Panda Zhuyin
Bopomofo & Taiwanese Hokkien
Only for iPhone
Free · In-App Purchases · Designed for iPhone. Not verified for macOS.
Panda Zhuyin — steady bopomofo and Taiwanese typing.
A keyboard that packs 37 bopomofo symbols into a few large keys: tap for the center, flick four directions for the rest. Every key is "center + four directions" — wherever you tap or flick, you get one definite sound. Inspired by Japanese flick keyboards. Initials on the left, medials in the middle, finals on the right — following bopomofo's own structural grouping, so there is nothing new to memorize. Mandarin only uses 412 actual syllables, so impossible combinations are grayed out. Each key big enough you won't tap the wrong one.
New in 2.0: Taiwanese Hokkien keyboard
· Type Taiwanese with extended phonetic symbols: all 7 tones, entering tones, and nasalized finals
· Taiwanese lexicon cross-checked from four public dictionary sources
· Custom dictionary now supports a Taiwanese category with auto-inferred readings
· Romanization lookup panel: per-syllable cards mapping phonetic symbols to Tai-lo and POJ
· Select any text and replace it with its romanization
· Learn as you type: per-key labels show Hanyu Pinyin on Mandarin keys, Tai-lo or POJ on Taiwanese keys
New English and symbol keyboards
· Standard QWERTY layout; swipe down on a key to type uppercase; European accented letters included
· Halfwidth and fullwidth symbol layouts redesigned; punctuation commits directly
Make the keyboard yours
· Theme editor: colors, fonts, opacity, borders, and backgrounds (solid, gradient, or photo)
· Five built-in fonts with continuous weight adjustment
· Glass finish: translucent keys with a subtle edge highlight, tuned for light and dark
Features
· Open-source Homa composer for more accurate long-sentence conversion
· Custom dictionary + auto-learning (fact, not prediction)
· iCloud Sync (opt-in) mirrors to your own private iCloud space — never through any panda-zhuyin server
· Candidate tabs: frequency / single characters / symbols
· Emoji candidates and symbol dictionary
· Chinese numeral and date-time input
· Spacebar long-press cursor glide
· One-handed mode and landscape layout
· Full VoiceOver support across the keyboard
· Extended bopomofo (opt-in) for Old Mandarin
Privacy
· No outbound network calls — the keyboard is fully offline
· Your input never leaves your device
· Auto-learning data stays local
· "Allow Full Access" is used only for haptic feedback (an Apple platform requirement); no data is transmitted either way
About the subscription (Panda Supporter)
Core typing is free forever. Supporter is an auto-renewable subscription (NT$30/month or NT$290/year) that unlocks appearance extras: featured effect themes, font switching, glass-finish color sets, and background gradients. Cancel anytime in Manage Subscriptions.
Terms: https://erikyin.net/panda-zhuyin/terms.html
Privacy: https://erikyin.net/panda-zhuyin/privacy.html
Who this is not for (honestly)
· You type comfortably on the built-in bopomofo keyboard — it may already be enough
· You want cloud AI prediction — Gboard or SwiftKey fits better
· You don't type bopomofo or Taiwanese
Requires iOS 18 or later.
