4 of one of the best obscure iPhone options you are not utilizing

Apple touts many

iPhone
options from the hills, no matter how vital they’re in apply. Contemplate the

Camera Control
button on the

iPhone 16
, for instance — I largely solely use it for opening the Digital camera app, taking a shot, and adjusting zoom, and a few folks do not use it in any respect. This kind of factor is to be anticipated, although, because it’s within the nature of capitalism to assert any benefit you’ll be able to over the competitors.

Sometimes, nonetheless, Apple does introduce options that obtain little if any advertising and marketing regardless of being genuinely helpful. That additionally is smart in its personal method, as a result of a number of the issues that make a product higher aren’t essentially simple to promote by way of TV commercials and roadside billboards. These are a number of the extra obscure iPhone options I like — your individual record might range.

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1

Again Faucet

Like Double Faucet in your iPhone

Again Faucet is much like the Double Faucet gestures Apple launched with the Apple Watch Collection 9 and Extremely 2, letting you employ movement gestures to set off instructions as a substitute of clicking a button or utilizing a touchscreen. Arguably, it is higher — particularly since you’ll be able to assign your individual customized capabilities everytime you double- or triple-tap the again of your iPhone, resembling turning on the flashlight, taking a screenshot, or opening Management Heart.

Why have not you heard a lot — if something — about Double Faucet? For one, Again Faucet continues to be thought-about an “accessibility” characteristic, meant to simplify iPhone use for folks with bodily impairments. The opposite is that you need to flip it on manually by going to Settings > Accessibility > Contact > Again Faucet. It is off by default, presumably as a result of it might be all too simple to set off instructions unintentionally in the event you had been unaware of the characteristic’s existence. How typically do you drum on one thing once you’re bored?

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2

ChatGPT integration into Siri

Lastly, Siri can really let you know in regards to the Mongols

Apple / Pocket-lint

Till iOS 18.2, Siri was notoriously dangerous at answering data questions. It might reply some apparent ones, resembling who the US President was or what the climate was going to be like, however too typically it might throw up its fingers or ask you to faucet on an online hyperlink — even in the event you had been speaking to a HomePod. Actually, that is nonetheless how questions work on Apple’s sensible audio system.

iOS 18.2 added ChatGPT integration for iPhones with Apple Intelligence, particularly the iPhone 16 sequence and the iPhone 15 Professional. So in the end, in the event you ask a fancy query, Siri can produce a solution with out making you go some place else for it. You might have to attend a second whereas Siri contacts OpenAI’s servers, however it nonetheless makes the assistant really feel much more highly effective. You may even make it generate photos in some conditions, resembling Messages.

Apple does really promote this characteristic a bit, however solely within the context of different Apple Intelligence choices. It is most likely none too wanting to shine the highlight on a product it is not liable for, and it is trying to recruit different AI companions too, resembling Google.

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3

Altering default apps

Use your most popular on a regular basis instruments

Apple would favor that you simply use its personal apps each time attainable, however it additionally lives in the actual world — different apps are generally extra fashionable, and antitrust lawsuits can (and do) preserve its conduct in test. In the event you go to Settings > Apps > Default Apps, you’ll be able to select your individual preferences for issues like e mail, net looking, translation, and passwords. In some nations, a minimum of, you’ll be able to even select a substitute for Apple Pockets for dealing with NFC transactions.

The principle catch right here, other than attainable regional restrictions, is that some apps you’d suppose can be selectable merely aren’t. Google Translate cannot be chosen as a substitute for Apple Translate, as an illustration, despite the fact that it is undoubtedly extra widespread. Keep watch over this characteristic — the gates could also be compelled all the best way open by legislators sooner or later. You would not tolerate a Home windows PC that locked out Chrome and Firefox, in spite of everything.

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4

Textual content Alternative

Create shortcuts and repair shortcomings

Plenty of human communication includes the repetition of inventory expressions. That is not a judgment of the species — that is simply how language works. As a result of expressions like “see ya” and “on my method” are so commonplace, they’re loaded with which means, and we do not have to trouble formulating a brand new phrase every time we talk the identical common idea. You’d suppose somebody was losing their time in the event that they mentioned “I sit up for seeing you once more after I return to work tomorrow morning” earlier than heading out to their automobile.

To avoid wasting much more time, when typing a minimum of, you’ll be able to go to Settings > Common > Keyboard > Textual content Alternative and generate shortcuts that mechanically swap in your most used expressions. Utilizing “omw” to set off “on my method” is an apparent instance, however I might probably use “@rf” to insert one thing like my e mail deal with, cellphone quantity, or Bluesky deal with. In a really perfect world, I might have the ability to share an entire contact card, however that is not right here simply but.

NameDrop
can do one thing related if each folks have an iPhone (and so they’re standing proper subsequent to one another).

An fascinating trick Apple helps is utilizing Textual content Alternative to pressure iOS to not change one thing, say if it is a bit overzealous about “correcting” product names, tune names, or swear phrases. Within the Textual content Alternative menu, you merely enter a phrase or sentence into the Phrase discipline, however go away Shortcut clean. Actually, that is one among my largest pet peeves about iOS, so I am reminded that I ought to sit down someday and enter a flurry of latest shortcuts. At some point, iOS will cease attempting to right me in regards to the obscure ambient and industrial bands I like from locations like England and Germany.

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