iOS & iPhone How-Tos « iOS & iPhone

How To: Water in Your iPhone's Speaker? This Shortcut Can Get It Out

Remember when water and iPhones couldn't mix? Pools, tubs, and toilets would suck down the working iPhones of clumsy and careless owners and spit out expensive paperweights like they were nothing. Times have changed, however, and the newest iPhones can take a swim without fear of certain death. But a dip in water now can still cause muffled music and audio from the speakers.

How To: Back Up Your iPhone Photos & Videos with Google Photos for Free

Since iCloud's introduction in 2011, you get only 5 GB of complimentary cloud storage with your Apple account. With iPhone backups, app data, iCloud Drive files, and even emails (if you have a Mac, Me, or iCloud email address), you'll quickly run out of space to back up photos and videos. Fortunately, Google offers 15 GB of free storage, making it easy to upload your Camera Roll for safekeeping.

How To: Use All 10 Fingerprints for Touch ID on Your iPhone — Not Just 5 of Them

While Apple has moved on from Touch ID to Face ID in newer iPhone models, there are still plenty of iPhones with fingerprint sensors — and they're all still supported in iOS 12, from the iPhone 5S to the iPhone 8 Plus. With Touch ID, you can register up to five fingerprints, but it doesn't stop there. Using a little-known trick, you can sneak another five fingerprints in there for a total of ten.

How To: Get Haptic Feedback in Your iPhone Keyboard to Feel Everything You Type

For years, iPhones have had haptic feedback. Rather than full-force buzzing, the Tactic Engine provides a tiny vibration under your finger when performing certain actions on the screen. While Apple itself was able to take advantage of this tech before app developers, for some reason it was never included in the stock iOS keyboard — but there's still a way to get haptic feedback when typing.

How To: Monitor the Battery Levels of All Your iPhone Bluetooth Accessories with Just a Swipe

The battery icon in your iPhone's status bar gives you a visual idea of how much power is left, and there's a battery percentage option you can switch to or view in the Control Center, depending on your model. But what you may not know is that there's a way to view the battery percentage of every device connected to your iPhone, from AirPods to Bluetooth speakers and your Apple Watch.

How To: Generate Viral Memes Like a Pro with These Apps for Your iPhone

If you use the internet regularly, it's nearly impossible to avoid memes. They are the epitome of internet culture, demonstrating how jokes can spread and change like wildfire. While there are many different types, the most common ones you'll come across are images and GIFs with humorous text accompanying them, and we've found the best iOS apps to help you create your own.

How To: Disable Apple Pay After Your iPhone Is Stolen

When your iPhone goes missing, it's serious business. Depending on your usage, your whole life might be connected to your iPhone, not the least of which includes debit cards, credit cards, and Apple Pay Cash stored in Apple Pay. While it's nearly impossible for someone to use your money with Apple Pay, it's still a good idea to disable it until you find your iPhone, just in case.

How To: Get Your Missing iPhone Back by Remotely Setting a Message & Contact Info on Its Lock Screen

So, you're on the way back from a restaurant and realize you left your iPhone there, but you're late for a meeting and can't go back yet. You may as well kiss that iPhone goodbye, right? Not yet, as long as the right person gets their hands on it first. But that potential do-gooder won't know to contact you, and that's where Find My iPhone's "Lost Mode" comes in handy.

How To: Get Samsung Galaxy S10 Wallpapers on Your iPhone

Samsung isn't set to reveal its latest and greatest — the Galaxy S10 line — until February 20, but that hasn't stopped leaks from giving us an early taste. While we already know what the rumored devices will probably look like, we now have access to their wallpapers as well. Apple fans don't need to be left out of the fun — someone has already cropped these images to fit your iPhone's display.

How To: Set Up Find My iPhone to Always Keep Track of Your iOS Device

While iPhones may be more expensive than ever, it won't stop us from losing them or having them stolen. Whether you have an iPhone 5S or an iPhone XS Max, there's a good chance it'll go missing at some time during your ownership. It could end up in a couch cushion or in the hands of a pickpocket, but no matter what happens to it, you need to prepare it beforehand for the inevitable.

How To: Download Images on Your iPhone When a Site on Safari Won't Let You

Some websites block image downloads on their webpages so you can't save them for reuse. That means long-pressing or force-pressing on protected images in Safari on your iPhone will not do anything or will omit the "Save Image" option. Taking a screenshot is the obvious solution to bypass restrictions, but you won't get the best quality. Thankfully, there's another way.

How To: Change Instagram's Interface Colors for a More Personalized Experience on Your iPhone

Your Instagram feed is jam-packed with interesting and lively photos, videos, and stories that largely offset the iOS app's comparatively bland user interface. If the interface's dull colors have always bothered you, you can splash on some much-needed color to better reflect your personality and tastes.

