In case you missed it, Google released a new handwriting app for Android:

Google Handwriting Input (Google Play)

The app supports 82 languages including Japanese, and is very forgiving to my sloppy input.

You can adjust the auto-selection timing or disable it altogether in Settings > Language & Input > Google Handwriting Input.

While it looks like cool tech, is there any real practical use for this? I would imagine just typing would be quicker in most cases.

Looks like it's time to charge up the old android tablet and give this a whirl. I was looking for something similar on iPad but the only thing I could find was pretty expensive and a lot of the reviews were quite negative.

Update: Yeah, this thing is legitimately awesome. I tried a bunch of obscure and complicated kanji and it gets them right every time, and when you turn off the auto-select it lets you write as much as you can fit in. I'm sitting here writing on my tablet and watching the google doc sheet on my monitor update as I write and checking it in real-time with Rikaisama, so this is actually even better than what I was hoping to find to begin with. Great for free-writing practice, will definitely be keeping this tablet around more often thanks to this! I appreciate the heads up CB!

How does this compare with Mazec, for those who already have it?

@Zarxrax I use mine for those times when I see a kanji/word I can't read, and want to look it up in EBPocket.

Omg I am so happy. This eliminates the only reason that I wanted to spend hundreds on a Denshi Jisho. Now I can look up kanji on the fly. Finally! Thank Google.

Thank you so much for posting this!! I was just looking this up yesterday and tried mazec out.. The google is just as good IMO. The only drawback is if you cannot write kanji quickly enough it will auto complete quickly. For instance 餓 will complete as 食 if you forget the right side for a split second.. Which often happens when I wrote kanji.

The utility of this is not so much texting or writing emails and such, but rather using it for dictionary lookups on android which largely do not have built in kanji writing lookups.

Thanks again!

Damn! Might be finally time to get an Android device! This sounds amazing!

Tried it, and while it wasn't as accurate as Mazec for me, it was still very good for a free app. A lot of learners might want to decrease the auto-recognition speed (in the settings) if it's recognising kanji before you finish writing them.

Sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet!! I've been waiting probably 6 years to have something that even came close to the insanely good handwriting recognition on windows mobile. I've only tried a few kanji but so far it just works. Awesome!

Light years against any other pathetic excuses for japanese handwriting keyboards on android i've tried!!

I prefer Swype and ATOK for various reasons, but it's not bad! Good to go to in a pinch.

Thanks for posting this and sorry if this is a necrobump. Definitely giving this a try tomorrow morning.

Anybody else like juniperpansy that has used tegaki on Windows Mobile OS want to share your experiences with this new app?

I've used Windows Mobile phones, iPhones, and am currently on an Android (Galaxy Note series). The handwriting apps available for Android have been a mixed bag for me. Some have been very good while others have been crap, but none of them were as good as Windows Mobile implementation, which is kinda sad for me since I don't want to go back to a WinMob phone. I wish I could find a handwriting input app on Android with dual/tri-box input, good prediction, and forgiving recognition.