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New in iOS 18: Ultimate Home Screen Personalization!
Mar 11, 2025
iOS 18 is set to revolutionize home screen customization with new personalization options! 🎨📱 Now, iPhone users can change app icon colors and freely position icons anywhere on the screen. No more rigid grids—embrace a truly personalized experience. Learn all about these exciting updates and how they can transform your iPhone usage. Timestamps: 0:00 – iOS 18 to introduce new home screen personalization options 0:03 – Change app icon colors on the home screen 0:09 – Place icons anywhere, breaking free from the grid 0:29 – Mark Gurman’s insights on app icon customization 1:03 – Current limitations and potential of new features 2:05 – Speculations on AI-powered customization 3:14 – Benefits of non-grid icon placement 4:26 – Comparison with Android’s customization features 5:22 – Future possibilities for iPhone home screen design Don't miss out on the latest iOS updates! Subscribe to our channel for more tech news and in-depth reviews. 🚀🔔 More Apple news: http://www.cultofmac.com Follow us! Twitter: https://twitter.com/cultofmac
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0:00
iOS 18 could bring new home screen
0:02
personalization options iOS 18 will
0:04
reportedly let iPhone users change app
0:07
icon colors on the home screen plus
0:10
you'll finally be able to put icons
0:11
anywhere you want you won't have to
0:13
follow the rigid irritating annoying
0:15
grid of like every icon has to go left
0:18
to right top to bottom you know it Jesus
0:20
it's it's 2024 you can finally do that
0:23
in a few weeks you know it they they
0:26
couldn't work it out until now um in
0:30
edition of power on of the power on
0:31
newsletter Bloomberg's Mark Gman says he
0:33
thinks users will be able to quote
0:36
change the color of app icons um for
0:39
instance you can make all your social
0:40
icons blue or Finance related ones green
0:44
they won't need to be and they won't
0:45
need to be placed in the standard grid
0:48
um so right now they Apple has an API
0:51
where developers can make custom app
0:53
icons for their for their app and if the
0:56
the app you're using supports this then
0:57
you can pick which icon want but it's
1:01
kind of a a a niche feature and not
1:04
everybody adopts that because you know
1:06
Facebook wants their Facebook Blue app
1:08
to be blue and their exact shade of blue
1:11
as dictated by their marketing
1:12
department so you can't change that you
1:14
know and a lot of people don't really
1:15
know where to look for that stuff
1:17
because it's not a systemwide feature so
1:20
Apple's implementation could be easier
1:21
to use um I although and a lot of people
1:26
want to be able to change their app
1:27
icons because you you you you want to
1:30
have a theme you want your home screen
1:31
to look nice the phone is a device you
1:33
use every single day like many many
1:35
times a day you want it to you want it
1:36
to look good and uh especially since
1:40
they introduced like theming your lock
1:41
screen and the home screen widgets you
1:44
know lot of people are making these
1:46
custom Aesthetics and you except for the
1:49
you know pile of clown vomit that is
1:51
like all of these different app icons
1:53
that you have to work around
1:56
so I think this could be really
1:59
interesting but I'm really curious how
2:03
it'll
2:04
work uh because again if it's if it's a
2:07
thing that developers have to opt into
2:10
then nobody's going to enable it it'll
2:12
be exactly the same as this situation it
2:14
is now but I I I guess my question is
2:17
like is Apple going to like let users
2:19
override the color of their app icon so
2:21
you can like turn Facebook Brown if you
2:23
want appropriate and does this does this
2:26
have anything to do with their AI
2:28
features they're upcoming like would you
2:30
be able to churn all your finance apps a
2:32
certain color with that's that's another
2:34
question like a lot of people some
2:36
people were speculating that like um
2:38
maybe when you upload an app icon you
2:42
know through the through through App
2:44
Store connect and you know you you you
2:46
recompile your app for iOS 18 like the
2:49
app icon will have like a separate layer
2:51
that you can determine like oh this is
2:53
the this is the layer of the app that
2:54
people can change the color of but you
2:56
know our this other app or this other
2:59
icon this other part of the icon has to
3:01
stay fixed this color but you know
3:03
they'll have a layer that you can change
3:04
the color of other people are saying
3:06
well you know maybe it will be entirely
3:08
AI powered where it's like they run it
3:10
the app icon through an AI model that
3:12
tries to recolor it for you huh I don't
3:14
know it's an open question yeah that
3:16
would that that it seems like it would
3:18
be easier to do it that way than
3:21
to I don't know do this per icon or
3:23
maybe you could batch edit them in some
3:25
way to like it would be really cool to
3:27
create a minimalist theme where they're
3:29
all black and white or gray or something
