The release of the iPhone 6 and the iPhone 6 Plus marks Apple’s first foray into larger smartphone screen territory. Apple’s decision to add more screen real estate is seen as a move to thwart the efforts of rival smartphone makers such as Samsung or HTC, who are attracting more and more of the market with their larger displays.
But is there anything more to the iPhone 6 and the iPhone 6 Plus’ larger screen size? Below are three nifty tricks that take advantage of the latest iPhone’s larger screen:
A. Display Zoom
With display zoom, users get to experience the full advantage of having a larger screen. This option allows two settings: Standard, which shows more content such as words in an email, or website elements, and Zoomed, which enlarges items such as text, icons, images, and more – perfect for those with poor eyesight.
To enable this feature, follow these easy steps:
1. Go to your phone’s Settings.
2. Tap Display & Brightness.
3. Tap Display Zoom.
4. Select either Standard or Zoomed.
5. Tap Set.
B. Reachability
Because of the iPhone 6’s larger screen size, some elements are now out of your thumb’s range when handling the smartphone using only one hand. Thankfully, Apple devised a way to make content at the top of the screen move towards the middle, for instances wherein you can only use one hand for your phone (like standing in a train, for example).
To make icons move down, follow these steps:
1. Double tap your phone’s home button (Don’t press it, as doing so will bring up the multitasking window. Tap the button the same way you select an app.)
2. The screen’s contents will move down, making anything previously unreachable now within range.
3. Select an item and the screen will revert back to normal.
Personally I have found this annoying and disabled it. Heh.
C. Landscape Orientation (iPhone 6 Plus Only)
For the first time, an iPhone’s homescreen can now be viewed in landscape mode, similar to the iPad. The landscape orientation was limited only to certain apps, but now even the default homescreen re-organizes itself to accommodate landscape mode – a feature that many users might find handy. In addition, built-in iOS apps such as Mail and Calendar also support landscape mode, allowing for new interfaces and different ways of displaying information.
Iphone 6 is really amazing and I always want to have one. I love the screen size, the speed and it’s over all performance especially the quality of the video’s and photo’s taken out from it.
In all fairness, every one of those features can be found on the much cheaper Samsung Galaxy line of phones, and in general are more flexible than the iPhone, and are far more user-customizable than the iPhones are.
On the other hand, a consistent phone with easy import and export between new models does give Apple the advantage on the returning customer market. But as a staunch Android user, I’m not making that switch, as I like money in my wallet and I don’t want anything to do with the iTunes app store.
There’s always so many different tap sequences and tricks for the iPhone and it’s difficult to remember everything. It certainly seems like accessibility has been a main consideration during the latest update though.
I’ll be honest. I have an Android phone so I don’t know much about the iPhone although I do have an iPad. However, I am surprised to hear that only now does the iPhone allow their home screen to be in landscape mode. I do have an Android app or two that doesn’t do landscape, but everything else seems to accommodate it just fine. It’s just odd to hear that an Apple product was a bit lagging in the landscape arena.
The new iPhone 6 tricks are amazing but the phone itself is horrible. I like how they added the landscape orientation which is appropriate because of the massive phone. I think Display Zoom is not that great because most of the time, you can zoom in anyway.
I agree with you, they went crazy with that size. Not practical at all to be honest. I prefer the iPhone 5, it was way more practical. The iPhone 6 plus of my friend reminds me more of a phablet than anything else. He says he loves it, but misses his iPhone 5, mostly because it was more comfy to hold in a single hand and answer calls right away with a single hand. I hope apple goes back to their senses soon.
I agree too! It actually does make complete sense and Apple need to truly get back to their senses because to be honest, on the market it’s quite obvious what’s going on recently.
Well, yes, I have to agree with you, the phone is unnecessarily big and as for me, it would be king of annoying carrying everywhere that huge thing. But I really liked the display zoom thing though, I think it would be helpful in order to get to see more content of a site, which can’t really be possible in other smallest phones, I guess.
That’s really awesome. I’ve never knew they existed haha, I will surely share it with my friends. Thank you for this post.
I thought this was a great post. To be honest I expected three iPhone tricks that I had read before, but these were unique. Especially reachability – I never considered this as an issue with large screens, now I will be more careful with my next mobile phone purchase. I would like to add that instead of zoom, the iPhone 6 user can enlarge the font.
I have already sent the link to this article to my friend who owns an iPhone 6, I think he will find this article super useful, because even though he has always owned several iPhones, I don’t think he knows those tricks… yet 😉 I’m sure he will appreciate them. As for me? Well, I own an android 🙂 But who knows, this article might come in handy one of these days.
Landscape orientation is such an intuitive and basic function, I’m honestly surprised that it took so long for it to be implemented!
The zoom function does sound a little redundant given the increased screen size.
I think that’s a great thing that they have used the size of the phone as an advantage. I include myself in the little group of people who don’t really appreciate the coma back of super large cell phones, mostly for how hard it would be to use it, but I think that this makes things easier for a lot of people. I also really liked the display zoom thing, sometimes it’s kind of annoying to lose some content of an internet site just because you’re on a mobile. They actually thought twice every little detail, that’s awesome.