are devices from the Huawei and Honor brands. SwiftKey is also available, but disabled by default in Samsung devices. Such a popular application, available for download on Google Play for everyone, also supports design management. To change the keyboard color, follow this procedure:
After authorization, the theme is activated instantly. You can return the design or add a new style through the same menu.
Yandex.Keyboard
As the name of the application suggests, this software was developed by the Russian company Yandex. It supports a huge number of languages and is updated regularly. To change the color you will need to do these steps:
After tapping on the design preview, the style will be immediately installed and applied.
Prestigio Keys
This app is the best option for older devices. Gadgets with Android 4.0 and newer versions are supported. There is nothing stopping you from downloading Prestigio Keys on a new smartphone: for example, on the Galaxy S21 Ultra this program works flawlessly.
To change the theme:
Since the design options are already built into the application, you can choose different themes without an Internet connection.
Flexy
One of the best keyboard designs in terms of typography and compatible with a large number of themes. The advantage of Flexi is the increased convenience of writing with swipes, which, despite its presence in GBoard, does not work well enough in the Google keyboard. You can verify this yourself by downloading Fleksy from the Play Store.
After installation, a software icon will appear in the application menu. It opens the virtual keyboard settings menu. To manage appearance:
The settings will be applied instantly. If you have chosen a paid theme, it is activated immediately after payment via Google Pay, which is compatible with bank cards, PayPal and SMS payments from some operators. We also recommend reading the article about what to do if the keyboard on Android disappears.
Smart Keyboard
Another application from developers other than large companies. The application supports the installation of a large number of themes and is also distributed free of charge.
To change the design, do the following:
As you can see, there is a rather unusual set of styles presented here: all of them are made in the style of keyboards on popular devices. If this doesn’t seem enough, you should tap “Get more design options...” to see a variety of themes, including minimalist and more modern ones. The theme of the program on w3bsit3-dns.com also presents a large set of styles under the spoiler.
Please note: older versions of Smart Keyboard constantly crash on Android 11. Always use stable releases of the application. Version 4.24.0, released in September 2022, can be called working perfectly.
Go Keyboard
One of the very first keyboards on Android, whose first versions were available on Android 1.6 and higher (modern ones require at least 4.1), is still receiving updates.
Instructions for Go Keyboard are presented below:
You can also open the software settings through the phone’s control panel by repeating steps No. 1 and No. 2 of most of the instructions in this article - by going to the gadget settings menu and to the “General settings” section.
SwiftKey
To put a background image in SwiftKey, follow these steps:
Step 1 : Launch SwiftKey in any app and tap on the small plus icon in the top left corner of your keyboard.
Step 2: Then tap on the settings icon and tap on the other settings icon in the top right corner. You will be taken to SwiftKey settings.
Step 3: In Settings, click on Themes. Then go to the "Custom" tab and click "Start".
Step 4 : Click the "Add Image" button and navigate to the image you want to use.
Step 5: Adjust the width by dragging the red borders and also adjust the background brightness if you want. Hit Done.
Step 6: You will see a preview of the keyboard. You can now hide borders and enable symbols. Finally, click Done in the top right corner.
Your SwiftKey with your own image is now ready to use. If you want to edit it, go to the Custom tab in SwiftKey Themes and edit it.
Problems and solutions
The keyboard has not changed
Most likely, you just downloaded the application, but did not make it available by default. Take a look at the instructions above for the steps to install a keyboard on Android. Some applications add their own icons to the software menu, after clicking on which you can also configure the program, following the steps described by the developers.
Keyboard won't install
Your device is probably not among the models supported by the application. This happens - for example, as already mentioned, the Samsung Keyboard program is only suitable for devices of this brand. A similar situation exists with some other gadget manufacturers.
The reason may also be due to incompatibility between Android versions. If you are using an old phone, we recommend paying attention to Prestigio Keys and early versions of Go Keyboard, which have already deserved attention in this article.
There is nothing complicated in managing a theme, as this article confirms. It is also easy to change the keyboard program on your smartphone - this point is also described in the text.
If you are tired of the standard design of the Android keyboard, then you can modify it.
At the moment, all popular keyboards on Android allow you to set any picture or photo as a background image.
Let's look at how to do this on Swiftkey and Gboard keyboards.
This photo of a rowan tree will be used as an example:
1. Swiftkey keyboard
1) On the keyboard toolbar, click on the 3 dots (“…”), and then select “Themes”.
2) It will be necessary to develop a new topic.
To do this, go to the “Custom” tab and click on the “Start” button.
3) Next are the settings.
- The image itself;
- Button borders (display or not);
- Symbols and numbers (to be placed on keys or not).
4) Let’s take a closer look at image settings.
To add a photo, click on the “Add image” button, after which you will need to select it from your phone memory or from your Google Photos account.
Then the background darkening is adjusted.
The higher the percentage, the darker the photo will be.
The area of the image that will appear on the keyboard will be highlighted in a blue frame. It can be moved.
After setting the settings, click on the “Done” button.
5) The keyboard will be rebuilt on the fly, that is, before saving the changes, you can see what it will turn out like in the end.
If you are satisfied with everything, then click on the “Save” button.
6) As a result, a new keyboard theme will be created with your picture/photo.
It will automatically be selected as the current one.
You can create as many of your own keyboard themes as you like.
2. GBoard Keyboard
1) First you need to go to settings, to do this, click on the gear icon.
2) In settings, select “Theme”.
3) Next, you can choose one of the standard themes, or you can create your own.
To do this, in the “My Themes” section you need to click on the plus icon (it is located 1st in a row).
4) Then you need to select the image that you want to put on the keyboard.
5) By analogy with SwiftKey, the scaling and brightness are adjusted (after completion, you need to click on the “Save” button).
6) You can also configure the presence of key outlines.
To complete creating the theme, click on the “Apply” button.
7) The topic will be saved and become the current one (checked).
Intuitive tutorial to change keyboard background
Is there a way to use your photos or images as your keyboard background?
The answer is simple yes, but the procedures vary depending on the device you are using.
This comprehensive guide will show you how easy it is to change the keyboard background on iPhone and Android phone.
Change keyboard background
Flexible
Unlike Gboard and SwiftKey, which offer free themes, some themes on Fleksy require you to pay for. But if free themes don't really appeal to you, you can create your own theme to your liking in the settings.
Here's how to add an image to Fleksy Keyboard.
Step 1: Launch Fleksy in any application and click on the smiley icon at the bottom. Then select Settings from it.
Note: Alternatively, you can click on the Fleksy icon in the application drawer.
Step 2: In Themes, click on the Add icon in the My Themes section.
Step 3: Click on Select Gift next to Background Image and select your desired image.
Step 4: Adjust the height and width and click Done.
Step 5: You will be taken to the theme builder screen again. Swipe left to see other keyboard options such as key color, suggested word colors, etc. Customize them as you wish.
ai.type
Quite a popular keyboard with a huge number of functions. It suggests suitable words as you type, corrects errors and typos, and allows you to add emoticons and pictures.
A particularly interesting feature is automatically inserted correspondence templates that are collected from user messages. Sometimes you come across funny gems.
In ai.type you can create layouts, there is a built-in theme store and a lot more. It’s not easy to figure this out right away, and lovers of minimalism will be horrified by the keyboard.
In addition, the free version is overloaded with advertisements. But still ai.type is worth a try.
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