Freeform Is the Best IOS App You’re Not Using.
For starters, you get a whole host of Apple apps included with iOS and iPadOS, from FaceTime to Safari to Notes , with new ones arriving fairly regularly: the Journal app , for example, was added in iOS 17 .
Sometimes these new apps can go unnoticed, which brings us to the Freeform app that Apple introduced in iOS 16.2 . Apple describes it as a way to “bring your ideas to life”—essentially, it’s a digital whiteboard you can use for everything from research projects to travel planning.
Even though Freeform offers a lot of useful features, it doesn’t seem to get enough attention, so we’re going to tell you what the app can do on iPhone and how you can put it to good use. This.
Getting started with Freeform
Like other Apple apps, you can find Freeform on iPhone, iPad, and Mac, and all your work automatically syncs across devices thanks to the magic of iCloud. The app is built into various operating systems, but if you’ve uninstalled it for any reason, you can find the iOS and iPadOS version here .
Don’t be put off by the blank white canvas that appears when you first open the app—it’s just waiting for you to get creative. You need to click on the new board icon in the top right corner, which looks like some kind of writing instrument inside a square. The next screen you’ll see will be your new board: a blank page with a faint dotted grid.
Along the bottom are freeform tools for adding hand-drawn doodles, shapes, stickers, text boxes, and images to the canvas—tap any tool to use it and add something new to your workspace. You can move objects by clicking and dragging them, and you can resize them by clicking and dragging the handles in the corners and sides. To rotate something, place two fingers on it and then rotate your fingers.
If you need to select multiple items, touch and hold the canvas and then drag it. You can also touch and hold one item and then tap additional items to select them. Then, several alignment options appear at the bottom of the screen that you can use to bring order to the chaos. (You’ll also see on-screen tooltips when objects are aligned or matched.)
Freeform Key Tools
There’s a lot to learn with Freeform’s tools, but they’re all pretty easy to use. Tap the Pen tool (bottom left) and you’ll get a choice of pens, crayons, markers, and erasers. When one is selected, you get options for stroke size, opacity, and color. The dotted line pen is a selection tool that lets you select scribbles already on the page.
To the right of the Pen tool is the Note tool, and these notes work just like they do in real life. Double-tap a note to place text on top of it, and then tap and hold the note if you want to change its color or text format. Touch and hold a note, then tap the plus sign icon in the rectangle to quickly copy it.
To the right of the Scrapbook tool is the Shape tool, and there are a variety of shapes available to you. Use the categories at the top of the search box to find a shape to insert. As with notes, you can double-click a shape to add text to it, or long-press on a shape to change its properties, such as its color and its outline style.
The last two Freeform tools are the text box tool (for adding blocks of text) and the import tool on the far right – this allows you to upload any type of file from your iPhone, which can include images, videos, stickers, web links and even PDFs . These options really expand the capabilities of the Freeform app and the complexity of your boards.
Freeform features and options
Speaking of posting other items on your Freeform board, it’s easy to do from other apps on iOS—you can share anything with Freeform from almost anywhere. For example, if you want to post a link to a board from Safari, click the Share button at the bottom (the box with the up arrow) and then select Free Form.
We’ve written about aligning objects, but you can find more options by long-pressing an individual item on the board and then tapping the three dots in the pop-up panel. This gives you the ability to lock elements so they can’t be moved, duplicate elements, and change the way they stack on top of each other.
As your boards get busier, simply spread your fingers to zoom out, then tap and hold to scroll through them. You can also click the dotted rectangle icon (top right) to zoom in to fit the current selection or the entire board. board. From here you can also show or hide the dotted grid on the board.
This should give you some idea of how you can use Freeform to record ideas, plans, projects, and more. Using the three dots (top right), you can print your boards or export them as a PDF, and using the Share button at the top of the screen, you can share your boards with other people and collaborate on them.