How To: Disable the 'Good Morning' Message on Your iPhone's Lock Screen

I'm not a morning person, so getting a "Good Morning" message on my iPhone when I wake up makes me want to toss it across the room. If you feel the same way about this morning greeting, there's an easy way to stop it from showing up on your lock screen. This also applies if your "Good Morning" is actually "Good Afternoon" or "Good Evening," depending on your sleep schedule.

How To: Set Different Downtime Schedules on Your iPhone for Each Day of the Week

When Apple released its Downtime feature in iOS 12, it gave us an easy way to control how much time we spend on our iPhones — but it's not perfect. When setting Downtime, you're forced to use the same time schedule for every day of the week, so your weekdays and weekends have the same restrictions. Apple is changing this in iOS 12.2 so lockout periods can be more customized.

How To: Get Dark Mode on Facebook for Less Eye Strain When Browsing Your News Feed

Dark mode support has steadily made its way to mainstream acceptance, with big-name apps like YouTube, Reddit, and Twitter adopting the feature to satisfy user demands. In this regard, Facebook is lagging, yet to offer the sought-after feature for easier viewing in low-light conditions. If your iPhone is jailbroken, however, you don't have to suffer like everyone else.

How To: The Super Simple Trick to Get App Updates & Downloads Faster

You open the App Store to see a huge red number hovering over the "Updates" tab. There's a ton to install, so you tap "Update All." But wait! You needed to check Instagram or send a reply to a timely WhatsApp message, but those apps are now stuck waiting for others to update first. Luckily, you don't need to stick to your iPhone's update queue — you can choose which apps to update first.

How To: Purchase Tweaks & Apps That Work with Sileo for Jailbroken iPhones

Sileo is an ideal marketplace for developers to showcase apps, tweaks, and themes that Apple would never allow in the App Store. While a majority of these packages are free to try out, there are jailbreak apps that cost money for your iPhone. But actually paying for mods can be a bit tricky.

How To: Get Google Home Reminders on Your iPhone So You Never Forget an Important Task

Smart home speakers, such as Google Home and Apple HomePod, are must-have accessories if you're trying to turn your home into a smart home. While HomePod is made to be used with the Apple ecosystem, the less-expensive Google Home can also be used with your iPhone — in more ways than you'd think.

How To: Rearrange Apps on Your CarPlay Screen for Quicker Access to Your Favorite Services

CarPlay is no doubt the best way to use your iPhone when behind the wheel since you can safely drive without too many distractions. It gets even better with all the music and podcasting apps available, as well as third-party navigation apps such as Google Maps and Waze. With more apps being added to CarPlay every day, it becomes more necessary to rearrange your home screen.

How To: 8 Shortcuts to Improve Your Instagram Experience on Your iPhone

Instagram has extensive tools built in for creating and editing posts and Stories, but there could always be more. Third-party apps can help you add photo and video effects for even more visually stimulating content, as well as create announcements, text-based images, and everything in between. However, now that Shortcuts exists on iOS, you may no longer need all those extra apps on your iPhone.

How To: View Air Quality in Apple Maps to See How Polluted Cities & Destinations Are

While the United States, in general, doesn't have the worst overall pollution, the air quality can drastically change from one day to the next. If you're particularly sensitive to pollutants in the air, there are apps that show how clean or polluted the air is in your area, as well as in cities you plan on traveling to, but Apple's making those apps less relevant with a new feature in Apple Maps.

How To: Reconnect Your AirPods to Your iPhone Without Digging in the Bluetooth Settings

If you're an Apple fan, AirPods are the must-have wireless headphones to own. They know when they're in your ears, will pause music when one is taken out, and when you pair them with your iPhone they'll already work on your Mac, iPad, and iPod touch using the same Apple ID. However, whenever you use them on any other device, you have to manually reconnect them later to your iPhone.

How To: Add Repos to Sileo So You Can Find More Jailbreak Tweaks to Install

If you're familiar with jailbreaking, you're well aware of the fragmented nature of downloading tweaks. Unlike the iOS App Store, which contains about two million apps of varying categories, installing jailbroken packages often require you to first install a separate repo into either Cydia or its replacement Sileo, as many of these tweaks aren't available outright.

How To: Use Google Maps or Waze with Siri Instead of Apple Maps

When driving, you can get directions hands-free by asking Siri. You can also make general map searches, show a location's details, call a query's phone number, and view traffic details. However, Siri defaults to Apple Maps for all those. If you prefer Google Maps, Waze, or another third-party navigation app, the map-based Siri commands won't work. But that doesn't mean you can't still use Siri.

How To: Siri Settings, Shortcuts & Hacks Every iPhone User Should Know

Out of the box, Apple's digital assistant could be a godsend or a nuisance, depending on your daily interactions it. No matter which camp you fall into, Siri can always be better suited to your personal needs with a little customization. You can make Siri a powerhouse not to be reckoned with, or you can minimize its presence if you only need Siri help sometimes — all without any jailbreaking.

