I’m experiencing a problem with Japanese input in the card editor on AnkiMobile.
Environment
- Device: iPad Air 11-inch
- iPadOS: 26.5 (the issue also occurred on earlier iPadOS versions)
- AnkiMobile: latest version
- External keyboards tested:
- Apple Smart Keyboard
- Third-party Bluetooth keyboard
- Japanese input:
- Japanese - Romaji
- Japanese - Kana
Problem
The issue only occurs in the card editor fields (Front, Back, etc.).
When typing Japanese with an external keyboard, pressing the Space key does not perform IME conversion. Instead, the conversion candidate interface behaves strangely. Pressing Space repeatedly moves the candidate UI, and Tab and the arrow keys produce similar behavior instead of allowing normal conversion.
The IME itself works correctly. The selected candidate actually changes when pressing Space, but the currently selected candidate is not visually highlighted. Pressing Enter confirms the invisible selection correctly.
Other text fields in Anki work normally, and Japanese input works correctly in other iPad apps such as Notes.
I have confirmed that:
- The problem occurs with multiple external keyboards.
- It occurs with both Romaji and Kana input.
- Full Keyboard Access is disabled.
- The problem has existed for a long time, not only on iPadOS 26.5.
Is this a known issue? If not, I’m happy to provide additional information or test anything that might help reproduce it.
I found that enabling Settings → Accessibility → Display & Text Size → Increase Contrastmakes the selected Japanese IME candidate visible again in the card editor.
Also, thank you very much for all your work on Anki and AnkiMobile. I’m a Japanese student studying for a university entrance exam. I rely on Anki for most of my learning, and it has had a huge positive impact on my studies. I really appreciate your continued work and support.