Use the built-in Freeform app for brainstorming, not a paid third-party mind-mapping tool.
The Infinite Whiteboard You Already Own
Trying to connect a storm of ideas can feel like you need a complex blueprint. Many people buy fancy mind-mapping software, which is like buying an expensive architectural drafting table. But you already have a magical, infinite whiteboard hanging in your digital house: the Freeform app. It’s an endless canvas where you can throw down sticky notes, draw connecting arrows, and paste in photos and links. It’s flexible, visual, and collaborative, allowing you to invite your whole team to brainstorm on the same board at once. It’s the free, limitless space your best ideas deserve.
Stop using a separate app to identify music. Do use the integrated Shazam in the Control Center instead.
The “Name That Tune” Button That’s Built Into Your Wall
You hear a great song in a coffee shop and frantically scramble to open a special app to identify it. This is like having to run to a drawer to find your “music identifier” tool before the song ends. Apple has built this tool directly into the walls of your iPhone. By adding the Shazam button to your Control Center, you have a magic, one-tap “Name That Tune” button that is always just a swipe away. You can even identify a song playing in a video on your own phone. It’s instant musical knowledge, no app-fumbling required.
Stop manually creating citations. Do use a reference manager that integrates with Pages instead.
The Automatic Librarian for Your Research Papers
Writing a research paper and manually typing out your bibliography is a tedious, soul-crushing task, like being a scribe in a medieval library. You’re bound to make a mistake. A reference manager that integrates with Pages is like hiring a magical, modern librarian who lives inside your document. As you write, you just tell the librarian which book you’re referencing, and they automatically format the in-text citation and add it to a perfectly organized bibliography at the end. It’s a powerful tool that saves you hours of painstaking, error-prone work.
The #1 secret for a better reading experience in Safari is using Reader View to eliminate distractions.
The Serene Reading Room of the Internet
Reading an article on the modern web is like trying to read a book in the middle of a loud, flashy casino. Pop-up ads, auto-playing videos, and blinking banners are all trying to steal your attention. The Reader View button in Safari is the secret door to a serene, soundproof library. With a single tap, it strips away all the distracting clutter of the casino and presents you with the pure, clean text and images of the article. It’s a beautiful, focused reading environment that is waiting for you on almost every webpage.
I’m just going to say it: The built-in Shortcuts app is the most powerful and underutilized app on the iPhone.
The Domino Set for Your Digital Life
Most of us perform the same digital tasks every day, like knocking over individual dominos one by one. The Shortcuts app is like being given a massive, magical box of dominos that you can set up in any pattern you can imagine. You can create a “Leaving Home” shortcut that, with one tap, gets directions to your next appointment, texts your partner, and starts your favorite podcast. It’s the ultimate automation tool that lets you chain together any number of actions, turning dozens of taps into one.
The reason your presentations are boring is because you’re not using the advanced animation and transition features in Keynote.
The Static Slideshow vs. The Hollywood Movie
A basic presentation with simple slide transitions is like showing a series of still photographs. Keynote, however, has a Hollywood-level special effects studio hidden inside it. Features like “Magic Move” can make an object appear to seamlessly fly from one slide to the next, and its advanced animations can bring your data to life in cinematic ways. It’s the difference between a dry, static slideshow and a dynamic, engaging story that captures your audience’s attention. Your ideas deserve to be presented like a blockbuster, not a history lecture.
If you’re still using a basic text editor, you’re missing out on the powerful features of TextEdit on the Mac.
The Simple Notepad vs. The Swiss Army Knife
Many people think of TextEdit as just a basic digital piece of paper for typing plain text. That’s like thinking a Swiss Army knife is just a knife. Hidden within its simple interface is a surprisingly powerful set of tools. It can create rich text documents with different fonts and images, it can open and edit HTML code, and it can even handle Microsoft Word documents. It’s the versatile, powerful, and free multi-tool that has been sitting in your Mac’s toolbox, waiting to be discovered.
The biggest lie you’ve been told is that you need to pay for a professional video editor; iMovie is incredibly capable for most projects.
The Hollywood Cutting Room You Already Own
The world of video editing can seem intimidating, with complex and expensive software. This leads people to believe they can’t make great videos. But iMovie, which is free on every Apple device, is like having a powerful, intuitive Hollywood cutting room already installed in your house. It gives you all the essential tools you need: you can easily trim clips, add beautiful transitions, drop in a professional-sounding music score, and even create a cinematic movie trailer. For the vast majority of projects, it’s the only editing suite you’ll ever need.
I wish I knew about the powerful data analysis and visualization tools in Numbers when I was in school.
The Storyteller for Your Spreadsheets
In school, I treated spreadsheets like a boring, gray filing cabinet for data. I wish I had known that Numbers is a powerful storyteller hiding in plain sight. It can take a dull table of data and, with a few clicks, transform it into a beautiful, compelling visual story. Its charts are vibrant and easy to read, and its pivot tables can help you find the hidden narrative in your data. It’s a tool that turns a simple list of facts into an insightful and persuasive argument.
99% of people make this one mistake with Apple Maps: not downloading offline maps for areas with poor connectivity.
The Map You Print Before You Enter the Wilderness
You wouldn’t go hiking in a remote wilderness where there’s no cell service without first printing a physical map. Yet, people drive into these same areas all the time, expecting their digital map to work. Downloading offline maps is the modern equivalent of printing that map. Before you go, you can tell Apple Maps to save a detailed map of the entire region directly to your phone. Now, even when you have zero bars of service, you’ll still have a fully functional, turn-by-turn GPS to guide you safely.
This one small habit of using the search bar in the App Store will help you discover new and useful apps.
The Librarian Who Knows Every Book in the Library
The App Store is a library with millions of books. Just browsing the “featured” shelves is like only looking at the bestsellers table by the front door. The search bar is your personal, all-knowing librarian. The small habit of not just searching for specific app names, but for problems you want to solve—like “habit tracker” or “photo editor”—will unlock a world of possibilities. The librarian will bring you a curated stack of books you never knew existed, perfectly suited to your needs.
Use the built-in Translate app for conversations, not just typing in single words.
