How to enable and use the ChromeOS virtual keyboard
ChromeOS has a lot of really nifty tricks hidden in the operating system. One such trick is a virtual keyboard. You might be wondering why a virtual keyboard is even necessary, especially since your Chromebook already comes with a handy physical keyboard.
Consider this: if your Chromebook can be used in tablet mode, flip that screen over and suddenly that physical keyboard isn’t exactly handy. How are you? You use the virtual keyboard.
However, the virtual keyboard is not enabled by default. So before you can use it, you need to activate it.
Let me show you how not only to enable the physical keyboard, but also to make it flat so that it doesn’t take up so much screen space and you can move it to where you need it.
Likewise: 5 reasons why a Chromebook is the perfect laptop for most users
I will be demonstrating on ChromeOS 106.0.5239.0 but this should work on older instances of the operating system.
Enable the virtual keyboard
1. Open Settings
The first thing you need to do is open the Settings app. Click the taskbar (where time lives) and click the gear icon to open the Settings app.
2. Find Accessibility
In the left pane of the Settings app (illustration 1), click Advanced to expand the entry.
illustration 1: The ChromeOS Settings app is where you make most of your settings. Image: Jack Wallen
If Advanced is expanded, click Accessibility, and then click Manage Accessibility Features (figure 2).
figure 2: The Accessibility section of the ChromeOS Settings app. Image: Jack Wallen
3. Activate the virtual keyboard
Scroll down until you see “On-Screen Keyboard” (figure 3).
figure 3: Enable on-screen keyboard in ChromeOS. Image: Jack Wallen
Click the on-off slider until it’s in the on position, then close the Settings app.
Open the virtual keyboard
With the virtual keyboard enabled, you should now see a keyboard icon on your shelf. Click on this icon to open the virtual keyboard (figure 4).
figure 4: The virtual keyboard is open and ready for use. Image: Jack Wallen
Enable the floating keyboard
As you can see, the virtual keyboard takes up a lot of space, so much that using the Chrome web browser might get a bit tricky. How are you? You can enable the floating keyboard which not only is smaller but also can float on the screen wherever you need it.
To float the keyboard, click the right-pointing arrow in the top-left corner, and then click the small square near the center (Figure 5).
Figure 5: Activate the floating keyboard with a single click. Image: Jack Wallen
Once the keyboard is floating (Figure 6), you can resize it by clicking and dragging one of the blue corner handles and dragging it around by clicking the bottom handle (circle with the four arrows).
Figure 6: The ChromeOS floating keyboard has been enabled and takes up much less screen real estate. Image: Jack Wallen
And that’s all for enabling and using the ChromeOS Virtual Keyboard. For those with a two-in-one Chromebook, this is a great tool once the physical keyboard has been put out of the way.