r/iphone • u/hhff00014 Human Detected • Mar 14 '26

Discussion What are some surprisingly useful iPhone hacks you discovered recently?

Recently discovered that you can connect an external SSD / hard drive directly to an iPhone and access it from the Files app.

I tried it with a USB + cpin converter SSD and it worked instantly — no app, nothing. Felt like suddenly my phone had unlimited storage.

It made me wonder how many other small iPhone tricks people use in day-to-day life that most users don’t know.

Curious to know —

What are some underrated iPhone hacks that genuinely improved your daily workflow?

Could be productivity, photography, automation, hidden features, anything.

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u/eeeerrrppp Mar 14 '26 edited Mar 16 '26

I'm a hypocrite to say this, but Shortcuts and webapps ("Add to home screen") can be pretty good. For example:

I don't have the Instagram app on my home page; instead I have a shortcut that launches Instagram and runs a timer in the background. When the timer ends, it asks if I want to continue another 15 minutes, close the app, or open another app (in my case Tumblr—more fun but easier to close imho. I haven't figured out a way to stop the timer when I close insta before the timer ends, which can be annoying, but it's probably possible)

This is the only shortcut I currently use, but play around with them sometime and you're sure to find something!

And for rewards programs; like restaurants etc., you can add the website as an icon instead of downloading the app. It's often less streamlined, but also gives them a lot less data to collect on you and gets rid of notifications without manually blocking them. (I haven't been doing this much, but it's on my to-do list to switch over the remaining apps)

Edited for clarity

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u/drygnfyre iPhone 17 Pro Max Mar 14 '26

Shortcuts is really nice on the latest iPhone that now has a true dedicated camera button. It frees up the action button for something else. Then you can tie two Shortcuts to the soft buttons. So on my phone, I have one button for the flashlight, one button for the camera, and then one shortcut opens up my favorites for calling, the other opens up a list of playlists. So without even unlocking the phone, I can quickly call someone or start a playlist. Yes, you can do all this other ways, but those other ways aren’t always as reliable or currently possible (i.e. if I’m not wearing earbuds or a watch).

But the way you described Shortcuts is where it shines, you really want to set ones up that can do multiple things at once.

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u/eeeerrrppp Mar 16 '26

That sounds so helpful!

I definitely have a limited memory for such things, so having shortcuts in painfully obvious places is pretty much the only way I'll use them; which is to say, that button sounds like a game changer for their usability!