How To: Use Siri with a Third-Party Email Client Instead of Apple Mail on Your iPhone

Until very recently, Apple apps were among the only ones that would play nicely with Siri on iPhones. If you wanted to take advantage of the digital assistant to, say, compose an email, you would need to go with Apple Mail instead of the email client you actually use. As of iOS 12, this is no longer the case.

How To: Use Siri with a Third-Party Weather App Instead of Apple's on Your iPhone

If you ask Siri to check the weather on your iPhone right now, you'll get information from the stock Weather app in iOS — even if you have and prefer other weather apps installed. But that doesn't have to be the case. Thanks to Siri Shortcuts in iOS 12 and later, you can set specific phrases that Siri will respond to for any compatible weather app you want.

How To: Use Sileo to Uninstall 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, which is a little more tedious to perform.

How To: App Over 150 MB? Here's How to Download It Using Cellular Data on Your iPhone

These days, cellular connections can be just as fast — if not faster — than traditional internet providers. That, coupled with the prevalence of unlimited data plans, means less worrying about hopping on a Wi-Fi network to download something. However, try to install an app or update over 150 MB, and your iPhone will insist you switch to Wi-Fi. We don't think this is very fair, so here's a way out.

How To: Set Multiple Timers on Your iPhone to Run Side by Side

Although the Clock app in iOS has undergone some design changes over the years, you still can't set more than one timer on your iPhone. Oddly enough, Apple's own HomePod speaker added this feature, mimicking the timer on Amazon's popular Echo smart speakers. Fortunately, through Apple's Shortcuts app, there's a clever hack to set multiple timers — without using a third-party timer app.

How To: 19 Tips for Making the Most of the Health App on Your iPhone

It's not easy staying fit and healthy these days with addicting phones, oversized portions, and long workdays, to name just a few things. To succeed, it takes work, commitment, and an understanding of your mind and body — and your iPhone can help you with some of that. While Apple pushed its Screen Time tool to help curb unhealthy smartphone habits, its "Health" app can help with everything else.

How To: The Ultimate Guide to Customizing Your iPhone's Home Screen Without Jailbreaking

Your iPhone is just that — yours. Why should your home screen look like everyone else's? While iOS, and by extension, Apple, famously locks its users into its way of doing things, there's a lot more room for customization than you'd think. Before you make the switch to Android, you might want to see what you can do with the iPhone you already have.

How To: Add Some Color to Your iPhone's Notification Banners for Easier Sorting

The iPhone's notification system has drastically improved over the years, but it could still use some work. The notifications, while useful, are all monochrome, making it hard to distinguish which app posted each alert, and that's not even mentioning the drab overall look. This is where jailbreak tweaks can come in handy.

How To: Track All Your Online Orders from One App

Shopping wasn't always this easy. Now, in a matter of minutes, you can order your groceries for the week, send your cracked phone in for repairs, get your holiday shopping done, and have everything delivered to your front door in just a few days — without ever having to leave your home. Online shopping is convenient, comfortable, and a blessing ... right? Well, it can also be a headache.

How To: Control Your iPhone Using Your Eyes

During the keynote at WWDC earlier this year, Apple introduced the latest iteration of its mobile operating system, iOS 12. Despite a thorough demo on stage, Apple glossed over new eye tracking features that use ARKit 2. Developers can now use the TrueDepth camera on the iPhone X, XS, XS Max, and XR to determine where your eyes are looking, opening up incredible new possibilities for new apps.

How To: Hide Notification Badges Without Actually Removing Them from Your iPhone's Home Screen

By default, there aren't many customization options for the notification badges on iPhones — you can either leave the numbered red bubbles there, or turn them off. But thanks to a new jailbreak tweak, you can now give your badges a unique look with new functionality.

Privacy 101: How to Prevent Apps from Accessing Your iPhone's Microphone

Any app on your iPhone could potentially listen in on your conversations and use that information to target you with tailored ads. Although most companies, including Facebook and Apple, have come out and vehemently denied these claims of spying on consumers, who's to say they're telling the truth? The only way to be sure you're safe is to take matters into your own hands.

How To: Get Android's Smart Lock Feature on Your iPhone

As great as passcode and biometric security features like Face ID are for preventing unwanted access, they aren't needed 100% of the time. When you're at home with a locked door between you and anyone you wouldn't trust with your phone, they really only serve to slow you down. Android has long had a solution for this, but a new Cydia tweak has now brought a similar solution to iPhones.

How To: Easily Store Your iPhone's Wi-Fi Passwords & Share Them with Anybody — Even Android Users

iOS 12 has a feature that lets you instantly share saved Wi-Fi passwords with other iPhone users, but it can be finicky when you're sharing with multiple people. Then there's an even more pressing question: How do you share your password with Android users? Thankfully, there's a Shortcut that can solve these problems.

How To: Use Face ID with Sunglasses On

The iPhone X introduced the world to Face ID in 2017, and now, every new iPhone uses Apple's biometric security system instead of the old Touch ID. It's more secure than fingerprint scanners and it's even more user-friendly. True, it's not without its faults, but at least one of the biggest problems can be fixed.