All the Ways You Can Customize Your iPhone's Home Screen

All the Ways You Can Customize Your iPhone's Home Screen Apple introduced many of these changes with iOS 18 in 2024, and iOS 26 brought a new app color scheme to your device. Zachary McAuliffeStaff writer Zach began writing for CNET in November, 2021 after writing for a broadcast news station in his hometown, Cincinnati, for five years. You can usually find him reading and drinking coffee or watching a TV series with his wife and their dog. ExpertiseWeb hosting | Operating systems | Applications | SoftwareCredentials Apple software beta tester, "Helps make our computers and phones work!" - Zach's grandparents The new All Clear icon look in iOS 26 is part of the Liquid Glass design. Apple/Screenshot by Jeff Carlson/CNET Apple released iOS 26 in September, and it introduced a Liquid Glass design to your device. As part of the redesign you can make your app icons and widgets on your home screen clear. These changes build on the home screen customization options Apple introduced to the iPhone with iOS 18. Apple released iOS 18 in 2024 and it brought a major (and long overdue) change to your iPhone: the ability to customize your home screen. With iOS 18, you can remove app labels, change the color of app icons and arrange apps around the screen in new ways. You can frame your background with your apps or give your iPhone a more personal touch with different colored apps. Here are the ways you can customize your home screen to make it as fun and unique as you are. Don't miss any of our unbiased tech content and lab-based reviews. Add CNET as a preferred Google source on Chrome. How to remove app labels 1. Long-press on your background to enter jiggle mode -- where your apps are all shaking. 2. Tap Edit in the top left corner of your screen. 3. Tap Customize. Tapping Customize opens a new menu. Apple/Screenshot by CNET 4. Tap the two different-sized squares in the top-right corner of the new menu that appears at the bottom of your screen. Tapping the little and big squares change the size of your apps. Apple/Screenshot by CNET Your app icons will grow and the labels beneath them will disappear. This looks much cleaner to me: I don't plan on displaying app labels ever again. If you don't like this, follow the above steps again and tap the different sized squares once more. The apps will revert to their normal size and the labels will reappear. How to change the color of your app icons and widgets 1. Long-press on your background to enter jiggle mode -- where your apps are shaking. 2. Tap Edit in the top left corner of your screen. 3. Tap Customize. Then you can choose between Default, Dark, Clear and Tinted app icons and widgets. These options can change the color of your apps and widgets. Apple/Screenshot by CNET If you choose Dark from this top menu, Apple's first-party apps, like Messages...

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