iOS 18 Beta: How to Resize Your Widgets Right From Your Home Screen [CNET]

July 20, 2024July 20, 2024 Zachary McAuliffe technology

You can also easily turn app icons into widgets.

Zachary McAuliffe Staff writer

Zach began writing for CNET in November, 2021 after writing for a broadcast news station in his hometown, Cincinnati, for five years. You can usually find him reading and drinking coffee or watching a TV series with his wife and their dog.

Expertise Web hosting | Operating systems | Applications | Software Credentials

Apple software beta tester, “Helps make our computers and phones work!” – Zach’s grandparents

Apple released the first public beta for iOS 18 on Monday, a little more than a month after the tech giant announced the software at its Worldwide Developers Conference in June. In addition to more ways to customize your lock screen and home screen, the new operating system also lets you instantly resize widgets on your home screen and quickly turn your apps into widgets.

In past iOS versions, you’d have to delete a widget if you didn’t like its size. After deleting it, you’d have to go through the whole process of choosing the right size, adding it to your screen and then finding the right spot for it. Now, you don’t have to take those extra steps and can instantly resize your widget.

We recommend downloading a beta only on something other than your primary device. Because this isn’t the final version of iOS 18, the update might be buggy and battery life may be short, and it’s best to keep those troubles on a secondary device.

Note that the beta is not the final version of iOS 18, so there could be more features to land on your iPhone when iOS 18 is released. Apple said iOS 18 would be released to the public this fall, but there’s no definitive date yet.

Here’s how you can resize your widgets and turn your app icons into widgets.

How to resize widgets and turn apps into widgets

Long-press on a widget until a menu appears. Then, you’ll see some new tiled icons in the shape of different widgets.

Some widgets, like for Weather, show four different sized options: the app icon, a small tile, a longer tile and then a large tile that looks like a whole page. Other apps, like Contacts, will only show the tile icon and one other tile option. Tap the size widget you want to try and the app will expand on your home screen in real time.

An app menu with options to resize the icon outlined — You can transform the Photos app into four different sized widgets.

Apple/Screenshot by CNET

You can also turn your app icons into widgets the same way. Long-press on an app until the menu appears, and then select the widget size you want to try. If an app doesn’t have a widget, like Messages, you won’t see these options.

If you’ve arranged your apps in a particular way around your home screen, changing the size of widgets or transforming app icons into widgets will likely disrupt your custom layout. Unfortunately, I haven’t found a way to lock in custom app layouts, so you might have to rearrange your apps again after changing the size of the widget or app icon.

Don’t forget, iOS 18 is still in beta so this feature could be buggy or not work properly. There will likely be more betas before the OS is released to the public, so there’s plenty of time for Apple to address any issues. As of now, though, there’s no word on when Apple will release iOS 18.

For more on iOS 18, here’s my hands-on experience with the first public beta, how to get rid of your flashlight from your lock screen and how to use T9 dialing to easily make calls.