All the Hidden IOS Gestures and Shortcuts You Might Have Forgotten
IOS is packed with tons of useful gestures , but some of the best are the ones that are useful when you need them but don’t use them every day. Here are a few of our favorite hidden gestures and shortcuts that are exactly what you need when you need them.
Press and hold the “+” in Safari to reopen recently closed tabs.
Have you accidentally closed a tab in Safari? You can open a list of all recently closed tabs by pressing and holding the “+” icon in a new tab. A combo box will appear so you can select it to open in a new tab.
Tap the bottom of the screen to open the Safari toolbar.
When you scroll down on a page in Safari, the toolbars disappear for an unobstructed view. It’s common knowledge that you can reopen the URL bar simply by tapping the top of the page, but you can also return to the bottom menu by simply tapping the bottom of the screen.
Press and hold the refresh button to reload the site without ad blockers
If you are using an ad blocker on iOS , you know that sometimes they can mess up your page load. Luckily, you don’t have to turn off your ad blocker just to fix one web page. Just press and hold the refresh button in the URL bar and you will see a popup asking you to reload the site without a blocker.
Touch and hold tabs to reorder
If you want to keep the tabs organized, you can easily change their order. Open a tab tab (on iPad, tabs are at the top of the screen), touch and hold the top of a tab, then swipe to move it to the desired location. You need to hold your finger down for about a second before you can move the tab, so be patient.
Swipe down on the photo to return to viewing the album
When viewing pictures in the Photos app, you can swipe left or right to scroll through them, and usually press the Back button to return to viewing the album. However, it is usually much faster to simply swipe down on the photo to return to browsing the album.
Swipe your finger across the screen to select multiple images in your photos. Select some photos.
If you want to select multiple photos at once in the Photos app, you don’t need to touch each photo individually. Just tap the Select button, tap and hold any photo, then swipe to select multiple photos at once. Now you can move them to folders, delete or do whatever you want.
Tap the top or bottom of the screen in photos for instant scrolling
If you have a lot of pictures in the Photos app, don’t slide your finger endlessly across the screen to see them all. You can instantly scroll your collection up or down by clicking on the top or bottom of the screen, respectively.
Pinch your fingers to zoom in or out on videos
Most people don’t think they can zoom in on videos, but you can. Just use the old zoom gesture we are all used to for photographs.
Swipe vertically through songs and videos to change the scrolling speed
Fast-forwarding a podcast or long audio track is a slight issue with the default clear speed, but when you press and hold the slider, you can slide your finger up or down to scroll through the song exactly, quarter, or half speed. This makes it much easier to get exactly where you want on the audio track.
Press and hold the 123 key on the keyboard to enter a character.
Everyone knows that you can switch to the numeric and character keyboards by pressing the 123 button. But if you just need to select one number or symbol (for example, the @ sign in an email address or the ampersand in a sentence), quickly press and hold the 123 icon, and then slide your finger to the character you want. After you select it, the keyboard will automatically return to the alphabet.
Swipe left or right to delete numbers in the calculator
Typed in your calculator? You don’t have to start over like a regular calculator, just swipe left or right on the numbers to delete them.
Force refresh the app store by tapping the tab bar 10 times
If the App Store freezes, freezes, or never loads, you can go ahead and force close, but it’s quicker to do a forced update. Just tap any icon at the bottom of the screen 10 times and it will reload the App Store.
Swipe down in mail to minimize compose window
When you compose an email in Mail, you may need to go back and double-check something in your inbox. You can save what you’ve done as a draft, or you can simply swipe down on the email to collapse it so you can move through the rest of the mail. When you’re done, just tap the draft at the bottom of the screen to upload it back.
Tap with two fingers to zoom out on maps
You probably know that you can zoom in on Maps in preset increments by double-tapping the screen. To zoom out, just tap with two fingers. It’s much easier than pinching and pulling.
Tap-Tap-Swipe in Google Maps for one-handed zoom
While this is not an Apple app, it is still worth mentioning as Google Maps is so popular. If you want to zoom in when using Google Maps with one hand, just double-tap and hold your finger, then swipe up and down to adjust the zoom.