Hot iOS & iPhone Posts
How To: Major iPhone Update Finally Lets You Manage Past Wi-Fi Networks and Even View Their Passwords
For years, Android has provided easy ways to view all the Wi-Fi networks you connected to in the past, and you can even see the saved passwords in plain text. With iOS 16, Apple finally gave us a similar way to view saved Wi-Fi hotspots, copy their passwords, and remove old ones without being near their access points.
How To: Snap Photos on Your iPhone Hands-Free for Better Selfies, Group Shots, and Low-Light Pictures
You can take a photo on your iPhone with just one tap or press, but you can also use the Camera app hands-free for more impressive images. Doing so lets you take more detailed selfies, include your whole group in the frame, or get steadier results in Night mode — and it's easy to accomplish. Spoiler alert: using "Hey Siri" is not enough.
How To: Disable Lens Correction for the Ultra-Wide Camera on the iPhone 12, 12 Mini, 12 Pro & 12 Pro Max
The new iPhone 12, 12 mini, 12 Pro, and 12 Pro Max are equipped with some great cameras, but not perfect cameras. The ultra-wide lens is known to cause distortion at the edges of the frame, so people and objects look slightly warped. To compensate for the skewed edges, Apple incorporated "Lens Correction," but that fix isn't perfect either.
How To: Can't Send Photo Messages on Google Fi? Fix This Setting on Your iPhone
There's a serious issue with Google Fi's service for iPhone that prevents sending any MMS pictures via the Messages app. The problem doesn't affect all iPhone users on Google Fi, but if you're like me and keep getting that frustrating "Not Delivered" alert, there's a fix.
How To: The Best MagSafe Wallets You Can Buy for Your iPhone in 2024
Phone in one pocket, wallet in the other? It's the classic combo guaranteed to give you more pocket bulge. But it's 2024. Half that stuff in your wallet is practically antique. It's time to finally ditch all the dead weight and get a MagSafe wallet for iPhone — and we've got the best picks to slim you down to the essentials.
How To: Find and Manage Your 'Sign in with Apple' and 'Hide My Email' Accounts on Your iPhone
The "Sign in with Apple" service lets you create accounts with third-party apps and websites more easily using your Apple ID. More importantly, it can hide your personal email address using auto-generated disposable email addresses. However, it's easy to lose track of the accounts you use with Sign in with Apple, as well as any throwaway email addresses you used to hide your actual address.
How To: Stop Getting Those Annoying 'Share Your Name & Photo' Alerts in iMessage Threads on Your iPhone
Your iPhone comes with a feature that allows you to share your name and photo with anyone you iMessage in Messages. It's a useful feature if you want people to see a customized name or fun image that you pick, but seeing all those "Share your name and photo" alerts in conversations can get real annoying quickly. There's a way to stop that from happening, thankfully.
How To: Switch from Grid to List View for Apps on Your iPhone's Home Screen in iOS 14
The average iPhone user has between 60 to 90 applications installed. On one of my devices, I have over 600. With a ton of apps to sort through, it can sometimes be challenging to find the one you're looking for without having to use the Search tool (which is even better in iOS 14). Even then, you may still come up dry.
How To: Use Siri to Play Spotify Music (All the Commands You Need to Know)
Finally, Spotify now works with Siri! It's been a long time coming, but as of Spotify Music version 8.5.6 for iOS 13, you can make Siri or Hey Siri on your iPhone play and control music in your Spotify account. But what commands can you use? We've built a list of everything you can tell Siri to do on Spotify right now, and as time goes on, the list may grow even more powerful.
News: What Are Those Animated Switches in the Top Right When You Wake the iPhone X, XS & XS Max?
When you wake your iPhone X, XS, or XS Max for the first time, you'll probably notice a subtle animation in the top right of the screen that slides down to reveals a couple switches, one toggled on and one toggled off. At first, the meaning of this could be confusing, but it's just Apple's way of helping you learn your new device better.
How To: Change Your App Store Country to Download Region-Locked Apps & Games on Your iPhone
Before many games make it to the US-based iOS App Store, they get "soft launched" in a smaller country to get real-world testing for bugs. It's a pilot program, so to speak, as countries like Vietnam or the Philippines have far fewer iPhone users than the US, thus offer a more controlled environment for developers to get feedback and zero-in on issues that may occur in a game's early development phases.
How To: Remove Widgets from Your iPhone's Lock Screen
Widgets are great ... if you actually use them. A quick swipe right on the lock screen will reveal the Today view and its widgets, and it's very easy to accidentally open. Plus, others can see your widgets without any authentication. You could manually remove every widget, but that wouldn't prevent the right-swipe from opening the Today view. There is a way, however, to disable the page entirely.