The Universal Translator in Your Pocket
Typing a single word into a translation app is like using a dictionary. Apple’s Translate app, however, has a powerful conversation mode that is like having a real-time, universal translator from science fiction. You can tap the microphone, speak a full sentence in English, and it will say it out loud in Spanish. Your friend can then reply in Spanish, and it will be translated back to you. It turns a clumsy, word-by-word exchange into a fluid and natural conversation, breaking down language barriers on the spot.
Stop using a third-party app to track your flights. Do let the Wallet app automatically track them for you.
The Boarding Pass That’s Also a Live Flight Tracker
When you add your flight’s boarding pass to the Wallet app, you’re not just storing a static picture of a QR code. You are storing a living, breathing document. It’s like a boarding pass that has its own built-in, live flight tracker. Without any extra apps, your Wallet will automatically update with your gate number, your boarding time, and any delays. It will even show up on your lock screen when it’s time to head to the airport. It’s the smartest and simplest way to travel.
Stop manually creating events from your emails. Do let the Calendar app automatically detect and add them for you.
The Butler Who Reads Your Mail and Updates Your Schedule
When an email arrives with “Let’s meet for lunch at noon on Tuesday,” the old way was to manually open your calendar and type it all in. It’s like having to tell your butler every single detail of your schedule. But your iPhone has a smarter butler. It can read your mail, and when it sees a phrase like that, a subtle banner will appear at the top of the email with a pre-made calendar event. One tap, and your butler has added it to your schedule, no extra work required.
The #1 hack for a more organized inbox in the Mail app is using rules and smart mailboxes.
The Army of Robot Mail Sorters
An overflowing inbox is like a chaotic mailroom with letters piling up everywhere. Rules and Smart Mailboxes are like hiring an army of brilliant, tireless robot mail sorters. You can create a “Rule” that says, “Any email from my boss gets a gold star and goes in the ‘Urgent’ bin.” You can create a “Smart Mailbox” that acts as a magical bin that automatically collects all emails with the word “invoice” in them. These tools turn your chaotic mailroom into a pristine, self-organizing system.
I’m just going to say it: For most people, the built-in Weather app is more than enough and has a beautiful interface.
The Beautiful Window in Your House
There are hundreds of complex weather apps, with dense radar maps and dozens of obscure data points. These are like a professional meteorologist’s control panel. The built-in Weather app is like a beautiful, crystal-clear window in your house. At a glance, it gives you the essential, need-to-know information in a visually stunning and easy-to-understand way. For the simple, daily question of “What does it feel like outside, and should I bring a jacket?” this beautiful window is all you really need.
The reason your notes are a mess is because you’re not using the tagging and smart folder features in the Notes app.
The Piles of Paper vs. The Magical, Self-Sorting Filing Cabinet
A notes app without organization is like having a hundred brilliant ideas written on separate pieces of paper, all thrown into one big pile. The tagging and smart folder features are what turn that pile into a magical, self-sorting filing cabinet. You can add a tag, like a colored sticker (#work, #ideas), to any piece of paper. Then, you can create a “Smart Folder” which is like a magic drawer that automatically collects every single piece of paper that has a blue sticker on it. It’s a powerful, automatic organizational system.
If you’re still using a third-party app to listen to podcasts, you’re missing out on the seamless syncing of Apple Podcasts across your devices.
The One Story That Remembers Where You Left Off
Using a third-party podcast app can sometimes be like reading a book at home, and then having to find your page all over again when you pick up a different copy of the book at the office. The Apple Podcasts app is like one single, magical storybook that exists in all your places at once. When you pause a show on your iPhone on your commute, it makes a note. When you get to your Mac and press play, the story picks up in the exact same spot, as if you never left.
The biggest lie you’ve been told is that GarageBand is just for making music; it’s also a powerful tool for recording and editing podcasts.
The Recording Studio, Not Just the Band’s Rehearsal Space
The name “GarageBand” makes it sound like it’s only for aspiring rock stars. This is like thinking a professional recording studio can only be used to record music. GarageBand is that full-featured studio, and it’s brilliant for spoken word. It gives you the ability to record your voice with high-quality effects, easily edit out your mistakes, add in intro music and sound effects, and export a professional-sounding podcast episode. It’s a free, powerful audio workstation that’s been hiding in plain sight.
I wish I knew about the powerful PDF editing and annotation features in the Preview app on the Mac.
The Swiss Army Knife for Your Documents
For years, whenever I received a PDF, I thought it was a “read-only” stone tablet. I wish I had known that the simple Preview app on my Mac is a powerful Swiss Army knife for documents. You don’t need expensive software. Preview can fill out forms, add your digital signature, highlight text, add arrows and comments, and even merge multiple PDFs together. It’s an incredibly capable and surprisingly powerful set of tools that can handle almost any common PDF task, and it’s been sitting in your Dock all along.
99% of users make this one mistake with the Clock app: not using the “Bedtime” feature for a more consistent sleep schedule.
The Gentle Butler Who Tucks You In
We use the Clock app to set a jarring alarm to wake us up, which is like hiring a butler just to shout at you in the morning. The “Bedtime” or “Sleep” feature is that same butler, but now he’s also been tasked with gently tucking you in at night. You can set a consistent sleep schedule, and it will give you a gentle reminder when it’s time to wind down. It can also automatically turn on a “Sleep” Focus mode to silence distractions, helping you to protect your sleep and wake up more naturally.
This one small action of exploring the “For You” tab in Apple Music will introduce you to your new favorite artists.
The World’s Best DJ, Who Only Plays for You
Apple Music is more than just a giant library of songs; it has a personal DJ living inside it. The “For You” tab is that DJ’s personal studio. It spends all its time listening to what you like, what you skip, and what you add to your library. Then, it uses that knowledge to create personalized playlists and recommend new albums that it thinks you will love. The small habit of visiting your personal DJ every week is the best way to break out of your musical rut and discover your next favorite band.
Use the Stocks app to not only track stocks but also to get the latest business news.
