Daily Tip: How to create text shortcuts in iOS 5
Tired of typing out long words, names, and sentences and wondering how to create text shortcuts? Lucky you! One of the new features of iOS 5 is the ability to do just that. For example, instead of typing out "On my way!", you just type "omw" and the iPhone automatically changes the acronym to the full phrase. This phrase is actually the only shortcut that comes setup with iOS 5. To find out how to add your own, follow along!
- Launch Settings
- Tap General
- Tap Keyboard (towards the bottom)
- You will find a section called Shortcuts and a pre-created shortcut for omw.
- Tap Add New Shortcut...
- In the Phrase field, type in the entire phrase you'd like to create a shortcut for
- In the Shortcut field, type in the acronym you want to be replaced with the above phrase
- Tap Save
- To edit a shortcut, tap on it from the Keyboard menu.
- To delete a shortcut, tap Edit in the top right corner of the Keyboard menu
There you go! Now you're all set to create you own shortcuts! They work exactly like autocorrect, so there's nothing special you need to do to use them. Just type the shortcut and you'll see a bubble pop up with the replacement phrase. Pressing space with allow the replacement, and tapping the bubble will cancel the replacement.
Any other favorite texting tips? Let us know, and let us know what your favorite shortcuts are!
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App and Photography Editor at iMore. Mother, wife, and math instructor. Follow her on Twitter @llofte and send her apps to consider for review at iosapps@imore.com
There are 30 comments. Add yours.
Glad they finally added this. One of the things I missed when I made the jump from BB.
What is the globe icon in your keyboard?
International Keyboards. Go into Settings>General>Keyboards>International Keyboards
You can add different languages including Emoji icons.
The globe lets you access the emojis. ( or other language keyboards if you have them enabled). You have to have the emojis enabled in keyboards
Bloody brilliant. I have an obnoxiously long email address that I hate entering everytime I want to log into somewhere. Fixed!
What is the globe icon in your keyboard?
It's the ability to use your keyboard for foreign languages. Pretty cool if you're texting ESOL family relatives and/or iMessaging people in another country
Nice. I used to use this all the time on PalmOS. I hope they enhance it to allow for current time and date in different formats.
Tell us something we dont know
I didn't know it. When did they add this feature? Prior to iOS 5?
yes, i love this feature.
Has anyone figured out how to use carriage returns in the shortcuts? I'd like to have a shortcut for an email signature, but not all on one line.
OMW is not an acronym. MOW would be, and WOM would be. But not OMW.
Here's an acronym for you - GAL - Get A Life !
LOL and +1
I think you're confusing acronyms and anagrams.
I think you haven't read a dictionary in quite awhile.
One thing I've used it for is common typos that don't autocorrect. For instance, I have it switch "te" to "the"
I like the simple one of using "il" for "I'll". Saves a lot of steps.
Nice find! I had literally just found this un-advertised feature 10 mins ago by accident when I upgraded my iPad 2 to iOS 5 playing around in Settings. Sweet!
How do I go about having Siri do a bunch of these up? :-D
nice little feature
Thanks for the tip Leanna!
Thank you Leanna !!!
Any clue as to the max number of shortcuts allowed? I'm using this feature extensively but I've recently started feeling that some of my earlier shortcuts get deleted when I add a new one.
Is there a way to include "carriage" returns in a shortcut (so that you can have a shortcut that includes several separate lines instead of just one continuous string of words)? I want to use the shortcut feature to make different signatures for my work and personal email accounts (why the heck doesn't Apple already have this as a built-in feature!?!!), but I want my signature to have several lines (for phone, address, website, etc). The shortcut feature only allows one long line of text without any breaks. Is there any way around this?
what does +1 mean?
in the phrase?
+1 on carriage return
good website!! You could start many more. I love all the info provided. I will stay tuned.
+1 for carriage return does work for me. Everything is still on the same line. Can someone put a sample please? Try to setup a signature is that possible?
+1 is shorthand for "me too"
Back to the question.....how do you put in a hard return into the shortcut when composing a signature over multiple lines?
When the heck is Apple going to come out with an OS that allows a separate signatures for each email addresses? Surely they have figured out one signature does not fit all !!!