How to Customize Your iPhone Dock

The iPhone Dock lets you access your most frequently used apps from any of your Home screens. The default iPhone Dock apps are the Phone, Safari, Messages, and Music apps. I’ll teach you how to add and remove apps, rearrange apps in your Dock, and organize those apps into folders.

What Is the Dock on iPhone?

The iPhone Dock is located at the bottom of the iPhone. It is sometimes referred to as the iPhone menu bar, iPhone Home Dock, or the Home Screen bottom bar. It is important not to confuse the Dock with the iPhone Home Bar at the bottom of the screen. Like the Home Button that came before it, that bar can be used to return to the Home Screen and to navigate between Home Screens. People often ask how to remove the iPhone Home Bar from their phone. Unfortunately, this isn't possible. But you can customize the apps in your Dock! We'll go over how to do that below.

How to Move Apps in & out of the iPhone Dock

Can you have more than four apps on the iPhone Dock? Not if you already have four apps on your iPhone Dock. Instead, you'll have to remove an app before you can add a new app to the Dock. If you'd like more apps in your Dock, there's a workaround we'll go over below. But first, here's how to customize the iPhone Dock at the bottom of the Home Screen:

1. Press and hold anywhere on your Home Screen where there are no apps.
2. When the apps begin to wiggle, you will know you can customize your Home Screen.
3. If you already have four apps in your Dock, drag one out of the Dock and lift your finger to place it on the Home Screen.
4. To add an app to the Dock, drag it from the Home Screen to where you want it in the Dock and then lift your finger to drop it in the Dock.
5. When you're finished, tap Done.

That's how to add apps to the bottom bar on iPhone. Now you know how to add and remove apps. If you don't want any apps in your iPhone Dock, you can remove all apps using this method and leave the Dock empty. To add even more apps, you can create folders within your Dock.

How to Use Folders to Add Apps to the iPhone Dock

You can add apps to the Dock using folders. You can drag folders into and out of your Dock just like you'd drag any app. This will allow you to add an entire folder of apps to your iPhone Dock. To get tips like these directly in your inbox, don’t forget to sign up for our free Tip of the Day newsletter.

How to Remove Dock on iPhone

Can you remove the bottom Dock on the iPhone Home Screen? A lot of people wonder if it's possible to remove their iPhone Dock. Currently, the only way to remove the Dock is through jailbreaking, though that is only possible on older versions of iOS. Plus, jailbreaking is particularly complicated and risky if you are not tech savvy. Even those who succeed at it may not be able to use the Dock space for other apps, so there really isn't much reason to try it. So if you're wondering how to remove the Dock on your iPhone, it is not possible, unfortunately. If you only put your most-used apps here, the iPhone Dock is a valuable tool that can save you time.

If you like this article, check out how to use the App Library to help you organize and find the apps you need. If you have other Apple devices, you might be interested in learning how to customize the Dock on a Mac.