The Business Section of the Newspaper, Delivered to Your Pocket
Most people who don’t own stocks never even open the Stocks app. This is like throwing away the entire business section of the newspaper just because you don’t own a company. The Stocks app is also a powerful and beautifully designed business news app. It pulls in editorially curated, relevant financial and business stories from top sources like the Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg. It’s one of the best free places to get a quick, high-level overview of what’s happening in the world of business.
Stop using a separate app for your daily journal. Do use a locked note in the Notes app instead.
The Secret Diary Hidden in Your Library
Many people want to keep a journal but are hesitant to download a special app for it. The Notes app is the perfect, minimalist solution. It’s like having a beautiful library for all your thoughts, and a locked note is the secret, hidden diary on one of the shelves. You can create a new note for your journal, and with a single tap, lock it with your device’s passcode or your face. It’s secure, private, and seamlessly synced across all your devices, making it the simplest and most convenient way to start a daily writing habit.
Stop manually calculating tips. Do use the built-in calculator’s tip function or ask Siri.
The Mathematician in Your Pocket
The end of a meal at a restaurant often involves a clumsy, rushed moment of trying to do math in your head. But you have a professional mathematician in your pocket. You can, of course, open the Calculator app. But it’s even easier to just say, “Hey Siri, what’s a 20% tip on $85.50?” and get an instant, verbal answer. It’s a simple, hands-free way to solve a common real-world problem without ever having to fumble with an app or a keypad.
The #1 secret for a more beautiful document is using the templates in Pages.
The Professional Designer Who Lays Out Your Work for You
Staring at a blank, white page can be intimidating. You have great ideas, but you’re not a graphic designer. The templates in Pages are like having a team of professional designers who have already done the hard work for you. Whether you need a resume, a flyer, or a research report, there is a beautiful, pre-designed template waiting for you. It gives you the perfect structure and style, allowing you to focus on what you’re good at—the words—while the designers take care of making it look stunning.
I’m just going to say it: The built-in “Measure” app is surprisingly accurate for quick measurements.
The Augmented Reality Tape Measure
You need to know if a new sofa will fit in your living room, but you can’t find your tape measure. The Measure app is the magical, augmented reality tape measure that you always have in your pocket. By using your phone’s camera, it can see the real world and let you drop virtual pins to measure the distance between two points. While it might not be accurate enough for building a house, for those everyday questions of “how big is that?” it is a surprisingly accurate and incredibly futuristic tool.
The reason you’re always late is because you’re not using the “Time to Leave” alerts in the Calendar and Maps apps.
The Personal Chauffeur Who Watches the Traffic for You
You have a 3 PM meeting across town. You think you know when to leave, but you get caught up in your work and don’t account for traffic. The “Time to Leave” alert is like having a personal chauffeur who is constantly monitoring the live traffic reports for you. When you add a location to a calendar event, your chauffeur calculates the driving time and will send you a notification that says, “It is now time to leave for your 3 PM meeting.” It’s the intelligent assistant that takes the guesswork out of punctuality.
If you’re still using a third-party app for voice memos, you’re missing out on the simple and integrated Voice Memos app.
The Dictaphone That’s Already on Your Desk
There are many complex voice recording apps, with dozens of features you’ll never use. This is like buying a complicated, expensive recording console when you just need a simple, reliable dictaphone. The built-in Voice Memos app is that dictaphone, and it’s already sitting on your digital desk. It’s clean, simple, and does its one job perfectly. And because it’s built-in, it syncs seamlessly with iCloud and has a beautiful companion app on the Apple Watch for recording on the go.
The biggest lie you’ve been told is that the App Store is full of expensive apps; there are thousands of high-quality free apps available.
The Library Where Most of the Books are Free
The App Store can sometimes get a reputation for being a place of expensive, professional software. This is like walking into a giant, city-sized library and only looking at the rare, first-edition books that are locked behind glass. The vast, overwhelming majority of the books in that library are completely free to check out. The App Store is filled with an incredible number of high-quality, powerful, and fun apps that cost absolutely nothing, from social media and games to powerful productivity tools.
I wish I knew about the ability to use the Health app to store and manage my medical records.
Your Entire Medical History, in One Secure Filing Cabinet
Your medical history is often a scattered collection of papers from different doctors’ offices. I wish I had known that the Health app is a secure, digital filing cabinet that can consolidate all of that for you. If your doctor or hospital supports it, you can securely download your lab results, your immunizations, and your prescriptions directly into the app. It creates one single, comprehensive, and chronological record of your health that you can easily reference or share with a new doctor.
99% of people make this one mistake with the Home app: not creating scenes and automations for their smart devices.
The Light Switches vs. The Conductor of the Orchestra
Having a smart home and only using the app to turn individual lights on and off is like having a world-class orchestra where you can only ask the trumpet player to play a single note. Scenes and automations are what allow you to become the conductor. You can create a “Good Night” scene that, with one tap, turns off all the lights, locks the doors, and lowers the thermostat. You can create an automation that turns on the porch light every day at sunset. It’s how you make your smart home truly intelligent.
This one small habit of checking the “Updates” section of the App Store will ensure you always have the latest features and security patches.
The Free Upgrade for All the Tools in Your Toolbox
Your apps are the tools in your digital toolbox. The “Updates” section of the App Store is like the manufacturer’s delivery service, constantly dropping off free, upgraded versions of all your tools. These updates don’t just add cool new features; they often contain critical security fixes that patch newly discovered vulnerabilities. The small habit of checking for and installing these updates is like ensuring that all the tools you rely on every day are always the sharpest, safest, and most powerful versions available.
Use the Apple TV app as a central hub for all your streaming services, not just for Apple TV+.
The Universal Remote for Your Streaming World
The world of streaming is a confusing collection of a dozen different apps. The Apple TV app is designed to be the universal remote for that world. It’s not just the home for Apple’s own shows. You can connect many of your other streaming apps—like Max, Disney+, and Hulu—directly to it. This allows you to search for a movie and see all the different places it’s available, and it creates one single, unified “Up Next” list for all your shows. It brings order to the streaming chaos.
Stop using a physical remote for your Apple TV. Do use the Remote widget in your iPhone’s Control Center instead.
