Using a smartphone can sometimes be difficult for older people, especially those who have given up on feature phones. To make it easier for users to adapt to smartphones, brands offer various tools and setting options to make the transition less confusing.
Apple iPhones also come with several settings that you can change to make the device more senior-friendly. To help you, here are 5 settings you can change in a iPhone to make it more compatible with seniors.
Increase the font size on your Iphone Apple
The aging eyes of older people may find using a smartphone with a small font size a pain. Therefore, the first thing one can do to make an iPhone age-friendly is to increase the font size. By increasing the font size, you can make on-screen content clear and easy to read. To increase the font size on an Apple iPhone, you can go to Settings > Display & Brightness > Text Size > From the bar, you can select the font size you want. You can also make on-screen text bold by going to Settings > Display & Brightness > toggle on the Bold Text option.
Enable magnified view for larger orders
Much like font size, larger controls also make it easier for seniors to access the features offered by any smartphone. To enlarge the on-screen controls, Apple offers a magnified view feature. When enabled, everything on the screen, including app content, will be displayed magnified. To enable display zoom, you can go to Settings > Display & Brightness > Display > Zoomed > Set.
Activate the sound recognition function
With iOS 14, Apple introduced several new accessibility features and one of these features is called sound recognition. The feature is primarily designed for hearing-impaired users, but is useful for everyone. As the name suggests, the sound recognition feature uses the phone’s microphone to detect certain sounds around you. The feature can continuously listen for certain sounds, such as a crying baby, doorbell, or siren, and notify you when it recognizes those sounds. To enable this feature, you can go to Settings > Accessibility > Sound Recognition > Toggle Button.
Activate the voice control function
A few years ago, Apple added the Voice Control accessibility feature for iPhone users. As the name suggests, the feature lets you control your iPhone with just your voice. Once enabled, you can speak commands to perform gestures, interact with screen elements, dictate and edit text, and more. You can enable the accessibility feature by going to Settings > Accessibility > Voice Control > Enable Voice Control Toggle. Before activating voice control for the first time, make sure that the iPhone is connected to the Internet via a Wi-Fi network. Once the iPhone has completed a single file download from Apple, you do not have to you don’t need an internet connection to use voice control.
Enable spoken content features
Even if VoiceOver is disabled, you can make your iPhone speak selected text or the entire screen via the Spoken Content section. The section under the Accessibility tab offers several features, including speech selection and the speech screen. Once you enable the Speak Selection option, a Speak button will appear when you select text. With the Speak Screen option, you can swipe down with two fingers from the top of the screen to hear on-screen content.