How To: Unlock a Hidden Network Strength Meter for Your iPhone's Status Bar
The horizontal dotted icon in your iPhone's status bar serves as an indicator of your device's network strength. And while it does help provide an approximation of how strong your signal is, swapping it out to display an actual numeric value is a lot more precise and can change up the look of your iPhone (or at least the status bar). The process is quick, painless, and you don't even need to jailbreak your phone.
How To: Download & Play SNES Games on Your iPad or iPhone—No Jailbreak Required
Tired of playing old-school Game Boy Advance, Game Boy Color, Nintendo, and Nintendo DS games on your iPhone? We've got another retro video game system for you to add to your arsenal of emulators—Super Nintendo.
How To: Turn Your iPhone into a Personal Sound Machine to Help You Focus, Rest, and Stay Calm
If you get distracted or stressed out easily, your iPhone might be able to help you focus or calm you down. It can even help you fall asleep with white noise, and you don't have to install a third-party app or buy an audio track to turn your iPhone into a personal sound machine.
How To: Send Full-Screen Memoji Explosions in iMessage Chats from Your iPhone or iPad
A simple trick in the Messages app for iOS and iPadOS can make your iMessage conversations more fun for you and your recipients by sending a full-screen blast of any Memoji sticker you choose.
How To: Disable FaceTime's Creepy Eye Contact Feature in iOS 14 So You Don't Look Like You're Staring Awkwardly
It's incredible what technology can do these days, but sometimes, it gets a little scary. For instance, FaceTime's "Eye Contact" feature, which Apple beta-tested in iOS 13 but released with iOS 14, makes it appear like you're looking right at the camera, even when you're actually looking at your friend on the screen. If you find this artificial trick a bit creepy, rest assured you can turn it off at any time.
How To: Use This Trick to Quickly Select All Photos & Videos on Your iPhone to Bulk Delete or Share
With high-resolution photos and 4K videos being standard these days, it's no surprise that media hogs most of the storage space for many iPhone users. If that's you, there's always iCloud, but you only get 5 GB free, and a paid 50 GB or 200 GB plan can fill up fast. To save money and reclaim storage, you can just delete content from the Photos app, and there's a trick to doing it faster.
How To: Get Fast Charging on the iPhone SE (2nd Gen) Without Breaking the Bank
After many years of rumors, the second-generation iPhone SE is here. At $399, it is the most inexpensive iPhone Apple has sold since the original iPhone SE came out. And while the new SE comes with Apple's typical five-watt power adapter, the smartphone supports fast charging — you just need to get a fast charger separately.
How To: Disable Your Camera During a FaceTime Call
If you've ever wanted to turn off your camera during a FaceTime call, you might have noticed it seems, well, impossible. But it's not. You can kill your camera feed at any time, whether you're chatting with one friend or 31. Apple just makes the off button challenging to find.
How To: What to Do After Your iPhone Is Lost or Stolen — The Ultimate Guide
Your iPhone just went missing, and now you're panicking. You need it for work, to get around, to contact your friends and family, and pretty much everything else in your life. So, what are the chances you might get it back? The odds may be stacked against you unless it's just under a couch cushion, but you can improve your chances of recovering your iPhone by taking certain steps.
How To: Easily Scan Documents on Your iPhone in iOS 11
Scanning important paperwork on smartphones is a tedious process, often relying on either external scanners or third-party apps that had to be either purchased or were loaded with annoying ads just to get the job done. Thankfully, iOS 11 now lets you easily scan documents using your iPhone, and finally does away with the need for third-party apps or machines.
How To: Make iPhone Navigation Prompts Play Over Your Car Speakers When Listening to the Radio
Maps is great for making sure you always get to your destination, until you miss that critical turn because you couldn't hear the turn-by-turn directions.
How To: Your iPhone Has 24 New Accessibility Features You Shouldn't Ignore on iOS 17
Apple previewed new cognitive, speech, and vision accessibility tools for the iPhone back in May, and they've finally been realized with the iOS 17 release. But there are more accessibility features than that hiding in Apple's latest software update — and they're not just for users with disabilities.
How To: Track Your Sleep Activity in Apple's Health App for iPhone
While keeping your iPhone out of the bedroom might help to avoid unnecessary distractions before bedtime, it could be better served right by your side to help diagnose sleeping issues you may be experiencing each night.
How To: Hide Private Photos on Your iPhone
When a photo or video is just too sensitive to leave laying around in your Photos app, you'll want to either delete it for good or hide it away in safe, secure location on your iPhone. As for the latter, Apple actually has a few tools available to make photos and videos hidden — even password-protected — on your iPhone.
How To: Change Your FaceTime Caller ID to an Email Address or Phone Number
Whenever you make FaceTime audio or video calls from your iPhone, Apple automatically uses your phone number or Apple ID email address as the caller identification. So when someone that you're calling sees the incoming call, they'll see it's from your phone number or email address. But what if you'd rather it be a different identifier?