The Better Remote That’s Already in Your Pocket
The physical Apple TV remote is a tiny, slippery object that seems to have been scientifically engineered to disappear into couch cushions. But you already own a much bigger, more powerful, and harder-to-lose remote: your iPhone. By adding the Remote icon to your Control Center, you can instantly turn your phone’s screen into a large, easy-to-use trackpad for your TV. It also gives you access to a full keyboard, which makes typing in passwords a thousand times easier.
Stop struggling to find a movie to watch. Do use the “Up Next” feature in the Apple TV app to keep track of your shows.
The “On Deck” Circle for Your Television
You’re watching three different shows on three different streaming services. Trying to remember which episode you’re on for each one is a mental chore. The “Up Next” queue in the Apple TV app is the “on deck” circle for your television life. When you start watching a show in a connected app, it automatically gets added to this one, central list. Now, you have one single place to go to see all the shows you’re currently watching and to instantly jump into the next episode, regardless of which app it lives in.
The #1 hack for a more organized bookshelf is using the collections feature in the Books app.
The Different Shelves in Your Digital Library
Your digital book library can easily become one long, jumbled list of hundreds of titles. The “Collections” feature is the simple tool that lets you become your own librarian. It’s like being able to create different, dedicated shelves in your library. You can create a “To Read” shelf for all the books you’re excited about, a “Favorites” shelf for the books you love, and separate shelves for different genres like “Sci-Fi” or “History.” It’s the simple way to bring order and personal curation to your digital bookshelf.
I’m just going to say it: The “Look Around” feature in Apple Maps is a visually stunning and useful alternative to Google Street View.
The Convertible Car Drive Through a New City
Google Street View is like looking at a series of snapshots taken from a car. Apple’s “Look Around” is like getting into a convertible and smoothly, fluidly driving down the street yourself. The imagery is often higher quality, the motion is incredibly smooth, and the experience feels more immersive and realistic. For checking out a new neighborhood or getting a feel for a restaurant’s location before you go, it’s a beautiful, powerful, and genuinely delightful tool that many people don’t even know exists.
The reason your screenshots are a mess is because you’re not using the instant Markup and sharing features.
The Disposable Camera vs. The Polaroid
Taking a screenshot and letting it save to your photo library is like taking a picture with a disposable camera. To do anything with it, you have to wait for it to be “developed” (saved) and then find it again. When you take a screenshot on an iPhone, a little preview appears in the corner. Tapping it is like using a Polaroid. The image is instantly in your hands, ready for you to draw on it, crop it, and then share it directly via a message or email, all without ever cluttering up your main photo album.
If you’re still using a third-party app for reminders, you’re not taking advantage of the deep integration of the Reminders app with Siri and the rest of the ecosystem.
The Butler Who is Part of the Family
A third-party to-do list app is like a highly professional, hired butler. They are very good at their job. The built-in Reminders app is like a butler who is also a trusted member of the family. Because it’s built by Apple, it has a level of deep, privileged access that no outsider can match. It can talk to Siri seamlessly, it can remind you of a task when you get to a specific location, and it can integrate with all your other apps. It’s a level of “it just works” convenience that an outside service can’t quite replicate.
The biggest lie you’ve been told is that you need to be a developer to use the Shortcuts app; the gallery has plenty of pre-made shortcuts to get you started.
The Recipe Book for Your Smart Home
Opening the Shortcuts app for the first time can feel like being pushed into a professional kitchen and being told to “cook.” It’s intimidating. But the “Gallery” tab is the beautiful, illustrated recipe book that the kitchen comes with. It is full of hundreds of pre-made, ready-to-use shortcuts created by Apple and the community. You can find a shortcut to create a GIF, to calculate a tip, or to get directions to the nearest coffee shop, and add it with a single tap. It’s the perfect way to start cooking without needing to be a chef.
I wish I knew about the powerful search capabilities within the Photos app that can identify objects and scenes.
The Photo Librarian Who Has Memorized Every Picture You’ve Ever Taken
I used to spend ages scrolling through my thousands of photos, looking for that one picture of my dog at the beach. I wish I had known that my Photos app has a librarian with a photographic memory. The search bar is not just for dates and places. I can literally type “dog beach,” and it will use artificial intelligence to look inside all my photos and show me every single picture that contains both a dog and a beach. It’s a mind-blowingly powerful tool for finding the memories you’re looking for.
99% of users make this one mistake with Safari: not using Tab Groups to organize their browsing for different projects.
The Different Desks for Your Different Jobs
Imagine you’re a person who is planning a vacation, researching a work project, and learning a new hobby, all at the same time. Having all those tabs open in one browser window is like trying to do all that work on one single, chaotic desk. Tab Groups are like having separate, dedicated desks for each of your jobs. You can have a “Vacation” desk with all your travel sites, a “Work” desk for your research, and a “Hobby” desk. It keeps your mind focused, organized, and free from digital clutter.
This one small action of customizing your Today View with widgets will give you a personalized dashboard of information.
Your Personal Mission Control
The “Today View”—that screen to the left of your home screen—is often ignored. This is like being a pilot and ignoring the main dashboard in your cockpit. The small action of customizing this screen with widgets turns it into your personal mission control for your day. You can add a widget that shows you the weather, your next appointment, your top three reminders, and the latest news headlines. It’s a powerful, at-a-glance dashboard that can bring focus and clarity to your day with a single swipe.
Use the “Live Listen” feature with your AirPods to turn your iPhone into a remote microphone, not just for hearing better in a noisy room.
The Ears You Can Leave Behind
The “Live Listen” feature is designed to help you hear a conversation in a loud restaurant by turning your iPhone into a directional microphone. But it has another, more creative use. It’s like having a pair of ears that you can leave behind in a room. You can start Live Listen, place your iPhone in the living room, and then walk into the kitchen with your AirPods in and still be able to hear what’s happening. It’s a powerful tool for monitoring a sleeping baby or keeping an ear on the big game while you grab a snack.
Stop manually typing in documents to digitize them. Do use the “Scan Text” feature in the Camera app instead.
