How to customize your home screen with iOS 18

Apple’s iOS 18 public beta was recently released, and those brave enough to install it on their iPhone can now check out the latest features, including all sorts of detailed ways to customize your home screen, ahead of the global release.

One of the frustrating ways in which iOS lags behind Android is in home screen customization. Sure, iPhone users have widgets and third-party theming options, but until iOS 18, nothing Apple has really done has come close to how Android lets users customize their home screen. Thankfully, with the iOS 18 public beta, there is some light at the end of this long tunnel. Apple now gives iPhone users the ability to fully customize their home screen to reflect their personality and preferences.

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If you have the iOS 18 public beta installed on your device, here are all the ways you can customize your home screen. If you’re planning on playing it safe until later this year (and we don’t blame you), keep these tips in mind.

Here’s all the ways to customize your Home Screen using iOS 18.

Express yourself with new color palettes

Change the app’s hue and color gamut to match your background

Apple / Pocket-lint

iOS 18 lets you interact with and change the colors of your apps. A new menu option lets you turn on dark mode for your apps to give them a darker background. You can also change the color of your app icons using the “Tint” option. iOS 18 offers a full color spectrum and gradient sliders.

To change the app color:

• Press and hold On the home screen, tap to enable Shake mode.
• “edit“ It will appear in the top left corner of the display.
• Hit “Customize” Show the new menu.
• “Colored” Options on the right side of the screen.

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Then scroll the gradient slider to choose a color that suits your style and wallpaper. If you want it to sync up even more with your background, you can use the eyedropper to choose from colors that stand out against your background.

It’s a really great option that comes with iOS 18, and I was able to come up with some great and satisfying styles. Moreover, having the dark mode option for app backgrounds also improves the look of your home screen. It makes it more flexible and supports a variety of possibilities. Moreover, the dark option might help you save a little bit of your phone’s battery while using it.

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Organize and grow your apps

Staying on the grid

Apple / Pocket-lint

In addition to the new options to beautify your home screen, iOS 18 also lets you arrange and scale your apps. This is advantageous for those who have an attractive design or photo as their wallpaper and want to avoid cluttering the image with apps. The ability to scale and remove app labels also helps to organize clutter on your home screen.

Nothing has changed in terms of how you can better arrange your app icons. The only difference is that the icons no longer snap into place on the screen. Now you enter a jiggle mode, where you can move the app wherever there is free space on the screen. It will snap into place instead of jumping to the last free space. It’s still a bit buggy and a bit hard to use, as the grid still doesn’t allow full freedom of movement, so you can accidentally move an app from its intended location just by moving another app.

In the same menu where you change the app color, you can enlarge the app icon. Note that when you do this, the app label text will be gone, so act on your intuition and knowledge of the app icon. Other than that, the icons with large text have a cleaner look. For anyone wanting a more minimalist look for their home screen, this is definitely something you should use as soon as possible.

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More controls and options at your fingertips

Apple / Pocket-lint

iOS 18 gives you more power over how widgets and apps are displayed on your home screen. Since widgets were introduced in iOS 14, there have been few customization options available. In iOS 18 public beta, Apple has brought support for new tile icons, making it easier to choose size options. When you long-press on a widget, small icons that identify different widget sizes appear.

Some apps and widgets offer four options, ranging from a standard app icon to a small tile, a long tile, or a large tile that takes up most of the screen. Each displays a different amount of information and context. Which one works best for you depends on your preferences and how much screen space you’re willing to sacrifice in exchange.

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iOS 18 also gives you the ability to change app icons. This is a bit of a complicated customization option, but if you miss the old Twitter logo, this is your chance to use it in your X-app. To do this, you’ll need to have the app’s icon or image saved on your device beforehand. Then you can:

• open Shortcuts App.
• “+‘Icon and”Add Action”
• Type “Open the appSelect ” ” and then “Open the app“Action.
• “Apps‘ option and select the app you want to customize.
• “Add to Home ScreenClick ” ” to rename the shortcut to anything you like.
• under Home Screen Name and iconSelect the photo you want to use.
• Hit “choose” after that “addition”

As you know, app icon customization is still a bit buggy in iOS 18 public beta. Changing something on the home screen often causes apps to revert to their default icons. After testing the customization options for this article, I might give up on using them until the global software release. I think this will become popular among the iPhone user community if properly integrated.

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