by Jason Snell
Make an iPhone into a Dumb Phone
Jeremy White of Wired has a great tip that also serves as a reminder that amazing things can be found in accessibility settings:
Surely there must be a way to set up an iPhone as the perfect dumb phone for children—one with access to only the apps you deem appropriate, no internet browser, but with all-important tracking and navigation abilities—without having to pay another company to make it work? Well, there is. It’s been hiding in the iOS Accessibility menu the whole time. And, inexplicably, it’s a feature Apple barely talks about.
It’s called Assistive Access. Introduced with iOS 17, Apple designed it for those with cognitive disabilities. If you’ve never encountered or stumbled across it, it’s a distinctive iOS experience: fewer options, more focused features, easier to navigate. The aesthetic is ideal for kids: large, friendly tiles for the apps replace the smaller icons of the “normal” Apple interface.
It’s kind of beautiful. And absolutely the sort of thing you might want to give to a younger kid.
[Via Andy Ihnatko, who also detailed his own use of accessibility features to make streamlined workflow automations.]