{"id":458621,"date":"2025-09-28T19:43:18","date_gmt":"2025-09-28T19:43:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/458621\/"},"modified":"2025-09-28T19:43:18","modified_gmt":"2025-09-28T19:43:18","slug":"every-iphone-user-should-be-using-this-time-saving-settings-shortcut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/458621\/","title":{"rendered":"Every iPhone User Should Be Using This Time-Saving Settings Shortcut"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ever since Apple rearranged the iPhone\u2019s Settings menu, making changes to apps requires a laborious series of taps and swipes. But it doesn\u2019t have to be that way, thanks to a workflow that makes excellent use of Apple\u2019s Shortcuts app.<\/p>\n

The Problem With App Settings<\/p>\n

Every installed app on your iPhone has a system-level settings panel that allows you to quickly review an app\u2019s privileges, notification settings, and more, all from a single interface. You can use this screen to quickly enable or disable location services, access to your camera and microphone, bar an app from using mobile data, and much more without diving into each relevant menu separately.<\/p>\n

\"iOS<\/p>\n

Some apps even use this menu to define app-specific settings, or hide troubleshooting settings here (Slack for iPhone buries the cache reset and login feedback toggles here, for example).<\/p>\n

You can access these preferences under Settings > Apps (at the bottom of the menu), where you\u2019ll be presented with a long list of every app that\u2019s installed on your iPhone. Apple has even moved its first-party apps to this menu in an attempt to clean up the iOS and iPadOS Settings menu (except for Camera and Wallet, it seems).<\/p>\n

The only problem is that getting to this menu for each installed app seems to take forever. You could search with Spotlight, but you\u2019ll have to scroll since Settings results appear fairly low down the list.<\/p>\n

\"Spotlight<\/p>\n

How this Shortcut Fixes the Problem<\/p>\n

Much of the time, you\u2019ll want to access the relevant app settings panel while you\u2019re using the app in question. That\u2019s what makes this shortcut so clever. By adding the workflow as a Control Center shortcut, you can swipe down from the top of the screen and tap an icon to immediately be taken to the running app\u2019s settings panel.<\/p>\n

So if you\u2019ve got the Music app open and you want to quickly make changes to the audio quality, you can swipe down from the top of the screen, tap an icon, and make any changes you like\u2014all without having to exit the app or thumb through the Settings menu.<\/p>\n

The only app that this doesn\u2019t seem to work for is the Camera app, but that\u2019s not a huge issue since Camera preferences are in the root Settings menu anyway.<\/p>\n

Download or Create the Shortcut<\/p>\n

I can\u2019t say for certain where this shortcut originated, but Reddit user u\/grillinmuffins shared it in a post on the r\/Shortcuts subreddit<\/a> shortly after iOS 26 entered beta. It’s not clear if this is where the idea originated, but it’s the first place I saw it so credit where it\u2019s due.<\/p>\n

You can download the original shortcut and add it to your Shortcuts app by clicking here<\/a>. Though this is the easiest way to get it working, you might prefer to create the shortcut yourself from scratch. This will help you understand what\u2019s happening, and maybe even spur you on to create your own in the future.<\/p>\n

To get started, open the Shortcuts app on your iPhone. Tap the \u201c+\u201d plus icon to create a new workflow. Use the \u201cSearch Actions\u201d box, find the \u201cGet Current App\u201d action, and add it to your shortcut. This identifies which app is running when you trigger the shortcut.<\/p>\n

\"Get<\/p>\n

Now search for and add the \u201cText\u201d action to your workflow. You\u2019ll need to type \u201cApp-prefs:\u201d (without quotations) into this box, which is how we\u2019ll be skipping to an app\u2019s preferences pane using Apple\u2019s iOS link feature. While your cursor is still in the box, tap the \u201cCurrent App\u201d variable that appears just above your keyboard.<\/p>\n

\"Select<\/p>\n

You should see a new panel appear where the keyboard was. \u201cName\u201d will be checked, but we want to change this to \u201cBundle Identifier\u201d which is how the operating system identifies app processes internally. Once you\u2019ve done this, you\u2019ll see the text change to \u201cBundle Identifier\u201d instead.<\/p>\n

\"Text<\/p>\n

The final step is to add the \u201cOpen URL\u201d action to your workflow. This should automatically populate with the \u201cText\u201d variable you just created.<\/p>\n

\"Open<\/p>\n

You can now tap the shortcut\u2019s name at the top of the screen and change it to something more fitting. You should also change the app\u2019s icon (I searched for \u201cgear\u201d and used that). If you want to test your shortcut, hit the play button at the bottom. If you\u2019re taken to the app settings page for the Shortcuts app, you did everything correctly. You can close the Shortcuts app now.<\/p>\n

Now Add the Shortcut to Control Center<\/p>\n

The final step is to add the Shortcut to Control Center so that you can trigger it at any time. To do this, swipe down from the top-right corner of the screen to reveal Control Center. Now tap the \u201c+\u201d plus button in the top-left corner of the screen.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll need at least two spaces to add the control (but it will only take up one space once you\u2019re done). Remove any unnecessary icons until you have space, then tap \u201cAdd Control\u201d at the bottom of the screen. From here, find \u201cShortcuts\u201d and add the \u201cRun Shortcut\u201d control.<\/p>\n

\"Add<\/p>\n

When prompted, hit \u201cChoose\u201d and select the shortcut you just created (or downloaded). Once added to Control Center, you can drag the bottom right corner to condense the icon so that it only takes up a single space. I\u2019d suggest putting it somewhere like the corner of the screen so you know what it does.<\/p>\n

\"Control<\/p>\n

Now try opening an app, accessing Control Center, and triggering the shortcut you just added. It should take you to the relevant Settings page.<\/p>\n

Shortcuts is an incredibly powerful app, one that\u2019s easy to overlook. If you\u2019re new, here are a few more iPhone shortcuts to get you started<\/a>. In addition, you can use Shortcuts to run all sorts of handy automations<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ever since Apple rearranged the iPhone\u2019s Settings menu, making changes to apps requires a laborious series of taps…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":458622,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3159],"tags":[547,53,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-458621","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mobile","8":"tag-mobile","9":"tag-technology","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115283638032786621","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/458621","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=458621"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/458621\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/458622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=458621"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=458621"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=458621"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}