Keyboard disappears while texting

I have a new 8+ and the keyboard disappears sometimes while I am texting. I have to hard restart the phone to get it back. I‘m wondering If you think this a faulty phone or if this is a setting problem or something like that?

(there are other issues as well - home screen goes blank; when you swipe to view notifications on the lock screen, it won’t open; some text messages don’t come through during the course of a text conversation; speaker crackles when multiple notifications come at once....)

Thank you.