How Does Shortcuts App Work On iPhone?

Apple offers shortcuts app for you to download on your iPhone.  This app is one of the most useful features in an iPhone. As it gives you ‘Shortcuts’ to several features without searching for it and wasting your precious time. Shortcuts can be launched from the Today widget, from Search or by asking Siri. You can even add an app icon to your home screen for your favorite Shortcuts. 

As this app works with assistant Siri and delivers a quick way to get things done with your apps with just a tap or by asking Siri. The Shortcuts app enables you to create personal shortcuts with multiple steps from your favorite apps. Start from hundreds of examples in the Gallery or drag and drop to create your own. 

Shortcuts includes over 300 built-in actions and works with many of your favorite apps including Contacts, Calendar, Maps, Music, Photos, Camera, Reminders, Safari, Health as well as any app that supports Siri Shortcuts. 

Features of Shortcuts app

• You can get directions home, send your ETA and start listening to the news, just by asking Siri
• Also add a home screen icon that calls a loved one 
• Make animated GIFs
• Make PDFs from Safari or any app with a share sheet
• Get directions to the nearest coffee shop in one tap
• Tweet the song you’re listening to
• Get all of the images on a web page
• Send a message including the last screenshot you took

What all can you do with shortcuts app?

Shortcuts opens up incredible possibilities to automate things you do regularly on your iPhone and iPad. 

• You can easily search and share GIF and if you are chatter on whatsapp or messenger or any other instant messaging platform. You can use the ‘Search GIPHY and Share’ feature in Shortcuts. This lets you simply type the word, get the GIFs related to it and directly share it on any platform that you like.
• You can make a playlist of your favourite songs  you can ‘Make Top 25 Playlist’ feature in Shortcuts, you can create a playlist of your most listened track in your Music app. This widget auto-generates a playlist of what it thinks are the top tracks in your profile.
• You can move your phone go into silence mode until you leave a location using the ‘DND Until I Leave’ feature in Shortcuts. You can put your iPhone to DND mode at once instead of scrolling through those Settings menu. One tap on the feature will turn on the mode until you physically leave that current location.
• If you shop then make a quick reminder or a shopping list. Using ‘Remind Me at Work’ feature in Shortcuts, you can get a reminder about certain things when you hit a pre-selected workplace. Like if you set your workplace to a grocery store and add your shopping list, the feature will remind you about the items that you need to buy when it detects you in that location.
• Also you can quickly tell someone your ETA. On the tap of a button, you can tell someone when you will be reaching a location, in Shortcuts. The ‘Home ETA’ feature simply takes your current location; calculates how far you are from the pre-selected address and calculates the time when you will reach that location. This is then messaged to the pre-selected contact automatically.

Though these shortcuts are superb for the iPhone owner, if you want you can even hide apps on an iPhone especially if you don’t use those apps often. You can clear the apps from the home screen and look neat and clean. To hide apps on the iPhone you have to create a folder for a few apps and push the apps you want like a game to the second page of the folder. Then, the apps won’t be visible on your home screen.

You first need to create a folder and you can do this by tapping and holding down on an app and dragging it on top of another app. This will create a folder with those two apps. Once you see that the folder has been created, you can release the app. You can add as many apps to the folder that you want. The folder will be automatically named by your phone, but you can change this by clicking on the text above the folder after you create it.

Now, drag the app that you want to hide into the folder you just created. Tap and hold the app to drag it into the new folder, just like you did in the last step to create the folder.

If you wish to hide more than one app, drag it into the folder too.

Next, open the folder and tap and hold the app you want to hide. While keeping your finger on it, drag it to the right side of the folder. A new page of the folder will be created and your app will move to it. Let go of the app to make it stay on the second page of the folder.

Now to hide more than one app, drag it into the folder for all of the apps you want hidden. As you create more pages in your folder you’ll see multiple dots appear at the bottom of the screen. Those dots indicate how many pages are in your folder and you can swipe right or left to navigate between them.

Then, when you return to your home screen, only the apps on the first page of the folder will be visible.

iPhone iOS 14 update

With Apple’s latest software you can hide entire app pages for a simpler and cleaner iPhone interface.

All you need is to Tap and hold down (or long-press) on a blank area of your screen.

When the widgets start to wiggle tap the app page dot icons at the bottom of the screen. All of your app pages will then appear on your screen.

Now click the circle with the check mark under the app page you want to hide so that it is unchecked.

Next Tap Done in the top right hand corner to save your changes.

Now, the app page won’t appear when you swipe through the pages on your homescreen. You can reverse this feature at any time by repeating the steps above and checking off the app page that was hidden.

 If you change your mind at any point you can move the apps out of the folder or rearrange their order however you like.

Now use these wonderful Shortcut Apps and see how apps work and if you feel to hide the apps you can do so as well.