iOS 15 widgets: Here’s all the new widgets coming to your iPhone

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iOS 15 widgets: Here's all the new widgets coming to your iPhone

(Image credit: Tom's Guide)

Widgets were one of the biggest parts of terminal year's iOS update, and Apple hasn't forgotten about them for iOS xv. True, iOS 15 lavishes more attention on other features — such as FaceTime grouping calls, a new Focus mode and improvements to existing apps — simply widgets become a few welcome additions equally well.

Think of widgets in iOS fifteen as Apple fine-tuning the process that began in iOS 14, where you could finally identify widgets on the habitation screen. In iOS 15, Apple tree'south adding some new widgets of its own, tweaking the Smart Stack feature that combines multiple widgets and making it easier to discover new widgets. While not substantial changes, they're still welcome, and they hope to brand the widget experience even better than it was before.

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Heres what to look from widgets when you download iOS fifteen, whether you try out the public beta now or wait until the final version arrives this autumn.

Before we encounter the new iOS 15 widgets Apple tree's including with this software update, let's have a brief refresher course on what Apple tree introduced in iOS 14 and where you can find widgets in Apple's iPhone software.

Widgets are mini versions of apps that offer at-a-glance information — the electric current temperature from the Weather app, your upcoming appointments from Calendar, even a selection of your favorite images from Photos. Starting in iOS 14, yous could place these widgets on your home screen, and a Smart Stack characteristic immune y'all to combine multiple widgets, which you could swipe your way through or let the iOS switch between them automatically.

Y'all accept a couple of avenues to find widgets. The easiest method is merely to edit whichever home screen you happen to be on.

1. Long-press on an app or widget and select Edit Home Screen from the drop-down menu that appears.

(Epitome credit: Tom'south Guide)

2. All the apps and widgets on your home screen will get-go jiggling, simply you lot'll want to press the Plus (+) button in the upper left corner of the screen.

(Prototype credit: Tom'south Guide)

You'll exist taken to an screen of available widgets, featuring widgets for Apple's born iPhone apps likewise as third-party apps installed on your telephone.

(Prototype credit: Tom's Guide)

You lot tin can as well access the widget menu by swiping right to get to the Today screen, which houses agile widgets you haven't placed on your home screen. Scroll down to the lesser of the page, and tap the edit button. You'll get the same jiggly screen every bit in footstep 2 upwardly to a higher place, and from there you tin tap the Plus (+) button to run across other available widgets.

(Image credit: Tom's Guide)

Then now that y'all know how to go to the widget screen, what awaits you at that place in iOS 15? In addition to existing widgets for built-in apps that first appeared in last twelvemonth's iPhone software update, iOS 15 introduces new widgets for Mail, Detect My, Contacts, Sleep, App Store and Game Center. Hither's a closer expect at what each one delivers.

Mail: Apple promises quick access to one of your mailboxes through the new Mail service widget. So far, the option I have available on my widget screen is a list of messages from senders I've designated every bit VIPs. The two options show either the last 2 messages or the last iv.

(Image credit: Tom's Guide)

Detect My: You've got a couple widget options for Notice My — ome that lets you encounter the locations of family and friends and another that will help y'all keep tabs on your stuff. Presumably, the latter widget will exist particularly useful if yous've bought an Apple tree AirTag to track keys and other objects. Both versions of the Find My widget come up in square and rectangle views.

(Epitome credit: Tom's Guide)

Contacts: The contacts widget is really something — easily my favorite iOS 15 widget. On the surface, it seems pretty straightforward — the widget features a contact name that y'all tin can tap to access their info from the Contacts app. Depending on the size of the widget, you lot tin can show anywhere from i to six contacts.

(Image credit: Tom's Guide)

But if yous interact with that particular contact a lot, the subsequent folio that appears when you tap their name in the widget is a sight to behold. Aye, you lot go quick links to identify a phone call, transport a text, launch a FaceTime call, send an e-mail and even send payments via Apple Pay. But if you interact with that person a lot, you too get a handy digest of your interactions — contempo texts and emails as well as photos and links that y'all've shared. If there are upcoming appointments with that contact, they'll exist in that location, too. Information technology's incredibly handy having all that info at the ready.

(Image credit: Tom'southward Guide)

Sleep: If you utilize the slumber-tracking feature in iOS fifteen'southward Health app, at that place'due south now a widget that details how well you slept (or didn't in my example) and lets you review your sleep schedule.

(Prototype credit: Tom's Guide)

App Store: Apple tree's Today at the App Store gets its ain widget, available as a square, rectangle or block that fills half the screen. It'due south a good way to be notified of in-app events, and Apple also uses it to highlight curated app collections.

(Image credit: Tom'due south Guide)

Game Center: Apple'south often disregarded game management app now has two widget — one that surfaces recently played games and another that lets y'all meet what your GameCenter buddies take been playing.

(Image credit: Tom's Guide)

New widgets are the master focus in iOS 15, only the software update introduces some widget management features too. The one I've chiefly used upwards to this betoken is the ability to re-gild Smart Stacks — that is, change the order in which widgets bike through in a Smart Stack drove. Presumably, widgets at the peak of the listing are given greater priority, though widgets may also appear at certain times of the day and in certain places, based on your action. (Agenda appointments appearing at the start of the mean solar day, for case, or the Maps widget surfacing when you're away from home.)

Reordering a Smart Stack is simply a matter of long-pressing on the Smart Stack and selecting Edit Stack from the subsequent driblet-downwardly bill of fare. You'll get a window of the widgets in the stack that you can re-gild past dragging; you can also delete widgets from within a stack. I find the dragging to exist a little finicky, especially on iPhones with smaller screens, merely that's consistent with my long-standing complaint about home screen direction — I wish Apple offered a more than precise method than dragging.

(Image credit: Tom's Guide)

Other iOS 15 widget changes include Apple's promise to brand intelligent widget suggestions, with widgets for apps you already use actualization in Smart Stacks automatically based on past activeness. Apple tree says at that place'southward a new layout, likewise, aimed at helping with widget discovery. I haven't really noticed either feature during my fourth dimension with the iOS 15 beta.

The ability to add widgets to the domicile screen elevated the iOS 14 update a twelvemonth ago, vastly improving the iPhone feel. iOS 15 doesn't effort anything that radical — not with widgets at whatsoever rate. Just it does stay the course, proving that Apple's approach to widgets is here to stay.

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Philip Michaels is a senior editor at Tom's Guide. He has strong opinions well-nigh Apple, the Oakland Athletics and old movies. Follow him at @PhilipMichaels.

Source: https://www.tomsguide.com/news/ios-15-widgets-heres-all-the-new-widgets-coming-to-your-iphone

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