more Panda Zhuyin 2.5.1
Fixes
· Glide Input: long-pressing an initial, tone, or punctuation key no longer dims the rest of the keyboard without showing anything - the four-way selector is back. In learning mode the pinyin labels for the tone and punctuation keys live only in that selector, so they were missing too
· After selecting text, the pronunciation shown in the candidate bar now puts a space after any first-tone syllable, so you can see where one syllable ends and the next begins. Applies to both Mandarin and Taiwanese
· The pronunciation tab in Taibun lookup now follows your theme: typeface, weight, and text color match the other tabs in the same panel instead of being locked to the system font
· Annotation text in that tab now scales with your candidate font size, keeping the size hierarchy readable at every setting, with a legible floor at the smallest sizes
2.5.1 21 Aug
Panda Zhuyin 2.5.0
Typing initials only
· When you type just the initials, mid-sentence positions used to accept only a handful of characters, so the result often read oddly. Every character can take part now, and the natural phrasing comes first in the candidate bar
· Press a single key on its own and the first candidate follows everyday speech, not written-text frequency
· The neutral-tone key at the end of a sentence now leads with the particles that belong there, and characters after common connectives are picked for how they read together
· Names and terms you added yourself now show up in whole-sentence candidates, even from initials or untoned input
· Long initial-only strings respond about ten times faster per key, with the same candidates
Learning and candidate order
· A combination you picked segment by segment really does move to the front when you type it again, initials included
· A character you once picked on its own is no longer pushed into the tail of a combination you never demonstrated
· Rare words no longer hold the front spot on length alone; when two parses have the same word count, the one that reads better wins
Themes and appearance (Supporter subscription; typing features stay free)
· Four new featured themes, each with a light and a dark version. One of them outlines every key in a color set by its phonetic role
· The glass finish was rebuilt: translucent keys with an edge highlight, the same look across iOS versions, and no flicker when you switch. "Liquid Glass" is now called "Glass Finish"
· The three original packs get brighter dark-mode accents and text tinted to each pack
· The built-in pixel font is now GNU Unifont with Taiwan-standard forms: 16x16, full strokes, look-alike characters easier to tell apart, and far fewer missing characters in Taiwanese
Taiwanese
· The 170 loanwords in the Ministry of Education dictionary appendix, most of them without a Han spelling, can now be typed as phonetic symbols and are marked in the candidate bar; 87 come with a matching emoji
· Variant Han spellings now follow the Ministry dictionary, with its readings and sources added, so candidate order tracks the dictionary
· Selecting text shows the standard reading again: alternate, colloquial, and regional-accent readings all sort after it, and the choice no longer changes between keyboard launches
· The annotation in the candidate bar follows the notation you chose
Fixes
· Two words could not produce their emoji since 2.0.0 - fixed
· Taiwanese: typing without tone marks no longer leaves entering-tone words unreachable
· The Han tab of the Taiwanese lookup follows your theme font and text size
2.5.0 19 Aug
Panda Zhuyin 2.4.3
Taiwanese phonetic notation
· New "Notation" setting: the same sound has two accepted spellings - the Ministry of Education standard and the conventional one - and you can now pick which the keyboard shows
· After you first enable the Taiwanese keyboard, a card asks how you pronounce a familiar dish name and sets the notation from your answer; the conventional spelling stays the default, so nothing changes on upgrade
· You can also switch notation straight from the keyboard's floating menu while typing
· The lexicon was regenerated against the Ministry standard, fixing candidate ordering for a number of words
Taiwanese lexicon
· Regional pronunciations from the Ministry dictionary's variant readings are now available for candidate selection: 255 more words and 173 more single characters