The Camera That’s Also a High-Speed Scanner
You’re in a meeting and there’s a brilliant quote on a whiteboard. The old way was to quickly and inaccurately type it into your notes. The “Scan Text” or “Live Text” feature is like discovering your camera is also a high-speed text scanner. You can just point your camera at the whiteboard, a book, or a sign, and you’ll see the text become selectable. You can instantly copy and paste it into a note or a message as if it were a digital document all along. It’s a magical bridge between the physical and digital worlds.
Stop trying to remember all your Wi-Fi passwords. Do view them in your Wi-Fi settings on iOS 16 and later.
The Secret Keyring You Never Knew You Had
For years, our Wi-Fi passwords were a one-way street; once you typed them in, they were hidden forever. It was like a keyring that you could never look at. But now, your iPhone has a secret, secure compartment for that keyring. By going into your Wi-Fi settings and authenticating with your face or fingerprint, you can now see and copy the password for any network you’ve ever connected to. It’s a simple but long-awaited feature that finally lets you see the keys you already own.
The #1 secret for a more productive day is using the Focus modes to filter out distractions from specific apps and people.
The Smart Doorman for Your Brain
A standard “Do Not Disturb” is like a simple on/off switch for your attention. A Focus mode is like hiring a smart, highly-trained doorman for your brain. You can create a “Work” Focus that gives the doorman a specific guest list: “Only let my boss and my partner through, and only show me notifications from my work apps.” It’s a powerful way to create tailored, distraction-free environments for all the different roles you play in your life, ensuring that only the right information gets through at the right time.
I’m just going to say it: The built-in password manager in Safari and iCloud Keychain is secure and convenient enough for most people.
The Bank Vault That’s Already in Your House
There are many excellent, third-party password managers, which are like renting a high-security vault at a bank across town. They are a great option. However, for most people, the built-in iCloud Keychain is like discovering you have a world-class, impenetrable bank vault already built into the foundation of your own house. It’s incredibly secure, it’s free, and its perfect, seamless integration with the rest of your home (your devices) makes it the most convenient and practical choice for the average person.
The reason your iMessages are boring is because you’re not using the effects, stickers, and apps available in the iMessage App Store.
The Plain Letter vs. The Pop-Up Birthday Card
Sending a basic text message is like sending a simple, plain, handwritten letter. It gets the job done. But the iMessage App Store is like a magical stationery shop full of confetti, pop-up mechanisms, and funny stickers. You can send your message with a “Slam” effect that shakes the whole screen, you can react with a thumbs-up, or you can send a GIF that perfectly captures your mood. It’s a suite of tools that can turn your boring, functional messages into fun, expressive, and memorable conversations.
If you’re still using a separate app to create collages, you’re not using the creative tools built into the Photos app’s editing suite.
The Art Studio Hidden in the Back of Your Photo Album
People often think the Photos app is just for storing and cropping pictures. But hidden in the back is a surprisingly powerful art studio. While it doesn’t have a dedicated “collage” button, its advanced Markup tools allow you to be your own artist. You can take a blank screenshot, and then use the copy-paste and drawing tools to add and arrange multiple photos, creating your own unique and personalized collages without ever having to download a clunky, ad-filled third-party app.
The biggest lie you’ve been told is that you can’t run Windows on a Mac; with Parallels or a similar app, it’s easy and powerful.
The House with a Perfect Hologram Room
Many people believe that buying a Mac means you are forever exiled from the world of Windows. This is not true. Using a program like Parallels is like having a secret, high-tech hologram room in your beautiful Mac house. With a single click, you can create a perfect, fully functional simulation of a Windows computer right on your desktop. You can run any Windows application you need, and even drag and drop files between the two worlds as if they were one. It’s the best of both worlds, seamlessly coexisting.
I wish I knew about the ability to set custom alert tones for different apps to prioritize notifications.
The Different Doorbells for Your Different Guests
By default, your phone has one generic “ding” for most notifications. It’s like having a single doorbell for every type of visitor, from the pizza delivery person to an important business partner. I wish I had known that you can be the composer of your own notification orchestra. In the settings for many apps, you can assign a unique sound to each one. This allows your ears to instantly know the difference between an unimportant social media like and a critical message from your work chat, without ever looking at your screen.
99% of people make this one mistake with the Files app: not connecting their other cloud storage services like Dropbox and Google Drive.
The One Backpack for All of Your Books
Many of us have our digital “books” stored in different libraries—some in iCloud, some in Dropbox, some in Google Drive. The Files app on your iPhone is like a magical, universal backpack. Most people only ever put their iCloud books in it. But the real power is that you can connect it to all your other libraries. By enabling them in the Files app, you can have one single, organized backpack where you can see, search, and manage every single file you own, no matter which company’s shelf it’s stored on.
This one small habit of using the “Share ETA” feature in Maps will save you from typing “I’m on my way” forever.
The Live, Moving Dot on Your Friend’s Map
The constant back-and-forth of “Where are you?” and “Be there in 5” texts is a modern annoyance. The “Share ETA” feature in Apple Maps is a single tap that ends that entire conversation. It’s like giving your friend a private, live-updating map that shows a little dot of your car moving towards them, with an accurate, constantly updated arrival time. The small habit of tapping this one button at the start of your journey provides total transparency and lets you focus on the road.
Use the built-in Automator app on your Mac to create custom workflows, not just relying on the Shortcuts app.
The Custom Robot-Building Kit for Your Computer
The Shortcuts app is like a store where you can get pre-made robots to do tasks for you. The Automator app on your Mac is the full-fledged, industrial-grade robot-building kit. It’s an old-school but incredibly powerful tool that lets you drag and drop different actions to create complex, custom workflows. You could build a robot that automatically renames and resizes a hundred photos, or one that opens all your work apps and websites with a single click. It’s the secret to true, personalized Mac automation.
Stop using a third-party app to track your habits. Do use a recurring reminder in the Reminders app instead.
