do you smell that The scent of iOS 17 still baking in the oven wafting across from Cupertino, CA? Well, if you can’t smell what Tim Cook is cooking up ahead, everyone else knows that a reveal of the next iPhone operating system is coming at WWDC 2023. And I hope Apple takes requests.
The iPhone’s app library felt like a perfect idea upon arrival. A place for Apple to do your app sorting for you. Debuting in 2020’s iOS 14, the App Library has arrived to help you have less manually customized home screens – using the iPhone’s digital brain.
And it worked. Now I only have the one home screen and I keep all the apps that I don’t use that regularly in the app library. The only problem is that the App Library is actually not as smart an app organizer as it should be.
While Apple’s original press release (opens in new tab) explained that the App Library “automatically organizes all of a user’s apps into a simple, easy-to-navigate view and intelligently displays apps that may be helpful in the moment,” mean recent experience feels like this section of the home screen needs to get smarter.
Or to put it more simply: Apple should let us fix the bugs in the app library.
iOS doesn’t always know how to sort apps
We all manage our closets differently, so it’s not surprising that the app library coexists with the regular, editable home screen. But the app library bugs are so notable that I have to ignore their sorting. I’ve only recently discovered that I only use this screen for alphabetically viewing apps that you get from the search box (tap the top box or swipe the screen down).
What is iOS 16 doing so wrong? Well it thinks OKCupid dating app is a social media app. Wrong Siri, it’s a dating app. Not that the App Library has a “Dating” folder. It has an “other” folder where I can find the other dating apps I use. (Side note: dating apps are hell, and I envy those too old to know what they’re like.)
(Image credit: Apple)
Yes, I could make similar claims about other apps that don’t “belong” in a “social” folder. Messages, FaceTime, Signal, and WhatsApp are technically social apps, but they’re not social networks. They’re more like “messaging”. But I digress. By the way, my other folder does not only contain dating apps. It also has two of Netflix’s mobile games (Oxenfree and Poinpy).
Although my app library is mostly well sorted, it would be very easy to fix this error. If I could just long press on an icon and drag it to the right folder, that would be great. Apple would probably say “that’s what the Start screen is for,” and I get that.
Outlook: Let’s make the iPhone better
I’d appreciate it if Apple considered a quote from Pedro Pascal’s character in Wonder Woman 1984: “Life is good, but it could be better.” Yes, the app library (which has been around for over two years now ) is helpful, but it’s time to develop it further.
And with WWDC 2023 just around the corner – it’ll be here before either of us know – I thought this would be a good time to try and shout out to the world of tech news and hope that Apple hear me Either clean up the app library or let us put the finishing touches on it. Neither is a bad idea, and the latter would not be a sign of weakness.
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