EurKEY: Effortless European Characters on a US Keyboard

Below is some real-life experience from our Swedish buddy @fouroseven, who introduced me to EurKEY:

1. Why don’t you use the Swedish or US keyboard layout?
Well, the Swedish layout is fine for typing in Swedish, but I prefer the US layout for work—it’s just much better for programming. The downside is it makes it harder to type å, ä, and ö. I used to switch between Swedish at home and US at work, and honestly, it just messed with my head. EurKEY solved that for me—I can stick with the US layout and still type Swedish characters without any hassle.

2. What are the benefits of using EurKEY?

• I can type Swedish characters like å, ä, and ö without having to switch layouts, and with the Glove80, I can even bind them to any key I want.

• The keyboard still works like a regular US layout, which is great for programming.

• It’s handy for other European languages too—é, ü, ñ, and so on are easy to type.

• It seem to works the same way on Windows, macOS, and Linux, so no need to adjust when switching systems. I only use it on Windows for now.

• Once you get the hang of the AltGr shortcuts, typing special characters is super quick and smooth or you bind these shortcuts to keys on a layer.
  
  

3. Any downsides?
Honestly, as far as I know the only thing is that EurKEY isn’t built into the OS—you have to install it manually. But the installation is easy, and you only have to do it once.

4.  How do you actually use this?
Holding AltGr (right Alt) and pressing A gives me ä; holding AltGr + Shift + A gives Ä.
We can also assign these Swedish characters directly to a key in another layer or map them to a combo.
To assign a Right Alt key combination to a key, you would use:

Example: &kp RA(E) for Key Press Right Alt (AltGr) + E.

5. What makes it different from dead keys?

Dead keys require you to press a key (like ´ or ^) and then another key to produce an accented character (like é or ê). It’s a two-step process that can feel slow and interruptive—especially when typing quickly.

One big issue with US International is that it turns common programming characters like " and ' into dead keys, which is super frustrating when coding. That was a dealbreaker for me.

EurKEY avoids that. It uses AltGr shortcuts for most accented characters—so you get them in a single keystroke (like AltGr + E = é), with no delay and no interruption to your typing flow.
It does still include some dead keys, but only for less frequently used symbols—so it doesn't get in your way.
And as a bonus: EurKEY also supports the entire Greek alphabet, which is pretty cool. You can check out the full layout here:
https://eurkey.steffen.bruentjen.eu/download/windows/1.2/eurkey-layout-complete.pdf 

6.  Anything else you want to share?
I’ve only used EurKEY on Windows, and I’m definitely not an expert, but it works great once it’s set up. Installing it is super easy, and after that, it just runs in the background without any fuss. If you use a US layout but still need quick access to European characters—especially for Swedish—it’s a total game changer. No layout switching, no messing with your flow.
Also, big thanks to you for TailorKey and for helping me get my Glove80 setup. Really appreciate your work and dedication to the community 🙂