The Simple, Reliable Nudge
There are many complex habit-tracking apps with fancy graphs and charts. But for the simple, daily act of remembering to do something, a recurring reminder is the perfect tool. It’s like a simple, gentle, and incredibly reliable nudge on your shoulder. You can set a reminder to “Drink a glass of water” that repeats every single day at the same time. It’s free, it’s built-in, and its perfect integration with your lock screen and your watch makes it the most effective way to build a new, simple habit.
Stop being overwhelmed by your emails. Do use the “Swipe” gestures in the Mail app to quickly archive, delete, or flag messages.
The Sorting Chute for Your Digital Mail
Facing a full inbox can feel like standing in front of a giant pile of paper mail. The swipe gestures in the Mail app are the fast, efficient sorting chutes for that pile. Instead of opening every letter, you can just swipe it to the left or right. A short swipe can send it to the “Archive” chute, and a long swipe can send it straight to the “Trash” chute. By customizing these gestures, you can triage your entire inbox in a fraction of the time, bringing a sense of calm and control back to your digital life.
The #1 hack for a more personalized iPhone is creating custom app icons and widgets with the Shortcuts app and third-party tools.
The Interior Decorator for Your Digital House
For years, the inside of every iPhone “house” looked exactly the same, with the same grid of corporate logos for furniture. The ability to create custom app icons and widgets is like hiring an interior decorator for your digital life. Using the Shortcuts app and tools like Widgetsmith, you can change the color, style, and layout of your home screen to be a perfect reflection of your own personality. It’s a powerful way to transform your phone from a functional tool into a beautiful, personalized space.
I’m just going to say it: The free office suite (Pages, Numbers, Keynote) is a powerful and viable alternative to Microsoft Office for many users.
The Beautiful, Custom-Built Kitchen in Your New House
Many people assume that to do “real” work, they need to pay for and install the Microsoft Office suite. This is like moving into a brand new house with a beautiful, state-of-the-art kitchen and insisting on installing your old, clunky stove from your last apartment. The built-in Pages, Numbers, and Keynote apps are that beautiful, modern kitchen. They are powerful, intuitive, and perfectly designed to work in your new home. For the vast majority of home cooking, they are more than capable, and frankly, a much more pleasant place to work.
The reason you can’t find that old photo is because you’re not using the search and filter options in the Photos app.
The Librarian Who Can Find Anything
Scrolling through your photo library to find a specific picture is like wandering through a massive library, hoping to stumble upon the right book. The search and filter options are your master librarian. You can walk up to the desk and make an incredibly specific request: “Show me all the photos of ‘Sarah’ and ‘David’ together, at a ‘beach,’ that are also ‘selfies’ and that I have marked as a ‘favorite.'” The librarian can instantly search through tens of thousands of photos and hand you the exact memory you were looking for.
If you’re still using a third-party app to zip and unzip files, you’re not using the built-in compression tools in macOS and the Files app.
The Shrink-Wrap Machine That’s Already in Your Mailroom
Sometimes you need to send a big collection of files, and you need to bundle them up into a smaller package. For years, this required special software. But now, the shrink-wrap machine is already built into your digital mailroom. On a Mac, you can simply right-click any folder and choose “Compress.” In the Files app on your iPhone, you can do the same. It’s a free, fast, and perfectly integrated way to zip and unzip files without ever needing to download a separate utility.
The biggest lie you’ve been told is that you need to be an artist to use Procreate on the iPad; it’s an incredibly fun and accessible app for everyone.
The Art Studio That Welcomes Beginners
The incredible, professional artwork that people create with Procreate can make it seem like a daunting tool that is only for experts. This is like thinking you have to be a master chef to enjoy a beautiful kitchen. Procreate is that stunning kitchen, but it’s also incredibly welcoming to beginners. Its tools are intuitive, the feeling of drawing on the screen is joyful, and it’s a fantastic place to just play with color and shape. It’s an app that can be both a professional powerhouse and a relaxing, creative playground.
I wish I knew about the “Look Up” feature to quickly get definitions, translations, and more for any word on my screen.
The Instant Encyclopedia Hidden in Every Word
I used to constantly leave my reading to go and search for the definition of a word or the background of a historical figure. I wish I had known that an entire encyclopedia is hiding inside every single word on my screen. By simply highlighting any word or phrase on your iPhone or Mac and tapping “Look Up,” you get an instant, pop-up window with a dictionary definition, a Siri knowledge panel, and a Wikipedia entry. It’s a magical tool that satisfies your curiosity without ever breaking your reading flow.
99% of users make this one mistake with their calendar: not adding travel time to their events for more realistic scheduling.
The Teleporter vs. The Real-World Car
When you schedule two meetings back-to-back in different locations, you are scheduling as if you own a magical teleporter. You are not accounting for the laws of physics. The “Travel Time” feature in your calendar is the dose of reality. It allows you to block out the time it will actually take to get from one place to another. This not only gives you a more realistic picture of your day, but it can also alert you when it’s time to leave, turning your magical, impossible schedule into a practical, real-world plan.
This one small action of using the “Pin” feature in Notes and Messages will keep your most important information at the top.
The VIP Section for Your Digital Life
Our digital lives are a long, chronological stream of information. The important stuff can easily get buried under the new stuff. The “Pin” feature is the VIP section for your digital world. In Messages, you can pin the conversation with your partner so it’s always the first one you see. In Notes, you can pin your daily to-do list so it never gets lost in your archive. It’s a simple, powerful way to tell your device, “This one is important. Keep it at the top.”
Use the “Visual Look Up” feature in the Photos app to identify plants, pets, and landmarks, not a separate app.
The Built-in Nature Guide and Art Historian
You take a photo of a beautiful flower or a famous painting, but you don’t know what it is. You could download a special app to identify it. Or, you could use the super-smart guide that is already living inside your Photos app. If you see a little sparkle on the “i” icon for a photo, it means your phone has recognized something. Tapping it will instantly tell you the species of the plant, the breed of the dog, or the name of the landmark, as if by magic.
Stop manually typing in business hours. Do look them up in Apple Maps, which often has detailed information.
The Live, Updated Directory for the World
When you need to know if a store is still open, your instinct might be to search for it on the web. But Apple Maps is often a faster and more integrated source for that information. It’s like a live, constantly updated directory for the physical world. When you search for a business, its detailed place card will often show you not just its hours of operation, but also photos, reviews, and even whether it accepts Apple Pay. It’s a rich source of data that is right at your fingertips.
