This video is sponsored by Shortform
**Intro**
In this video, I’m going to share with you 10 tips about how to use your iPhone to get
things done more quickly, and save you time, and so in light of that, I’m going to keep
this intro very short and sweet.
Let’s get into it.
**Using the Spacebar as a Trackpad**
One of the great things about typing on your computer, is the ability to use the mouse
or touchpad to move your cursor to a specific point in the text when you need to make a
change, quickly and accurately.
Well, you can do that on your iPhone as well, and it’s actually really easy to do.
When typing, simply press and hold the space bar and then move your thumb around on the
screen.
As you do this, the cursor will move around the text field, allowing you to quickly move
around the text and make changes as needed.
In my experience, you can do this with pin-point accuracy, dropping the cursor exactly where
you need it, saving you a tonne of time in the process.
**Remove the last number in a calculation**
Is there anything as frustrating as getting part way through a complicated calculation
on your calculator, only to input the wrong number?
You’ve got no option but to cancel and start again, right?
Wrong, you can edit the number and carry on as usual, so long as you know what you’re
doing.
When in the calculator, simply swipe across the number display, and you’ll remove one
number at a time.
Keep doing this until you’ve removed enough to be able to carry on as usual.
It doesn’t matter if you swipe from left to right or right to left here by the way,
both swipes give the same result.
**Make use of Control Center**
Control Center is a feature on your iPhone that allows you to quickly access important
settings and functions.
With just a swipe up from the bottom of your screen, or a swipe down from the top right
of your screen on a phone like the iPhone 14, you can access the Control Center and
quickly turn on or off the torch or flashlight, whatever you call it, adjust the brightness
of your screen, control music playback, you can access frequently used apps, like the
calculator and the camera, without having to go to the home screen.
You can also use it to connect to Wi-Fi networks or toggle Airplane mode on or off with just
a tap.
Control Center is fully customisable, so you can add or remove shortcuts to the features
you use most, and you would do this by going to Settings, then scrolling down until you
see Control Centre, and tapping in there.
This screen is essentially split into two, with the section up at the top called Included
Controls, and that’s where you can view the functions you’ve already got included
in Control Centre, while down at the bottom you have More Controls, and these are the
options you can choose to add.
To add a function, simply tap the green plus next to it, and it will be added to your Control
Center.
**Shortform Integration**
Before we continue, a quick mention of the sponsor of today’s video, Shortform.
Shortform is a service that takes non-fiction books and turns them into easy to digest book
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I recently discovered a book on how we build habits around technology and become addicted
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Shortform's book summaries are written by a team of experienced writers and editors
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But it’s not just technology books you’ll find on the site.
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As a subscriber, you can even influence future drops by voting for which books you’d like
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If you’re interested, you can get a 5-day free trial, as well as 20% off your membership
by joining Shortform through my link, which you can see here on the screen, and you’ll
find in the description of this video.
**Make use of Widgets**
There are going to be some things on your iPhone that you don’t need to interact with,
you just need to quickly view, maybe the calendar or a list that you use often, or perhaps the
weather, and in those cases, adding a widget to your Home screen could be a great time
saver.
To see which widgets are available for your device, and to add widgets in, do the following.
From the Home Screen, tap and hold for a moment to go into what’s known as jiggle mode,
where all of the apps on your home screen will begin to jiggle about.
You’ll then see a plus icon in the top left of the screen.
Tap on this, then scroll down.
Many Apple first party apps offer widgets, apps like Mail, Calendar, Weather, Find My,
there are loads to choose from here, but third party apps may also offer widgets as well.
It’s really a case of scrolling through and seeing if anything here takes your fancy.
When you find an app you’re interested in adding, tap to see the options available to
you.
Again, this will vary depending on the app, but many apps will offer widgets of different
sizes, some only taking up a couple of app squares, some taking up half your screen,
so you can pick and choose and find something that works for you.
You may also find that, when you’ve added a widget, whilst still in jiggle mode, if
you tap on the widget, you can change some of the options associated with that widget.
So for example, if I add the world clock widget, and then tap on the widget whilst in jiggle
mode, I then have the option to choose which cities to include, and what order they should
be in.
This of course allows for really detailed customisation of widgets, so you can find
ones that work for you and your requirements.
**Make use of Force Touch**
Force Touch is a feature on newer iPhones that allows you to interact with your phone
in a more intuitive and efficient way.
The way that you do this will depend on the model of phone that you’re using.
On the iPhone XS for example, you would do this by applying more pressure on the screen
as you push down on an app tile.
On an iPhone like the 14 Pro, you would do this simply by tapping and holding on an app
tile for just a second, until you feel the haptic feedback tap of the screen.
Force Touch allows you to access hidden menus, preview content, and more.
Force Touch can save you tiny amounts of time, but used often, that saved time can add up.
