iOS 13 Made Searching Much Faster in iPhone Apps

Your iPhone is full of search bars. Messages, Notes, Photos, Reminders ... these apps and more allow you to search for specific items to speed up whatever it is you're doing. But the fastest way to search in iOS might not be by typing.

When you update your iPhone to iOS 13, nearly every search bar in both the OS and stock apps comes equipped with a dictation icon (aka the microphone). Tap this, and iOS will immediately boot up dictation, allowing you to start speaking your search right away. In the past, this option was exclusive to the keyboard, requiring an extra tap to reach the option. Now, things are that much faster. Just know, if this is your first time using dictation, you'll need to tap "Enable Dictation" after tapping the icon to proceed.

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While this new dictation option is found throughout iOS 13 as a whole, there are still many areas it's missing. Safari's search bar doesn't feature the dictation icon, and you won't find it in most third-party apps. Where it doesn't appear, you'll just need to rely on the keyboard's dictation icon for your voice-controlled search queries.

Cover image, screenshots, and GIF by Jake Peterson/Gadget Hacks