Stop struggling to find a good place to eat. Do use the curated guides in Apple Maps to discover new restaurants.
The Trusted Travel Guide in Your Pocket
Standing on a street corner in a new city and trying to figure out where to eat can be overwhelming. Apple Maps has a team of trusted travel guides built right in. The “Guides” feature offers beautifully curated lists of the best restaurants, coffee shops, and attractions from trusted sources like The Infatuation, Lonely Planet, and local experts. It’s like having a well-written, beautifully illustrated travel book in your pocket that can help you discover the hidden gems in any city you visit.
The #1 secret for a more immersive music experience is using Spatial Audio with dynamic head tracking on your AirPods.
The Concert Hall That’s Built Inside Your Head
Listening to stereo music is like having two speakers in front of you. Spatial Audio is like having an entire concert hall built inside your head. The music doesn’t just come from the left and the right; it comes from all around you. And with dynamic head tracking, if you turn your head to the left, the sound of the band stays where it is, on the “stage” in front of you. It’s a mind-bending, incredibly immersive experience that transforms listening to music from a passive activity into a magical, three-dimensional event.
I’m just going to say it: The seamless integration of Apple Pay within apps and websites makes online shopping faster and more secure.
The Express Lane at the Digital Checkout Counter
Online shopping usually ends with the clumsy process of finding your wallet and manually typing in your 16-digit credit card number. Apple Pay is the express lane for that digital checkout. When you see the Apple Pay button, one tap (and a quick glance for Face ID) is all it takes. It securely sends a one-time-use token to the merchant, so your real card number is never exposed. It’s the perfect combination of lightning-fast convenience and bank-vault security, and it makes online shopping an absolute joy.
The reason your phone is so distracting is because you haven’t set up custom Home Screens for your different Focus modes.
The Work Desk vs. The Weekend Playroom
Your phone’s home screen is your digital environment. The reason it’s so distracting is that you are trying to do your focused work in the middle of a chaotic playroom, with all your social media and game “toys” scattered around. Focus modes let you create different rooms for your different activities. You can create a “Work” home screen that has only your boring work apps on it, and a “Personal” home screen for your fun stuff. When you switch your Focus, you are magically switching rooms, creating a tailored environment for concentration.
If you’re still manually transcribing meetings, you’re not using a live transcription app that integrates with the Apple ecosystem.
The Court Stenographer Who Works in Real-Time
Sitting in a meeting and trying to take notes is like trying to write down every word of a movie as you’re watching it. A modern, AI-powered transcription app is like having a professional court stenographer in the room with you. It can listen to the conversation and transcribe it into text in real-time, often with surprising accuracy. It frees your brain to focus on the actual conversation, confident that your digital scribe is capturing every single word for you to review later.
The biggest lie you’ve been told is that you need to be a programmer to create your own app; with Swift Playgrounds, learning to code is more accessible than ever.
The Lego Set for Building Real Software
The idea of building an app can seem as complex as building a skyscraper. But Swift Playgrounds is like a beautiful, interactive Lego set for software. It’s a free app from Apple that turns the process of learning to code into a fun, engaging game. It gives you the real building blocks that professional developers use, but in a friendly, supportive environment that guides you every step of the way. It’s the most accessible and enjoyable way to take your first steps into the exciting world of creating your own apps.
I wish I knew about the ability to use my iPhone to control my GoPro for easier framing and shooting.
The Wireless Viewfinder for Your Action Camera
A GoPro is a fantastic little camera, but because it’s so small, it has no screen. Trying to frame a shot is a complete guessing game. I wish I had known sooner that the GoPro app on my iPhone is the perfect wireless viewfinder. You can connect your phone to the camera’s Wi-Fi, and a live preview of what the GoPro sees will appear on your big, beautiful iPhone screen. You can frame your shot perfectly, start and stop recording, and even review your footage, all from the palm of your hand.
99% of people make this one mistake with the Wallet app: not adding their loyalty cards and tickets for easy access.
The Side Pockets of Your Digital Wallet
Most people use the Wallet app for their credit cards, which is like only using the main cash compartment of a physical wallet. But a real wallet has all those extra side pockets for your other important cards. The Wallet app has those too. You can add your airline boarding passes, your concert and movie tickets, and even your grocery store loyalty cards. It turns your phone into a single, organized place for all your modern necessities, ensuring you always have the right card at the right time.
This one small habit of using the “Share” sheet to its full potential will unlock a world of productivity.
The Central Post Office for Your Digital World
The “Share” sheet—that little box with an arrow pointing up—is the central post office for your entire digital world. Most people only ever use it to send a text or an email. But the small habit of exploring its other options will unlock its true power. You can use it to send a file directly to an app, to create a PDF, or to trigger a powerful custom shortcut. By customizing the layout of your post office, you can create a lightning-fast, personalized workflow for sending any piece of information anywhere you want.
Use the built-in Stickies app on your Mac for quick notes and reminders, not cluttering your desk with paper notes.
The Digital Post-It Notes That Never Fall Off
Our physical desks are often a messy blizzard of yellow sticky notes, with important reminders and fleeting thoughts that can easily get lost. The Stickies app on your Mac is the perfect digital equivalent. It lets you create as many colorful, virtual Post-it notes as you want, right on your desktop. They will never lose their stickiness, you can customize their fonts and colors, and, most importantly, they are searchable. It’s the simple, elegant way to capture a quick thought without cluttering your real-world workspace.
Stop using a third-party app to check the weather. Do use the detailed hourly forecasts and weather maps in the built-in Weather app instead.
The High-Definition Weather Channel in Your Pocket
The built-in Weather app used to be a very simple tool. But now, it’s a full-featured, high-definition weather channel that you have in your pocket. It’s not just the temperature. You can scroll down to see a beautiful, animated map of the incoming rain, an hour-by-hour forecast of the temperature for the rest of the day, and detailed information on air quality and UV index. For the vast majority of users, it has all the powerful, detailed data of the pro apps, but with a much more beautiful and intuitive design.
