Report: iOS 18 will give you more freedom when arranging your home screen
iOS 14 introduced home screen widgets and the App Library, the biggest improvement since iOS 7 switched to a flat visual style or maybe since iOS 4 added folders. Now another change is coming – Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reports that the upcoming iOS 18 will make the home screen “more customizable”.
There will be several changes, but one new feature will allow you to leave gaps in the grid of icons. The icons themselves will still snap to the grid, but you will be able to leave empty spots, even whole rows and/or columns.
There should be other changes to the home screen too, but those are kept under wraps. Apple will unveil the new iOS version at the WWDC (which will be in June).
Home screen widgets • App Library • Customizable Lock screens • StandBy
Here’s a quick refresher on iOS versions from the last couple of years. iOS 16 focused on lock screen personalization with customizable fonts and colors as well as the addition of lock screen widgets. iOS 17 introduced StandBy mode, which turns the iPhone into a smart display while it’s on a dock in landscape mode, also it brought interactivity to widgets.
There is more to those versions that that, of course, these are just the most relevant changes to the look and feel of the OS. iOS 18 will bring new features unrelated to the home screen too – previous posts from Gurman point to RCS support and generative AI for Siri. The look of the UI might change too, with elements inspired by visionOS.