How To: Activate Your iPhone's Hidden Magnifying Glass for Extreme Zooming
When you want to see something far away with a little more clarity or you're having a hard time reading small letters right in front of you, you can point your iPhone's camera at the subject and "pinch" to zoom for a better look. But there's actually something built into iOS for the exact purpose of magnifying objects, and it goes above and beyond the normal camera features.
How To: Stop Your iPhone from Automatically Sharing Audio to Your HomePod or HomePod Mini
Pushing music from your iPhone to your HomePod or HomePod mini by just moving the devices close to each other is certainly a great party trick. But if Handoff is too easily triggered, you might not think it's worth the wow factor. Thankfully, there's an easy way to stop your iPhone from sharing audio to your HomePod or HomePod mini (and vice versa) if you're finding it happens way too often.
How To: Organize Your Smart Home, Rooms & Zones in Apple's Home App to Streamline Siri Commands
Every home is a little different, and for a smart home app to work, it has to be able to be customized to work with each person's unique setup. With the iPhone's Home app, everyone can set up a smart home just how they want, including the number and names of rooms, and where those rooms are in the house.
How To: Uninstall Sileo Tweaks from Your Jailbroken iPhone
Removing unwanted apps from your iPhone is a straightforward affair — long-press an app's icon, then hit the delete button once it appears. Unfortunately, the same can't be said when it comes to uninstalling tweaks from a jailbroken iPhone.
How To: 12 Things the iPhone 14 and 14 Pro Models Have That Other iPhones Don't
The new iPhone 14, 14 Plus, 14 Pro, and 14 Pro Max all come with great, never-before-seen-on-iPhone features, including the A16 Bionic chip, Bluetooth 5.3, precision dual-frequency GPS, and dual ambient light sensors. But that's only a few new features exclusive to the 2022 lineup.
How To: Get Haptic Feedback When Unlocking Your iPhone with Face ID
Haptic feedback is one of the iPhone's most underrated features. With Face ID, you'll feel a satisfying tap or two when buying something in the App Store or iTunes, unlocking protected notes, viewing saved passwords in Settings, and the list goes on. For the first time, Apple has added haptic feedback when unlocking your iPhone via Face ID, as well as a way to disable haptic feedback for Face ID entirely.
How To: iPhone Not Charging Past 80%? Here's Why (& How to Fix It)
So you've been using iOS 13 for a little while and noticed your iPhone is pretty slow to charge. Using the 5-watt power adapter out of the box, in the time it used to take your iPhone to charge its battery to 100 percent, your iPhone is stuck at 80% or below instead. That's because Apple introduced a new feature in iOS 13 that slows down charging — but for a good reason.
How To: Always-Updated List of Apps That Let You Change Their Home Screen Icons on Your iPhone
Apple's Shortcuts app lets you make and use custom icons for any app on your iPhone, but it won't actually replace any icons. If your goal is to change the official icon for the app itself without any redirects, there's a growing list of third-party apps that'll let you do just that.
How To: Annoy Your Friends on iMessage with a Barrage of Automated Texts
Back in its infancy, the App Store was filled with text bomb apps that allowed users to send a barrage of text messages to friends, family, and foes. It was a fun way to annoy people, but Apple quickly scrubbed the apps because of technical issues. Although text bombs are still banished, you can now use a Siri Shortcut to send text bombs through iMessage on your iPhone.
How To: The Easiest Way to Share Your iPhone's Live Photos with Android Users
Live Photos are a fun way to relive memories, but there's a problem: unless you're only friends with Apple users, sharing Live Photos isn't quite as fun. Without a third-party converter, you can't share your Live Photo in all its moving glory. That is, until iOS 13, where you can quickly turn your Live Photos into videos.
How To: Easily Record Phone Calls on Your iPhone and Get Auto-Generated Transcripts and Summaries
Recording phone calls has always been tricky due to legal, ethical, and technical considerations. With iOS 18.1, Apple brings your iPhone a native call recording feature that simplifies this process while addressing privacy concerns.
How To: Everything You Can Do with the Camera Control Button on Your iPhone 16 or 16 Pro
The devices in the new iPhone 16 series lineup have one feature no other iPhone models have: a physical Camera Control button. If you use your iPhone to take photos or record videos, the Camera Control speeds up the process and gives you immediate control over adjusting settings and values using intuitive gestures. But what exactly can you do with it?
How To: Remove Annoying Contact Suggestions in Your iOS Share Sheet Completely or Temporarily
By default, your iPhone's share sheet will have a row of contacts iOS thinks you'll want to share the content with. Those suggestions are handy if you frequently share things with the same people, but they also clutter the share sheet, invade contacts' privacy in screenshots, and tell nosy people in eyeshot who you share with the most. Thankfully, you can remove or hide them whenever needed.