The First Seven Tweaks You Should Make in IOS 18
Android has always had a reputation for being a highly customizable mobile OS. If you like tinkering with your phone, this is the place for you. If you prefer a more curated experience, you choose Apple. However, the latter has made it easier to customize iOS over the years, and it just so happens that iOS 18 introduces a lot of new ways to choose how your iPhone looks and works. In some ways, Apple’s iPhone has never looked more like Android.
Customize your home screen
Apple has dabbled in Home screen customization over the years: with iOS 14 , for example, users went crazy creating their own app icons to give their Home screen a personalized look.
But iOS 18 brings some new changes that weren’t seen on the iPhone before. For the first time, you can place app icons anywhere . Until now, Apple forced you to follow a strict grid pattern that starts at the top left corner of the Home screen unless you used clever workarounds to get your apps where you wanted them. Now you can simply place app icons anywhere you want.
When you first place an app on a new Home screen page, it may snap to the top left corner. But from here, drag it to the desired location and release it. It will still be grid-aware, so you won’t be able to play it literally anywhere. But you have a choice: essentially any four places in a row and as many rows as will fit on the main screen.
Once your app icons are where you want them, you can work on their appearance. If you long press on the home screen until you enter edit mode, tap Edit in the top left corner and select Customize . In iOS 18, you can now optionally give all your apps a dark theme or automatically switch based on the system theme. You can also tint these apps any color to make all your apps look blue, orange, or red. In the same menu, you can also increase the size of your applications, and their shortcuts will be removed. You can find out more in our complete guide here .
Hide your apps
If you don’t want to see certain apps on the Home screen, Apple already allowed you to remove them in previous versions of iOS since you can always access them from the App Library. However, if you want this app to be completely hidden, you can do so after updating to iOS 18 .
Just long press the app you want and select Require Face ID . When prompted, select Hide and Require Face ID . You’ll again be prompted for instructions on what you’re doing, but simply click “Hide App” to move it to the new Hidden Apps folder. You can find this app and any others you’re hiding by swiping left on the Home screen until you reach the App Library, then scrolling down to the hidden folder.
Edit your Control Center
Apple has let you customize Control Center for years , but only lets you select the tiles that appear under the Default options at the top. This year, however, Apple is handing over the reins to you: you can change almost everything in Control Center to suit your needs.
Don’t like the network options in the top left corner? Get rid of them. If you want to enlarge the Now Playing window so you can quickly control audio playback, do so. For the first time, you can turn off the volume and brightness sliders, orientation lock, alert toggle, and focus field. You can also change the size of any of the custom tiles: there are no additional features, but you can click a larger button.
All you have to do to get started is open Control Center and click (+) in the top left corner. For more information on setting up Control Center in iOS 18, follow our guide here .
Select shortcuts for your lock screen
In iOS 18, you can choose your own shortcuts on the lock screen or remove them completely. No more accidentally turning on the flashlight or taking your iPhone out of your pocket to find the camera is on.
To do this, open the lock screen editor by long-pressing your lock screen wallpaper, then select Customize . Tap Lock Screen and notice the shortcuts in the bottom left and right corners. To remove any of them, click the (-) button. To customize them, tap the icon itself after removing it: you have a choice of what to place here. Most of the options are the same as other Control Center tiles, such as alarms, timers, calculator, etc., but there are many others. Third-party apps may also create options, including Instagram if you need a shortcut to the camera in the app for quick posting.
For more information on customizing your lock screen , check out our full article here .
Select what you see in the Photos app.
Apple’s new Photos app will be controversial. The company has changed the overall design and layout of the photos, which some may like, but others may find confusing.
The good news is that you can customize almost every category presented in the new Photos channel, including which categories actually appear and in what order they appear. If you don’t want to see Wallpaper Suggestions , uncheck the box. If you want to view your featured photos first, drag them up using the hamburger menu. Reorder and tweak these categories until the Photos app is just the way you like it, or as close to what you like as possible.
Set up your fitness summary
If you use the Fitness app, you can now customize your summary to see specific stats, goals, coach tips, Fitness+ recommendations, and more.
To edit your summary, open the app, then scroll down and select Edit Summary . The various cards on the screen will start to shake like app icons, and you can move or delete the ones you no longer want to see. For example, if you don’t subscribe to Fitness+, there’s no need to keep a big card on your resume. You can use the (+Add) button in the top left corner to view and add new cards to your summary.
Perhaps you want to see your fitness trends at the top of the page; maybe you want number of steps and distance of steps instead. The only thing you can’t customize is the Activity Ring card: it’s always pinned to the very top.
Click back with any emoji you want
When you update to iOS 18, you’ll notice that the six tapback options in messages—heart, thumbs up, thumbs down, laugh, exclamation point, and question mark—have been changed. However, swipe the screen and you’ll instead see six emojis that you can use as reactions. If none of the options here work for you, tap the gray emoji icon to open the entire emoji keyboard. If you have stickers , you can even react with them. It’s not quite the same as customizing other parts of iOS, but hey: custom is custom.