· Local variant word forms from the Ministry dictionary's vocabulary comparison tables join the lexicon (1,703 more entries), and per-character accent readings now carry over to related words (4,405 more readings)
· Added key entries for phonetic symbol combinations that previously could not be typed
Glide Input
· Direction hints on rime keys became edge bands: directions that continue the current syllable show a long band, directions that start a new one shrink to a small dot - so you can tell at a glance which way composes
· When the base symbol dims, the directions that still compose stay legible
Simplified output
· New "Simplified output" setting: committed Mandarin text is converted to Simplified character forms, with the candidate bar matching; character forms only, vocabulary is unchanged, and Taiwanese mode is unaffected. Also switchable from the keyboard's floating menu
Fixes
· Sentence composition now prefers complete words: when a proper word exists, the top candidate is no longer a fragmented string of high-frequency single characters
· Long-press "Forget" now truly works on composed sentences: after forgetting a wrong composition the correct one returns immediately, and forgetting an unlearned default composition no longer changes the candidates
· Learning mode: for medial-plus-rime combinations formed by glide input, the pinyin / romanization label now comes from the official rime tables, correcting spellings that were previously built by concatenating each symbol's own spelling (10 in Hanyu Pinyin, 12 in Peh-oe-ji)
· The what's-new card shown on first launch after updating no longer appears as the full onboarding tour
2.4.3 18 Aug
Panda Zhuyin 2.3.0
Glide Input (early access)
· A new way to type medials: flick a rime key up, down, or sideways to compose the medial and the rime in one gesture - no more aiming inside a pop-up pad
· The shift key now flips key faces one tap at a time: tap once, type the variant, and it flips back automatically; Taiwanese nasalized and voiced variants now go through it
· Classic input stays the default - turn on "Glide Input" in Settings to try it, and switch back anytime
· The keyboard menu and in-app cards will guide you through the change; the manual and its demo animations follow whichever mode you choose
Taiwanese input
· Lexicon cleanup: removed a small set of entries with invalid syllables for cleaner candidates
2.3.0 2 Aug
Panda Zhuyin 2.2.1
Taiwanese Text Lookup
· Fixed the disappearing paste button: when Full Access is off, a settings guide with a shortcut replaces the button; when the system paste control fails to render, an alternative paste method takes over
· Multi-line pastes keep their line structure - poetry and similar text no longer collapse into one oversized card that runs off screen, and blank lines are preserved
Full-width symbol page
· Restored the operators: asterisk, plus, and equals
· Symbols that gave up their key are still reachable from the candidate row
· Unified behavior across all keys: punctuation now goes through candidates before being committed
· Added a half-width underscore candidate, so file names and code-style naming no longer require switching to the half-width page
· Circled numbers now cover 0 through 20
Mandarin input
· Added 783 rare characters, including Japanese joyo and jinmeiyo kanji
2.2.1 31 Jul
Panda Zhuyin 2.2.0
Taiwanese Text Lookup (formerly Romanization Lookup)
· Upgraded into a full conversion tool: paste Tai-lo, POJ, mixed script, or Han characters - the content type is detected automatically and converted both ways
· Now accepts extended Bopomofo input; the phonetic tab shows romanization and extended Bopomofo side by side
· Conversion results appear as word cards: swap words, split into characters, and adjust readings for heteronyms and variant pronunciations
Taiwanese Hokkien input
· Entering-tone tolerance: tones 4 and 8 are now interchangeable, so a mis-typed tone no longer blocks input
· Completed the entering-tone cycle on initial transform keys, with dimmed feedback for the default state
· Expanded vocabulary: alternate readings and academic terminology from Ministry of Education dictionaries, plus a 1928 botanical glossary; common-word ranking fixes
Stability
· Fixed several vocabulary-learning issues: forgotten words no longer come back, and learning no longer disrupts word selection
· Fixed stutter on long input and a crash in the reading tab with many entries
· Completed English localization of the keyboard interface