So here for example, with the Mail app, rather than me tapping to open the Mail app, then
tapping on the New Mail button, I can use Force Touch to bring up this contextual menu,
then choose New Message.
Or here on Twitter, if I want to create a new tweet.
Not all apps have Force Touch functionality, but many do, and you should have a look to
see if an app you use supports it.
**PDF Shoutout**
By the way, if you prefer to have content like this in a written format, there’s a
PDF to accompany this video, and you can access it by joining my membership programme, where
for a small monthly fee, you’ll get access to all video PDFs moving forward, plus the
growing library of old ones.
Just follow the link in the description of this video that says ‘Become a Channel Member’.
**Use Spotlight Search**
Spotlight search is a handy feature that is available on every iPhone and it can save
you a lot of time.
With this feature, you can search for anything on your device including contacts, emails,
files and apps, all in one place.
Simply swipe down from the middle of your home screen or press the Home button on older
devices, or if you’re using iOS16 or newer, you should be able to tap the Search button
at the bottom of your Home screen.
Then simply start typing your query.
The results will appear instantly, and you can tap on any result to go straight to that
app or file.
So here for example, if I type in the term ‘contract’, at the top you can see that
I can search the web for that term, or associated terms, but then below that are any files in
the Files app that contain the word contract, further down that there are settings, and
right down at the bottom I can even search within a specific app.
**Text Replacements**
We all spend a lot of time typing things on our iPhones, and we’ve probably all got
certain words or phrases that we type out quite often.
It would make sense therefore, to be able to type out these words or phrases at the
push of a button or two, and Text Replacement allows you to do exactly that.
Text replacement is a feature that allows you to replace a short code with a longer
phrase or sentence.
So a really common example that people use, is being able to type the phrase ‘@@’, and
that would automatically swap out for your email address.
You can use this for whatever you like though.
You can set up text replacements by going to the Settings app on your iPhone, tapping
on "General," then "Keyboard," and then "Text Replacement."
From there, you can add new text replacements by typing in the phrase and shortcut of your
choice.
**The Proper Weekly**
By the way, if you’re enjoying the content here, why not consider signing up to my newsletter,
the proper weekly.
I include some tech news from the week, a behind the scenes of what’s happening here
on the channel, as well as a tip for an item in the Apple ecosystem.
The newsletter goes out each Friday, it’s free to join, and I’ll include a signup
link in the description of this video.
**Scan and sign documents with your iPhone’s camera**
The world is slowly but surely going digital, but there will still be times where you’ll
be expected to a sign a document and send it on.
You can do this entirely on your iPhone if you wish, without the need for a printer or
a pen or even paper.
First up, take a picture of the document.
My recommendation would be to use the Notes app to do this, as you can take a scan of
the image with your phone, rather than a photo.
Open Notes, create a new Note, then tap the Camera button, and choose Scan Documents.
Position the document flat on a contrasting background, and tap the shutter button to
take the scan.
On the next screen, you can adjust the borders of the scan, and either retake it, or choose
Keep Scan.
Then choose Save, to insert the scan into the note.
With that done, you’re then going to want to tap on the PDF that’s been created, and
then tap on the Share button.
In the Share Sheet, choose Markup.
Tap the plus button in the lower right of the screen, and then choose Signature.
If you’re doing this for the first time, you’ll be prompted to insert your signature
using your finger.
You might find it easier to rotate your phone to landscape mode to do this, and you can
pinch and push to zoom in and out as you wish.
When you press Done, your signature will be inserted.
You can then move it around on the document, and resize it as you need to, to get it exactly
where you need it to be.
**Long Press back buttons**
If you ever find yourself getting quite deep into the menus of Settings on your iPhone,
or perhaps you’re browsing the web, and you want to jump back several pages, rather
than tapping the back button multiple times, simply tap and hold for a second.
The available back pages will show in a list, and you simply tap the one that you want to
get to.
Your iPhone will jump you right there.
**Quick take a video**
How many times have you opened your camera app wanting to take a video, but your camera
app is in the Photo option?
It takes a moment for you to realise, then you have to swipe across to the video mode,
and by that time it’s possible that whatever you were trying to catch a video of has been
and gone.
Try this instead.
When you open the camera app, and you find that it’s set to Photos, tap and hold on
the shutter button for a moment.
Your iPhone will begin recording video, rather than taking a picture.
You can either let go once you’ve finished recording the video, or if you want to record
for longer, simply swipe from left to right to lock the shutter button in place, and then
your iPhone will operate exactly as it would have if you’d gone to the video mode, and
started recording.
******End******
So there you go, 10 tips for saving you time on your iPhone.
What do you think, any time saving tips that should have been included in this video?
Drop me a comment and let me know.
And as ever, if you found this video useful, do please consider leaving me a like, and
subscribing to my channel for more content like this in the future.
See you on the next video.