Please remove bing search from top bar

I came here to add my voice in support of removing this cruel joke of a feature, but I was surprised to see that this trash made it all the way through the beta process without any user feedback being considered. This is exactly the kind of user-hostile behavior that people were afraid of when Microsoft bought SwiftKey. I've been a SwiftKey user since almost the very beginning, but combined with the update a while back that inexplicably removed the predictive text feature for a bit, I'm seeing a trend that most likely leads to me needing to find a new Android keyboard for the first time in over half a decade.

It's kind of ridiculous that there's a search bar there at all. I've been using SwiftKey for years and have always said it was awesome. This search bar is so ugly. I'm never going to use it. And it takes up space where the GIF and sticker buttons went. Makes no sense for a keyboard to have a search bar. Especially when i can just hold down the home key or use the google srch bar on my home screen. What gets me the most is that in order to even use the bing search on SwiftKey the keyboard has to be active which means you need to tap an area with a text input bar...
So the fastest way for me to do that would be to tap the google search bar on my home screen or the url bar in chrome. I have no idea why anyone would think this is a good idea. I'm going to give this a month and then I'm going to use an old apk without the bar and force the play store to not update it.

Lousy updates are the best reason to TURN OFF automatic updates in the Play Store. It's crucial to check reviews before allowing developers to wreck your apps with horrible updates like this one.

Hello SwiftKey team, 

do you listen to your users in your own forum? 

Please reply, don't ignore us. 

Here's a Twitter exchange I had with them: https://twitter.com/SwiftKey/status/1069724963391881216?s=09

Microsoft is going to screwe up SwiftKey too. Please give a option remove the bing bar or add a option to change it to google.
Or else i think it's time to move to gboard

I've voiced my concerns on the play store, and I really really like this virtual keyboard. Holy smokes they crammed in the search bar so hard they forgot to make space for the option to remove it. woopsie daisy!
Jokes aside, it's not inherently a bad idea with the search bar, and I'd probably check it out on my own, but as soon as you forced it on me, I refuse to touch it. All I see is a bing ad, not a search field.

Is there any solution removing this Bing Search? Microsoft you can close down Bing, we'll don't need it.

Please remove this or at least give us the option to move or remove it.

Just get rid of it. I don't need it, I don't want it. I'm close to uninstalling swiftkey.

PLEASE SWIFTKEY get rid of Bing - or at least make an option to disable it. I do not like it at all. It takes up the toolbar which could be used for quick access to things I actually use. * Never make a feature like this "unremovable" in the future. The best part of swift key is customization NOT propretiery restrictions!

Please update this soon -hopefully before the end of 2018 December. 

I have been a user since near the beginning too, and I also hate the Bing search box. I truly do not understand why there isn't an option to disable it.

Please don't ruin a great app by loading it up with TOTALLY unnecessary and irrelevant apps simply to satisfy your marketing department. NO DAMN BING.

Finally they listened... 

In SwiftKey Beta now the bing search is removable by user. 

Thank you  

🎊 🎉 🎇

I hadn't updated the app until recently and was immediately annoyed by the search. Not only does it take up way too much space, but it is permanently where my clipboard should be so I am constantly hitting it by mistake. Very poor decision. It needs to be just the icon and removable/movable like the other icons. To everyone else posting that they don't like it either, they probably don't even read these forums, they are here for the users to interact. Please, do like I did and submit it to support. Maybe if they see enough complaints on support tickets they will actually fix it. And thank you to the user who suggested a replacement. I paid for this keyboard, but I will be using that one until the issue is corrected and revising my review to lower stars as well.

Why isn't this optional like everything else on the toolbar? 

It takes up 1/3rd of the tool bar on my screen and has made the toolbar useless to me as I pretty much just have a giant search box tied to a search engine that I would never use.

PLEASE make it optional. Your app was once the most customisable keyboard out there, but now you are forcing Bing onto everyone who uses it. That's not only biased towards Bing, but it's also completely against your brand image to force something onto the keyboard without being able to turn it off. 

• What about the people who do like it but actually prefer to use other search engines and are now stuck with Bing?
  
  
• Why are you being biased towards Bing? Windows was forced through a lawsuit to offer their users other search engines during setup of their internet browser as it was found to be unfair to the competition - isn't this exactly what you are doing?
  
  
• Why add a search bar to the keyboard when there is one on the android homepage, at the top of every browser and on most quick access tool bars on phones, tablets and PC's - think Cortana for example?
  
  
• What about the fact that most people just use voice commands on their phones to search?
  
  
• What about older people like myself who have really tiny phones?
  
  
• What about people who don't want to have a search bar?
  
  
• What about the lack of customisation that you've left your users with that was once your claim to fame?
  
  
• If you insist on making it mandatory to have it there, why can't you make it a button like everything else?
  
  
• If you insist on making it mandatory to have it there, why can't you make it smaller?
  
  
• If you insist on making it mandatory to have it there and you're unwilling to make it a button, why not at the very least make it shorter - then it could expand when you use the search box for you to type in rather than it taking up so much precious screen room.
  
  
• Why not keep with your brand image and make it customisable like everything else?
  
  
• Why not listen to your users before they switch to a different keyboard? There are countless other great keyboards these days that offer almost identical services, and most of your users probably don't even utilise the full extent of your app anyway.

Please do the sensible thing and make it removable. I don't want it, and clearly a lot of other people don't either as there are even articles on various websites about it...