2.2.0 25 Jul
Panda Zhuyin 2.1.0
Taiwanese Hokkien input
· Switching to the Taiwanese keyboard now has clear guidance: a persistent arrow on the language switch key, a first-time highlight hint, and an in-app tutorial animation
· New reading lookup: view and edit the Taiwanese pronunciation of characters while composing or from selected text
· Redesigned small-form input for phonetic symbols - entering tones and neutral tones are more intuitive
· Word selection better matches everyday usage: real-corpus word frequency, plus expanded collocations and orthography ordering verified against Ministry of Education dictionary examples
· Fixed several input issues: sentence-final neutral-tone words (such as ho-ah) now input correctly, mis-toned characters fixed, and selection latency eliminated
Other
· Refined in-app wording and terminology for consistency
· Adjusted the width of the language switch key in the function row to align with adjacent keys
2.1.0 20 Jul
Panda Zhuyin 2.0.1
Taiwanese Hokkien input
· Sentence composition now only builds on real dictionary words - no more meaningless auto-joined character strings
· After you type a complete syllable, words with longer readings no longer intrude into candidates
· 146 new common collocations (pronouns plus particles), every reading verified against Ministry of Education dictionary example sentences
· Selected text now converts to romanization using the dictionary's original spelling: hyphens, proper-name capitalization, and neutral-tone marks preserved
Mandarin input
· Complete syllables are treated as locked: longer-reading words no longer join composition; initial-only quick typing is unaffected
· Input learning is more precise: only the exact combinations you picked get reinforced
Other
· Added libtabe lexicon license attribution under Settings > Acknowledgements
2.0.1 18 Jul
Panda Zhuyin 2.0.0
Taiwanese Hokkien keyboard
· New Taiwanese input mode: all 7 tones, entering tones, and nasalized finals with extended phonetic symbols
· Taiwanese lexicon cross-checked from four public dictionary sources; common words rank first
· Custom dictionary adds a Taiwanese category with auto-inferred readings
· Spacebar badge shows the current input mode
Romanization lookup
· Per-syllable lookup panel mapping phonetic symbols to Tai-lo and POJ
· Select any text and replace it with its romanization
Learn as you type
· Per-key labels show Hanyu Pinyin on Mandarin keys, Tai-lo or POJ on Taiwanese keys
English and symbol keyboards
· Standard QWERTY: swipe down for uppercase, caps lock, European accented letters
· Halfwidth and fullwidth symbol layouts redesigned; punctuation commits directly
· Keyboard switching now follows a 2x2 model: tap to flip text/symbols, swipe to switch writing systems
Themes and appearance
· Dedicated Themes tab with a new editor: colors, fonts, opacity, borders, backgrounds (solid, gradient, photo)
· Five built-in fonts with continuous weight adjustment
· Liquid Glass material on iOS 26
· New Supporter subscription (monthly/yearly): unlocks featured effect themes (Loom, Ember, Mist), font switching, liquid-glass color sets, and background gradients; core typing stays free
Engine and performance
· Composer upgraded to Homa; forward-maximal word coverage improves long-sentence conversion
· Rare readings demoted; symbols and emoji no longer take the first candidate slot
· File-backed lexicon loading: much lower memory, faster startup
Other
· Full VoiceOver support across the keyboard
· Settings restructured; help manual reorganized into categorized subpages
· First launch shows a five-page feature tour with inline toggles
2.0.0 14 Jul
Panda Zhuyin 1.6.4
Gestures
· On some initial-consonant keys, the right-flick symbol can now also be entered with a down flick — both gestures work
· A transitional change ahead of the upcoming keyboard layout update, so you can build the new muscle memory early
· Learning-mode hints and the long-press cross menu show both directions
Other refinements
· Added English localization for the licenses and acknowledgements page
1.6.4 6 Jun
Panda Zhuyin 1.6.3
Prediction engine
· Rewrote the fuzzy phrase engine with dictionary + learned-word integration for more accurate composed candidates
· New active-suggestion mechanism automatically surfaces candidates based on your usage history
· Learning memory now applies a 7-day time decay so recently-used words are prioritized