3:32
so that you don't have so many different
3:33
competing colors that are going on on
3:35
your screen you can already change some
3:37
of the icons but I think that is only
3:39
because some of the apps allow you to
3:41
change the icon inside the app which I
3:43
have actually done in some instances and
3:45
then I forget that I changed it and I
3:47
could never find the app again after
3:48
that because I it's a completely
3:49
different look to it but um I'm also
3:52
curious to see how they implement the
3:54
this these icons don't need to exist on
3:56
a grid anymore which I think is also
3:58
what German said which means you'll be
4:00
able to just move them freestyle
4:03
anywhere you want them to go like you
4:04
can on your Mac that could be
4:07
interesting actually I don't know I mean
4:09
that that actually could be interesting
4:11
so you could just have them all uh like
4:14
surrounding like an image or something
4:16
CU right now you have like those
4:17
backgrounds on your home screens but you
4:20
can never see them because they're
4:22
always you know covered by icons so it's
4:27
hilarious to me that we're even talking
4:28
about this I mean this is something that
4:29
you've been able to do on uh you know
4:32
Android phones probably all the way you
4:34
could probably do this on the zoom at
4:35
some point the brown Zoom uh if you
4:38
wanted to and um we haven't been able to
4:40
do this on iPhone but I'm all for this I
4:42
think it's cool I mean any kind of
4:44
Freedom they allow us to have to move
4:47
things around to our heart's desire I
4:49
mean you don't have to use it obviously
4:50
and if you want to then it kind of gives
4:51
you some more freedom I don't know any
4:52
thoughts on this Lois yeah I mean sounds
4:55
cool some people put so much time into
4:57
this I remember when I don't remember
4:58
which version of I came out but it
5:01
allowed some of this kind of stuff and
5:03
people were going crazy making all these
5:05
different layouts and stuff and and I
5:06
always look at wow that's really cool
5:08
and also I cannot imagine spending 10
5:11
minutes doing this so I don't know the
5:14
thing is like it's been it's been the
5:16
same way that it has been for so long
5:17
that it's just trained me to think that
5:20
like well any wasted space on my home
5:21
screen is waste any any empty space is
5:23
wasted space because the purpose of the
5:25
home SC screen is to launch apps so I
5:27
should completely fill my home screen
5:28
with apps and there shouldn't be
5:29
anything showing in the background but I
5:31
know that that's kind of unusual like a
5:32
lot of people want to have a picture
5:34
there and you some people like
5:36
intentionally leave a blank home screen
5:37
just so they can look at the picture and
5:40
it would also be nice even if you're
5:42
like me if I want to put an app icon you
5:45
know on you know row two position three
5:48
that I can just put it directly there I
5:49
don't have to think about rejigging
5:51
jiggering them so that it it's in the
5:53
right place in the line and they all
5:55
move around that is so frustrating
5:57
sometimes yeah
5:59
yeah uh you could also end up in a
6:02
situation where they have backgrounds
6:06
with specific placement for app icons so
6:09
that like the app icons actually become
6:10
a part of the background that would be
6:12
pretty cool and then when you swipe I
6:14
imagine when you swipe they maintain
6:17
their position as you swipe back and
6:18
forth between
6:20
Pages uh so that all your your apps can
6:23
like fit within like those little
6:24
squares within the background or
6:25
something anyway we've talked about this
6:26
for way too long do you want to move to
6:28
the next story here Griffin I think we
6:29
beat one sufficiently yeah wait well
6:31
remember how the the iPhone uh 6 Plus 6s
6:35
plus and 7 plus how you could turn the
6:36
home screen
6:38
landscape I want them to bring back oh
6:40
yeah I completely forgotten that they
6:42
did that and they I don't even know when
6:44
did they get rid of that I don't even
6:45
know they they got rid of it with the
6:47
iPhone 10 really huh I think the iPhone
6:50
8 8 plus could still go landscape but
6:53
with with the all screen design yeah
6:54
they they got rid of it okay I missed
6:56
that I didn't even notice it was gone I
6:58
never used it but I'm sure well if you
7:00
keep your phone mounted horizontally in
7:02
your car then it was pretty nifty you
7:03
know you wouldn't have to like that's
7:04
true turn it back on anyways you know
7:07
what just real quick that is a great
7:08
point and sometimes when you're watching
7:10
YouTube videos well if you're watching
7:13
them in full screen mode and then you go
7:15
back to um uh the normal uh perspective
7:20
and like you swipe to get rid of the
7:21
screen like now your icons in the wrong
7:23
places like that actually would be
7:24
useful in some scenarios to to have your
7:26
phone be able to be used in horizontal
7:28
mode if you're going to be doing
7:29
something horizontally
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