iPhone Life - Best Apps, Top Tips, Great Gear

Hands On with the iPhone 15 Pro: Is Apple’s Update Worth the Upgrade?

When it comes to the iPhone, I’ve always been happy with the base model. In fact, when Apple started producing mini versions of the iPhone, those were the ones I gravitated toward. I have had a 13 mini since it was released and would have happily held onto it for another few years. However, this year, I decided to take a risk and pick up the new iPhone 15 Pro. Here are my thoughts.

Your iPhone has a variety of free ringtones to peruse, and the iTunes Store has a gigantic selection of iPhone ringtones to purchase, but what if you want to make your own custom ringtone? Good news! You can make phone ringtones free using already purchased songs from your iTunes library. All you need is your iPhone, a Mac or PC, a Lightning cable, 20–30 seconds of your favorite song, a little bit of time, and a willingness to try something new. Let's get started learning how to make your own custom free ringtones for iPhone with iTunes! 

I’ve been a loyal Apple user for decades. I’ve also been an iPhone 6 Plus user since 2014 when the device was first released, with its large 5.5-inch, high-resolution screen, its dual FaceTime-capable cameras, its more powerful battery, and so on. The iPhone 6 Plus served me extremely well, so much so that I had little interest in changing iPhones. Recently though, I upgraded to the brand new iPhone 8 Plus; and if there’s one thing that has surprised me most about Apple’s newest model iPhone, it's just how little I’m impressed by it.

Since WWDC 2018, we've been eagerly awaiting the release of WatchOS 5 this September. Now that Apple has confirmed the official date for the September announcement (that's the 12th of September for those of you keeping score) we're more excited than ever to dive into the rumors surrounding the Apple Watch. What might the new design feature, and what do we already know about WatchOS 5? Read on to dig into all the rumors leading up to the big announcement.

In the 83rd episode of the iPhone Life Podcast, the team shares highlights from Apple's Q2 earnings report and discuss why analysts' gloomy iPhone X projections were all wrong. Sarah and Donna also share their favorite high-end headphone recommendations and weigh in on whether you can use emojis in place of punctuation marks when texting

Okay, so you’ve taken the leap and handed your child or teen a smartphone. You may feel like you’ve made the biggest decision already; but if you want to keep your child safe, you have many more decisions to make ahead of you. I hear a lot of chatter about how to keep kids safe on social media (which is a critically important topic), but there’s not as much guidance when it comes to one of the iPhone’s simplest features: text messages. In addition to keeping kids and teens safe while texting, we need to make sure they understand texting etiquette. Here, I’ll touch on the five most important things you and your child need to know to stay safe, secure, and polite when it comes to texting. 

There are a lot of different apps you could use to learn a language, but not all language apps give you the tools to truly become fluent in a language. Babbel offers language learning at a classroom level from the comfort of your smart devices. The app offers fourteen different languages and more than 8500 hours of learning content across them. I chose this app to feature because of the way it engages the learner; it immediately felt different to me than the numerous other language apps I’ve tried. We’ll go over more on what it does and why we love it below.

Learn how to temporarily disconnect from a Wi-Fi network using the Control Center on your iPhone. You're connected to a Wi-Fi network with a weak signal, and you'd like to turn off Wi-Fi on your iPhone. Of course, you could open your Settings app, open Wi-Fi, disconnect from your current Wi-Fi network, and join another or switch to cellular. But did you know there's a much faster way to accomplish this task by using the Control Center? Here's how

Good news for everyone who was disappointed 2018 concluded without the announcement of AirPods 2, the AirPower Charging Mat, or a new set of over-ear headphones, potentially called Studio Pods: We may be getting at least one, maybe two of those devices very soon. Via press release, Apple has given us an official release date and specs of the AirPods 2. The rumors of an accompanying wireless charging enabled AirPod case, indicate that Apple may finally be ready to release the promised AirPower Charging Mat as well. In this rumor roundup, we'll cover every update about the new rumored new wireless earbuds and wireless charging case, as well as Studio Pods and AirPower related rumors.  

The 118th US Open is fast approaching, so now's the time for golf fans to figure out how to stream the championship on our Apple TVs. The US Open begins June 11 and runs through the 17th at the Shinnecock Hills Golf Club in Southampton, NY. Fox Sports is in its fourth year of broadcasting the Open as the US Golf Association's principle broadcaster. Let's get started finding out which Fox networks are participating, the broadcast schedule, and how to live stream all the 2018 US Open action on our Apple TVs. 

I have always been leery of adhering a cover to my iPad. It isn't that I'm worried the adhesive will damage the device or leave it marred, it’s more about convenience. When you review cases you need to take them off with some frequency so you can test the next one. Well, I bit the bullet when two different cases arrived, both with adhesives. Here are my experiences and thoughts about the Twelve South SurfacePad and the Toast for iPad Pro.

2018 marks the 50th anniversary of the US Open tennis tournament, and Apple TV owners can catch all the action in high definition without a cable subscription. To accomplish this, you'll need to know the US Open TV schedule for 2018 and which online streaming services offer the best coverage from those networks. Let's get started learning how to live stream the 2018 US Open to our Apple TVs in advance of the tournament.

If you like PopSockets but wish there was a larger version for iPads and other tablets, there is good news from Safetray Products. The G-Hold iPad Holder ($29.95) is similar to a PopSocket, but it is larger and it can be more easily repositioned because it uses Micro Suction not adhesive. Safetray, as its name suggests, is known for similar adapters to help waitstaff keep a grip on serving trays; so this is right up the company's alley.

Voicemail-to-text transcriptions on the iPhone aren't a perfect offering—the service often drops words and mangles names—but despite that, voicemail transcriptions are useful if you would rather scan a bit of text than listen to a voice message. If you want to send that text to someone else, you'll have to select the text, then on the Edit menu that pops up, choose the Share option, and finally tap the sharing method you prefer and send the text. One feature we'd love to see added to the voicemail-to-text feature is a single-step method for sharing voicemail transcriptions similar to the method for sharing the audio of voicmails. While we're waiting for this feature, though, the select-share workaround is functional enough. Read on to learn how to share voicemail to text transcriptions on your iPhone. Please note that Voicemail-to-Text Transcription is only available for the iPhone 6s and later.

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