Organizing Your Apps In iOS

There are many ways you can organize your apps on your iPhone or iPad. You can move apps from page to page and set their positions inside each page. You can create and modify app folders and move apps around in those folders to different pages. You can also bring apps down to the bottom row of your home screen and even put app folders there. You can search for apps to launch them, instead of remember exactly where you put the app icon.

Comments: 14 Responses to “Organizing Your Apps In iOS”

    Richard Anderson
    9 years ago

    I have about 200 apps on my iOS devices which I organize by keeping them in alphabetical order, no folders. This is easy to do and maintain by using settings/general/reset home screen layout.

    To find an app to start it, I generally find it with spotlight search (as you showed in the video). I don't go through the screens to find it.

    One problem with iOS folders (categories) is that an app can be in only one folder. For apps that fall in multiple categories which one do you pick?

    Richard Fuhr
    9 years ago

    It would be nice if Apple extended its Spotlight Search capability on iOS so that the results of searches include folders. That functionality already exists on the Mac. I have put in a request to Apple that they implement similar functionality for iOS.

      9 years ago

      Keep in mind that iOS "app folders" are very different from Mac folders. iOS has no file system -- so there are no folders with files. Each app has its own set of documents. App folders on iOS are just collections of apps. Why search for the app folder name instead of the app name?

        Richard Fuhr
        9 years ago

        A possible reason to search for an app folder rather than a particular app would be if you have a folder in one of your distant home screens and you are not sure which app in that folder you would like to launch. For instance perhaps you have a Weather folder somewhere.

    Chris Laarman
    9 years ago

    I have six iOS devices and well over 2000 apps. I maintain some overall directory of the apps in a spreadsheet. On my devices, I group them in folders by (to keep it concise) type of data. Thus I can easily assess if I should add or remove "yet another you-name-it" from that device.

    Mr. Luigi
    9 years ago

    Unless I'm in a meeting and don't want to get caught playing on my phone, I like to use Siri to open Apps. No typing and easy on the eyes.

    For example to view recent MacMost podcasts on Downcast it's as simple as activating Siri and saying...

    "Open Downcast"

    BOOM! It's there. :-)

    Ross
    9 years ago

    I can't move the apps from page to page on my iPhone like you showed in this video. Can that be done?

      9 years ago

      Yes. Just drag them to the edge and wait for the screen to change. If you have never done it before, it can be tough to get the hang of it.

    Ron
    9 years ago

    I would love to use the search function. The instruction was to swipe down half way to go to search. On my iPhone6 that move produces only my notifications and calendars. Is the app search unique to the iPad?

      9 years ago

      Sounds like you are swiping from the very top of the screen. Swipe starting closer to the middle.

    Kika Wai'Alae
    9 years ago

    Whenever I swipe to search it give me two options. Search Web or Search Wikipedia. Do I need to set something in Settings?

      9 years ago

      Perhaps you've disabled the rest? Check in Settings, General, Spotlight Search.

    Rhkennerly
    9 years ago

    Anyway to sync apps/app folders across devices? It would be nice to at least start off with the same arrangement on both iPhone & iPad, even thought I'm sure each would "drift" over time. Also, folders that have the same apps often end up with different folder names. Or the opposite, same folder names but different apps. Is there a fix?

      9 years ago

      No way to sync app positions across devices. Most people have different apps on different devices. I have a lot of travel and GPS apps on my iPhone that are not on my iPad, and a lot of games on my iPad not on my iPhone. So it would get complex if you could sync positions. As far as folder names, why stick with the default names anyway?

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