TextExpander + Keyboard
Subscription-only, but is it worth it?
From $40 per year Developer SmileOnMyMac, textexpander.com Platform Universal Requirements iOS 9 or later
When an update to an app is released, people usually focus on what’s new. With TextExpander 4 (named TextExpander + Keyboard on the App Store), the focus has been on what’s missing. SmileOnMyMac now has its own cloud-based syncing platform for TextExpander, which replaces the use of Dropbox and iCloud, and enables group sharing of snippets.
The subscription model introduced for version 4 costs about $40 a year, compared to the $4.99 that TextExpander 3 cost outright. After an outcry, upgrade pricing of $20 is available for existing customers, and version 3 has returned for people who want to stick with other cloud services for syncing or don’t want subscription software.
TextExpander remains a wonderful app. It installs as a third-party keyboard in iOS and offers improved autocorrection and all kinds of snippets, from frequently used text, dates, emoji and phrases, to formatted text and code blocks. Many big-name apps support it directly, and the TextExpander keyboard covers the apps it doesn’t integrate with. But you can say the same about the old version, too…
Developers have to pay the bills, of course, but our job is to discover whether a new app is better than an old one. For individual TextExpander users, rather than businesses who’ll like group syncing, we suspect the answer to that is currently no.
the bottom line. A superb timesaver for anyone, but all that’s new in this version is group sharing and subscription pricing, which doesn’t feel like enough. It’s a powerful text tool, for sure, but the pricing is an issue. GARY MARSHALL