OPTED Magazine

There are tens of thousands of apps for the Apple iPhone and after using a trial and error strategy for testing out your favorite productivity apps or games, you could quickly find yourself with several screens of apps, many of which you never use.

When you purchase an iPhone, the phone comes with a standard set of apps and icons on the first screen.  But what if you aren’t interested in these and want them removed from your phone?

How to remove standard iPhone apps — Strategy #1

The simple, no brainer strategy is to drag each of these unwanted app icons to the last app screen to get them off the first screen.  Ideally your most used apps should be on the first screen for easy access.  Dragging the unwanted apps that can’t be deleted was one of the first iPhone decluttering tasks that I made.

To drag icons and to shift their position, hold your finger down on the app you wish to move and after a few seconds, the apps will start to wiggle like an earthquake.  Black X’s will appear in the corner of any apps you have added.  You can delete the apps that have X’s and any of them can be dragged around from screen to screen.  Click the home button to lock in your changes.

How to remove standard iPhone apps — Strategy #2

Jail break your phone.  If you’re not familiar with this (and honestly, I’m not either) you can check out Hack That Phone for how to jailbreak your iPhone to override standard settings.  There’s an app called Poof that will allow you to hide your icons.

Unfortunately, there is no easy way to delete the standard app set that came with your iPhone, which can be frustrating for the perfectionist!  Instead I would suggest playing around with a strategy for which screens different apps are displayed on.  My home screen has all my most-used apps, the second screen is my second tier of apps I use every once and a while, my third screen has all the games, and the last screen is for apps that came with the phone that I don’t use.

This post is part of OPTED Magazine’s regular “iPhone Tuesdays” series, where we’ll feature a new iPhone app or strategy that helps with productivity, tasking, goal setting, decluttering, or organization.  These posts will include a review and all the information based on a personal test and evaluation.  Watch for the series again next Tuesday!

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