iPhone users were stunned after a TikToker recently shared her realization that the Apple symbol on the back of her phone could be used as an "actual button."
Sharing useful information is one of the best things about social media, especially when that information might be something known to a lot of people. Jane (@jane_affairs) was able to make her own contribution in this vein when over 6 million people watched her short TikTok about iPhone accessibility.
“You are today years old when you knew that this is an actual button,” she wrote, highlighting the Apple logo etched into the back of her phone.
Flipping it over, she showed people how to enable it for various uses. After going into Settings, tap on “Accessibility,” then “Touch” under the Physical and Motor category. When you scroll down to the very bottom, there’s an option for “Back Tap.” It’s generally off by default, but if you dive deeper, you can enable double and/or triple tapping to do specific tasks, including muting your phone, taking a screenshot, turning the flashlight on/off, or accessing a shortcut.
@jane_affairs ♬ original sound - Jane Jane
The feature was actually only implemented with the release of iOS 14 in September 2020—so don’t feel too bad if you didn’t know about it before now. It also doesn’t work with some of the earlier iPhone models that were able to use iOS 14, but if you have an iPhone 8 or any newer model, you should be able to enable it.
Jane wasn’t the only one learning this for the first time, as a number of viewers expressed their own pleasant surprise at being able to set it up.
“Guys its real,” wrote @sourpatchkids28.
“I have an iPhone 11 Pro and it works,” @sundayeveryday_0 celebrated. “Thank you.”
“Not me trying to get my phone case off to try this,” added @ashlynn644.
A number of viewers (but not everyone who tried) reported it still working with their cases on. Testing it out with my own iPhone 13, tapping through the case is possible with a little extra emphasis, but not completely reliable. Of course, your mileage may vary depending on the material and thickness of the case you use.
And @benjaminmoah24 provided an additional helpful tip, pointing out that it’s not actually the Apple logo itself that serves as a “button,” but rather just tapping on the back of the phone in general—although several people claimed the response was most consistent the closer they stayed to the logo, which makes sense due to its centered position.
Most of us don’t bother to fully explore all the possibilities with any new devices we buy, but at least there’s always TikTok, clueing us in on fun new surprises… even if we could have known about them years sooner.
Sign up to receive the Daily Dot’s Internet Insider newsletter for urgent news from the frontline of online.
The post ‘Not me trying to get my phone case off to try this’: Apple customers are just now finding out what the Apple on back of iPhones is for appeared first on The Daily Dot.
