Joy to the world, the time has come! You may have heard by now that the wait is finally over for iPhone users. The newest iOS release, iOS 16, included massive progress in the realm of customization and easy app access.
For a long time now, iPhone users have felt excluded from creating a truly unique display for their devices. Meanwhile, other smart phones, Androids in particular, allowed for interactive home screen buttons, dynamic lock screens, and featured content from apps developed externally and downloaded by users.
In this segment, we’re working through the long awaited world of widgets. In this article: What are Widgets?
A widget is a small, interactive, and customizable element that can be added to your Home or Lock screen. With iOS 16, you can add widgets to your iPhone for quick access to information and shortcuts.
Widgets come in all shapes and sizes, and can be customized to display the information you want. You can add a widget for apps like wWeather, News, Stocks, Calendar, Notes, just to name a few of the pre-downloaded Apple options.
To add a widget, long press on an empty area of your Home or Lock screen, as if you were going to rearrange or delete apps. When the apps all start to shake, you should see a “+” in the top corner of your iPhone screen. Tap the “+” button to open the Widget Gallery. From here, you can browse through all of the available widgets. Some apps from the App Store have widgets, but not all of them. In a following article, we’ll go over some of the best options for apps that offer widgets.
When you decide on which app you want to display on your home screen, there may also be options for style and content of the widget. You can swipe over the widget’s preview to view each of the options. When you’re ready, tap “Add Widget” to add it to your screen. Can’t decide which Calendar widget you want? You don’t have to! You can add as many widgets as you’d like. You can even add multiple of the same widget, or one on every page of your home screen.
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Home screen and Notification Center widgets have been around for a little while, but were very limited. They’re now interactive and dynamic and have much more to offer. The real hype around the newest release are the Lock Screen widgets.
This new feature is in its infancy, so it’s quite limited. Right now the lock screen really only allows for the addition of 4 square widgets or 2 rectangular widgets. But you can customize your clock and the information directly on top of it to display, which is pretty rad.
For Lock Screen Widgeting:
To start, press and hold on your Lock Screen, just like you did on your Home Screen. When it goes into editing mode, the space where widgets can go are indicated by the rectangular outlines on the screen.
For example, there’s now an outline around the clock display to indicate that that is its own widget that can be changed. If you then tap anywhere within that space, it’ll go into it editing menu.
to add a new widget, simply tap the “+” button. This will bring up a list of all the available widgets that you can add to your Lock screen.
To delete a widget, tap the “-” button.
To rearrange the widgets (within their designated space) just tap and hold on a widget, then drag to its desired home.
Now, go explore which widgets your iPhone has to offer! Check back later for more tips and tricks for making your iPhone work for you.
Need to know more now? Follow this link to find Apple’s how-to on widget-ing.
Or click here for the iPhone Users Guide chapter on widgets.
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