Stop manually creating your “Memories” videos. Do let the Photos app intelligently curate them for you.
The Automatic Filmmaker for Your Life
You have thousands of photos and videos from your last vacation, but you don’t have the time to turn them into a movie. The “Memories” feature in the Photos app is like having a talented, automatic filmmaker living inside your phone. It can intelligently look through your library, find your best shots from a specific trip or event, and then automatically edit them together into a beautiful, poignant video, complete with cinematic transitions and a perfectly matched music score. It turns your forgotten photos into moving stories, with zero effort required.
The #1 hack for a more engaging iMessage conversation is using the Digital Touch feature to send sketches and heartbeats.
The Hand-Drawn Note in a World of Typed Letters
A standard text message is functional, but it lacks a human touch. The Digital Touch feature in iMessage is like being able to slip a quick, hand-drawn note or a personal gesture into your digital conversation. You can send a quick, animated sketch to illustrate an idea, or you can press two fingers on the screen to send a recording of your actual heartbeat to someone you love. It’s a simple, intimate, and deeply human feature that can add a layer of personality and emotion that plain text can never capture.
I’m just going to say it: The pre-installed apps on your Apple devices are more powerful and useful than you think.
The Fully Stocked Toolbox That Comes with the House
When you buy a new house, it comes with a set of basic, essential tools: a hammer, a screwdriver, a wrench. Many people immediately go out and buy a fancy, expensive toolbox, assuming the free ones are just toys. The pre-installed apps on your iPhone are that toolbox. From the surprisingly powerful video editing of iMovie to the robust features of the Notes app, this “free” toolkit is often more than capable enough for the vast majority of your daily tasks. Always try the built-in tool first; you’ll be surprised at its power.
The reason you can’t find a specific setting is because you’re not using the search bar at the top of the Settings app.
The Magic Compass for the Labyrinth
The Settings app on your iPhone is a deep and complex labyrinth, with hundreds of switches and options hidden in a dozen different corridors. Trying to find one specific setting by tapping through all the menus is like wandering through that labyrinth without a map. The search bar at the very top of the main Settings screen is a magical, all-knowing compass. You can just type what you’re looking for—”font size,” “battery,” “notifications”—and it will instantly point you directly to the exact location you need to go.
If you’re still using a physical level, you’re not using the hidden level in the Measure app.
The Carpenter’s Tool Hiding in Your Pocket
Hanging a picture frame perfectly straight used to require a trip to the garage to find a bubble level. But there is a perfectly calibrated, professional-grade carpenter’s level hiding inside an app you already have. If you open the built-in Measure app and tap “Level” at the bottom, your entire phone will transform into a sensitive and accurate tool for checking if a surface is perfectly horizontal or vertical. It’s one of those magical, hidden features that makes you feel like you’re living in the future.
The biggest lie you’ve been told is that the Apple ecosystem stifles creativity; the wide range of powerful apps on the App Store proves otherwise.
The World’s Best Art Store, Attached to a Beautiful Museum
Some critics say that the Apple ecosystem is a “walled garden” that limits what you can do. This is like saying that a beautiful, well-run museum stifles creativity. The reality is that attached to this beautiful museum is the biggest and best-stocked art supply store in the world: the App Store. It is overflowing with an incredible diversity of powerful, professional-grade tools for writing, making music, drawing, and creating videos. It’s not a prison for creativity; it’s a launchpad for it.
I wish I knew about the ability to use Markup to sign documents directly in the Mail app.
The Pen That Can Write on Your Screen
For years, when someone emailed me a document to sign, I would embark on the ridiculous ritual of printing it, signing it with a real pen, and then finding a scanner to send it back. I wish I had known that the pen was in my hand the whole time. In the Mail app, you can open an attachment and tap the Markup icon. This allows you to sign your name with your finger or an Apple Pencil, right on the screen. You can then instantly email the signed document back. It turns a 20-minute chore into a 30-second delight.
99% of users make this one mistake with Apple News: not customizing their channels and topics for a personalized news feed.
The Generic Newspaper vs. Your Personal Daily Briefing
Opening the Apple News app without customizing it is like reading the generic, one-size-fits-all newspaper that’s left outside every hotel room door. It has the big headlines, but it’s not for you. The real power of the app is in the “Following” tab. By taking just a few minutes to tell it which specific topics, magazines, and newspapers you’re interested in, you are transforming it from that generic hotel paper into a personalized, daily intelligence briefing that is perfectly tailored to your interests and passions.
This one small habit of exploring the accessibility features in settings will reveal powerful tools you didn’t know you had.
The Secret Room Full of Superpowers
The “Accessibility” section of the Settings app is often ignored because people think it’s only for those with disabilities. This is like thinking a secret room full of superpowers is only for a select few. In reality, this section is a treasure trove of incredible features for everyone. From the “Back Tap” that lets you create a secret button on the back of your phone, to “Live Listen” that can turn it into a remote microphone, exploring this one menu will reveal a host of powerful, life-enhancing tools that you never knew existed.
Use the “Screen Recording” feature to create tutorials or record a bug, not just trying to explain it with words.
Showing vs. Telling
Trying to explain a complex computer problem to a tech support person over the phone is a frustrating game of “he said, she said.” A screen recording is the ultimate “show, don’t tell” tool. By adding the button to your Control Center, you can create a video of exactly what is happening on your screen, and even record your own voice explaining the problem as it happens. It’s the most effective and efficient way to demonstrate a process, create a quick tutorial for a parent, or prove to a developer that their app has a bug.
Stop thinking of your apps in isolation. Do look for ways to connect them and create powerful workflows with the Shortcuts app.
The Separate Tools vs. The Assembly Line
Most of us use our apps as separate, individual tools. We use a hammer, then we put it down and pick up a screwdriver. The Shortcuts app allows you to become the architect of your own personal assembly line. It allows you to create a workflow where one app’s output becomes another app’s input. You could create a shortcut that takes the latest photo you took, resizes it, and then posts it to your social media, all with a single tap. It’s how you make your tools work together, intelligently.