· Sentence-final particles are now easier to select in long sentences, with more accurate full-sentence candidates
User dictionary
· Add custom phrases manually; pronunciations are auto-inferred and synced across your devices
· Fixed editing a word's pronunciation and adding new words to the dictionary
Cursor & gestures
· Pressing a tone key while the cursor is mid-string now treats the cursor as a temporary end; repeated tones are a no-op and switching tones overwrites naturally
· After flicking out the initial-consonant menu, sliding back to the center now correctly selects the center initial
Candidate ordering & performance
· Raw bopomofo strings (including tone marks) moved to the tail of the single-character group; common and multi-character words rank first
· Multi-syllable composition is significantly faster; active suggestions add no candidate latency
Other refinements
· Switching to an empty text field now clears stale composition buffer
1.6.3 30 May
Panda Zhuyin 1.5.1
Fixes
· Common phrases no longer overridden by composed candidates — when a dictionary phrase matches the full input, it now wins over fragment-composed candidates
· Medial flick: releasing on the center now commits the medial alone, with stage haptic when crossing the center boundary
· Multi-pronunciation characters now show the correct reading in selection, picked from the phrase context rather than character frequency
1.5.1 18 May
Panda Zhuyin 1.5.0
New
· Medial flick: haptic feedback when the selector opens
· Number-row pulldown commits on release — matches letter keys
· Predictions now suggest "?" after question particles (嗎/呢/吧)
Improvements
· Medial flick: left-side final order reversed for more natural leftward gestures
· Diphthong finals all swipe down now
· Candidate panel scrolls fully after expanding
· Hint opacity fixed for Bopomofo / Latin labels
Fixes
· Rapid typing crash: memory cache buildup and races resolved
· User dictionary crash: cross-thread write race resolved
· Medial flick falls back to the previous valid final when the target is disabled
Startup
· Dictionary loading and emoji injection deferred — keyboard launches faster
1.5.0 17 May
胖打注音 1.4.1
新功能
・連打多個注音時,候選列現在會多出「單一注音字符」選項;可在連打中段直接送出注音字符後接續組字
・開啟方音設定後,連打時亦可逐個選取對應的擴充注音字符
體驗改善
・「說明」分頁重整為 3 段,補齊 v1.4 各項功能的使用方式
1.4.1 10 May
胖打注音 1.4.0
新功能
・「忘記」功能:可在設定一鍵重置所有學過的詞,也能長按候選詞單獨忘記某條
・拉丁字母直接打:注音鍵盤上即可輸入英文,學習模式會在按鍵顯示對應字母提示
・擴充注音符號候選:在設定開啟後,可輸入老國音與方音符號
・候選下拉分頁:可單獨檢視字母或符號
・框選替換候選:框選文字後候選列會跳出可替換的詞、讀音、emoji
・正式推出英文版介面
體驗改善
・更主動學起常用片語
修復
・修正鍵盤啟用前「前往設定」按鈕的圖示與排版(感謝使用者回報)
・候選排序與聯想列更新更穩定
1.4.0 9 May
胖打注音 1.3.3
修復
・修正 1.3.2 引入的排序問題:常用單字反覆輸入後,不再被自動串聯成不通順的非詞排在常見片語之前
1.3.3 3 May
胖打注音 1.3.2
修復
集中改善候選字的選字學習與排序,讓你選過的字/詞「真的會被記住、真的會推前」。
・選用過的單字會被記住,反覆選用後會推前
・學習過的字/詞會被優先用於整段拼合
・iOS「文字替代」候選參與排序,不再永遠塞底
・完整音節候選前段不再被相近讀音的字穿插
1.3.2 2 May
胖打注音 1.3.1
修復
・單手模式下空白鍵不再被擠壓
・輸入單一注音字母時,候選首位改為常用漢字(注音字母本身仍可在列表中找到)
1.3.1 25 Apr
胖打注音 1.3.0
新功能
・打「箭頭」「愛心」「貓熊」直接出符號與 Emoji 候選(可透過 APP 設定關閉)
・多字前綴聯想:打完「注音」直接聯想「符號」「字母」
・聯想詞列新增下拉展開按鈕
・符號鍵盤候選字加入符號變體、中文數字變體、日期時間格式
・候選字加「全」角標,全形半形一目了然
體驗改善
・候選字數量不再被限制(原本只出 50 個,現在全部顯示)
・候選列渲染更流暢
致謝 Google Mozc 提供符號變體資料(BSD 3-Clause)
1.3.0 24 Apr
v1.2.0 更新內容
【新功能】
• 單手模式:長按鍵盤設定鍵開啟選單,可選靠左、置中或靠右
• 空白鍵滑動游標:組字中左右滑動空白鍵,游標沿注音音節邊界移動
• 連點循環輸入:同一鍵 1 秒內連點,可在該鍵各方向的符號間循環切換
• Emoji 候選開關:可在設定關閉注音候選字列中的 emoji
• 限用滑動輸入:新增開關停用連點循環,對齊日式 Flick 輸入習慣
【體驗改進】
• 觸覺回饋重構:注音鍵與符號鍵觸感分層更清楚,切換音節更有感
• App 介面改為四分頁架構(鍵盤/設定/說明/支持),對齊 iOS 設計指南
• 連點時按鍵高亮延長 1 秒,方便看出循環狀態
• 「支持」分頁加入官方粉專連結
【修正】
• 修正連按 儿 或介音時第二下會被吃掉的問題
• 鍵盤設定齒輪圖示改用實心版本
1.2.0 18 Apr
Panda Zhuyin 2.5.1
Fixes
· Glide Input: long-pressing an initial, tone, or punctuation key no longer dims the rest of the keyboard without showing anything - the four-way selector is back. In learning mode the pinyin labels for the tone and punctuation keys live only in that selector, so they were missing too
· After selecting text, the pronunciation shown in the candidate bar now puts a space after any first-tone syllable, so you can see where one syllable ends and the next begins. Applies to both Mandarin and Taiwanese
· The pronunciation tab in Taibun lookup now follows your theme: typeface, weight, and text color match the other tabs in the same panel instead of being locked to the system font
· Annotation text in that tab now scales with your candidate font size, keeping the size hierarchy readable at every setting, with a legible floor at the smallest sizes
more Version 2.5.1 21 Aug
Data Not Collected The developer does not collect any data from this app.