I Switched from Gboard to FlickReply for Two Weeks. Here’s What Happened.

I’ve been using Gboard since 2016.

For years, I never really questioned it. It came with my Android phone, it worked well, and I knew exactly where everything was. Typing, emojis, voice input, swipe typing — it was all just part of using my phone.

So when I started working on FlickReply, I had a slightly embarrassing problem.

How could I tell people that an AI keyboard was worth trying when I wasn’t actually using it myself?

That’s when I decided to make FlickReply my only keyboard for two full weeks.

No switching back to Gboard when I got annoyed. No “I’ll just use Gboard for this one message.” I wanted to see what would actually happen when FlickReply became part of my everyday typing.

And honestly, the experience surprised me.

The first few days were not great

I’m not going to pretend the switch was completely smooth.

The first day was annoying.

I had years of muscle memory built around Gboard, so I kept reaching for buttons that weren’t where I expected them to be. A couple of times I accidentally opened FlickReply’s AI features when I was simply trying to do something else.

At one point, I even sent an AI-generated suggestion to a friend by mistake.

Not exactly the smoothest introduction.

But that part didn’t last long.

By around day three, I was getting used to the layout. By day five, I wasn’t thinking about it much anymore.

And by the end of the first week, something interesting happened.

I stopped noticing the keyboard.

That might sound like a boring compliment, but I actually think it’s one of the best things you can say about a keyboard. When you’re typing, you don’t want to think about the keyboard. You just want to get your message out.

Where Gboard still has the advantage

Let’s be fair.

Gboard is a very good keyboard, and switching to FlickReply doesn’t suddenly make all of Gboard’s features bad.

There are still a few areas where I prefer Gboard.

Swipe typing

Gboard’s swipe typing is excellent.

I’ve used it for years, so my fingers almost know where to go automatically. I can fly through longer words without thinking too much about individual letters.

FlickReply’s swipe typing is good too, but Gboard still feels a little more predictable to me when I’m typing quickly.

It’s not a deal-breaker, but if swipe typing is the main reason you love your keyboard, Gboard still has an advantage.

Emoji search

This is another small thing that I noticed.

Gboard has an enormous emoji database, and its search is really good. You can type something like “shrug” and quickly find the emoji or reaction you’re looking for.

FlickReply has emoji search as well, but there were a few occasions where I searched for something and couldn’t find it as quickly as I expected.

It’s a small feature, but these little things matter when you use a keyboard dozens of times a day.

Voice typing

Gboard also has a strong advantage when it comes to voice typing.

Google has spent years improving speech recognition, and it shows.

FlickReply uses the standard Android voice input experience, which works perfectly well for everyday use, but Gboard still felt more polished to me when I was dictating longer messages.

Then I discovered why I actually preferred FlickReply

The biggest difference wasn’t typing.

It was writing.

Most keyboards help you type what you already know you want to say.

FlickReply can help when you’re not quite sure how you want to say it.

That distinction became obvious after a few days.

For example, imagine getting a message from a friend:

“Are we still on for Saturday? I might be late because traffic is crazy. Also, should we invite Sarah?”

A basic smart-reply system might give you options like:

Yes.

No.

Maybe.

That’s useful if all you need is a one-word answer.

But sometimes I don’t want to send “Yes.”

I want to say something like:

“Yeah, Saturday works. Just let me know if you’re running late. And yeah, Sarah should come too.”

That’s where FlickReply started feeling different.

Instead of just predicting a short response, the AI could help me create an actual reply that sounded like something I would send.

And that saved me more time than I expected.

The polish feature became my favourite

This was probably the biggest surprise of the entire two weeks.

Before using FlickReply, I didn’t think I needed an AI writing assistant inside my keyboard.

I was wrong.

I type quickly, especially when I’m busy, which means my messages sometimes look like this:

“hey sorry i didnt get bak to u yesterday was swamped”

I know what I mean.

But if I’m sending that to a client, it could definitely look better.

With FlickReply, I can polish the message and get cleaner versions without leaving the conversation, opening another app, copying the text, finding an AI tool, and then copying the result back.

That sounds like a small improvement.

After doing it repeatedly, it isn’t.

It removes a surprisingly annoying amount of friction.

I started using the polish feature for work messages, emails, quick replies, and even messages where I simply knew what I wanted to say but couldn’t find the right wording.

Privacy made me think differently about keyboards

This was another thing I didn’t think about much before.

Your keyboard sits in the middle of almost everything you type on your phone.

Messages. Searches. Emails. Notes. Work conversations.

That makes keyboard privacy worth thinking about.

With FlickReply, the idea is simple: normal typing stays on the device, while AI features are used when you intentionally ask FlickReply to help with something.

There’s also a privacy mode for situations where you don’t want AI features involved.

That separation matters to me.

I don’t think everyone needs to obsess over keyboard privacy, but I do think it’s worth knowing what happens to your data when you use any keyboard.

After two weeks, which one did I keep?

Honestly?

I expected to switch back.

My original plan was simple: use FlickReply for two weeks, write this review, and go back to Gboard.

Instead, I kept FlickReply as my default keyboard.

I still have Gboard installed. I’m not pretending it suddenly became useless.

There are things I still prefer about it, especially voice typing and some of the smaller everyday features.

But I found myself missing FlickReply whenever I switched away from it.

The AI replies became useful.

The polish tool became part of my daily routine.

And most importantly, I started spending less time thinking about how to phrase simple messages.

That’s the real benefit for me.

It isn’t about replacing every feature Gboard has.

It’s about making the moments where you’re stuck on what to write a little easier.

So, should you switch from Gboard?

If you’re perfectly happy with Gboard and you rarely struggle with writing messages, I honestly don’t think you need to switch.

Gboard is still an excellent Android keyboard.

But if you regularly find yourself staring at a message thinking, “How do I word this?”, FlickReply is worth trying.

It can help you reply, rewrite, polish, and clean up your messages without making you leave the app you’re already using.

And because you can try it without committing to a completely different way of using your phone, there isn’t much to lose.

I started this experiment expecting to go back to Gboard.

Two weeks later, FlickReply is still my default.

That probably tells you everything you need to know.

Try FlickReply and see if it fits the way you type.