Less transparent my ass. The first time you use any apple app it gives you a summary of the privacy implications, what data is collected, etc. that’s the exact opposite of your statement.

Google instead links you to their monolithic TOS / privacy policy which covers all their products and is super opaque.

Agreed. From what I can tell the swiping is inaccurate as you have to touch each letter perfectly for it to register where as on gboard being near to or adjacent to a letter is sufficient for it to guess the correct word

It can communicate via play services if you have that