How-To

Internet browsers allow websites to store cookies on your device to improve your experience. When you visit a website and it remembers your email and password for you, that’s a cookie working. However, some people would prefer to not have their cookies on, especially when it comes to remembering data and tailoring advertisements to the user. Or, instead of blocking cookies altogether, you can also clear them every now and again. Here’s how to block cookies and how to remove cookies already on your iPhone.

Last September, Apple released iOS 9 with a slew of upgrades to the software. From the long-awaited iPad multitasking capabilities to the smarter-than-ever Siri to a host of new and reimagined apps like iCloud Drive, News, Notes, and Maps, our iPhones and iPads saw some huge improvements. Yet all the changes, wonderful as they are, can be overwhelming to navigate. There are lots of new ways to utilize your iPhone, and we cover them all in our Ultimate Guide to iOS 9. Here's a sneak peak inside the guide, including an overview of everything it includes plus two full lessons covering iCloud Drive and Apple Pay. 

When you’re browsing the web on  your iPhone or iPad, it’s important to protect your information from malicious or fraudulent websites. The problem with this is you can’t always tell which websites are legitimate and which could cause your device trouble or steal your information. However, Safari has a built in function that will warn you with a Fraudulent Website Warning before you open a suspicious website. Here’s how to turn this on.

If you have an iPhone, you have the ability to send short video and audio messages right from a text message. This could be useful for sharing video or audio of where you are or what you’re doing with a friend without opening your camera or recording audio in the Voice Memos iOS app.

You can even set messages you send or receive to go away after two minutes (the default) or to stick around on your iPhone for a year. (Note that this will not determine how long the messages stay on a recipient's or other sender's phone.)

Instead of waiting by the phone for a call or text, what if you’re waiting for an important email? Sure, every few minutes you could unlock your phone, visit the mail app, open your Inbox, and see if it’s arrived. Or, you can ask Siri if you’ve received that email yet. Remember asking your parents from the back of the car, “Are we there yet?” Well, here’s how to ask Siri if that email is here yet.

Subscribing to a feed allows you to easily view and manage blogs, websites, or social media feeds from any Safari page. For example, if you discover a blog you really like, adding it to your subscriptions will allow you to quickly access and read any new posts. You’ll know which websites allow you to do this by whether or not the Add to Shared Links icon appears in your Share options. For websites that do allow it, here’s how to subscribe to a social media feed.

The iPhone 6s has some new features we’ve never seen before on iPhone. With the addition of 3D Touch and Live Photos, a whole new world of tips open up for getting the most from your device. I scoured our list of tips to bring you the top how-tos for the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus. The list includes tips for utilizing Peek & Pop functions of 3D Touch and how to get the most from your Live Photos. If you haven’t made the upgrade plunge check out Sarah and David’s debate on whether or not you should buy the iPhone 6s.

Many apps provide extra content or enhancements for a fee, but in-app purchases are a good way to accidentally rack up a high App Store bill. Those 99 cent extras add up quickly and before you know it, you (or your kids!) have gone way over your monthly phone bill budget. No worries though; there’s an easy way to prevent this in your Settings app. Here’s how to restrict in-app purchases.

Voicemails are easy to delete in the Phone app, but deleted voicemails aren’t removed from your device completely. Deleting your first voicemail creates a folder of Deleted Messages just in case you accidentally got rid of a message or want to visit it later. Deleted Messages can be listened to, un-deleted, and permanently deleted with a Clear All. Here’s how to manage and clear your deleted voicemails.

If you have a Bluetooth car stereo, a Bluetooth speaker, a Bluetooth keyboard, or any other Bluetooth-enabled device that you don’t want your iPhone to connect to anymore, it's easy to make your device forget about it. Follow these easy steps and your iPhone won’t remember your Bluetooth device. If you change your mind, no worries, you can pair the device as though it were new.

How to Cancel Siri Commands

By Conner Carey

Apple’s AI, Siri, is constantly improving. You can use Siri to do more now than ever, including including playing albums, asking about sport scores, and turning on and off certain settings such as Low Power Mode or Bluetooth. However, sometimes you ask Siri to do something and change your mind or need to ask another question. For instance, if you ask Siri to set a reminder but realize you don’t need the reminder, it’s easy to cancel the command. Here’s how to cancel Siri commands.

There’s two ways to add events in mail to your calendar app. With iOS 9 or later, there’s a feature in Settings that allows for Events Found in Mail to automatically be added to your Calendar app. You can turn this feature on or off. If you’d prefer to turn it off, you can also add individual Mail events to your Calendar app manually. This tip will show you how to do both.

How to Sort Notifications

By Conner Carey

With iOS 9, you have the option to sort pull-down notifications. This allows you to group or ungroup apps and view notifications sorted manually or by most recent. When you group apps, they’re sorted into blocks under notifications with the most recent app appearing at the top. When apps are ungrouped, notifications will sort intermixed by most recent unless sorted manually.

In iOS 9, you can view specifics on which apps are using your iPhone’s battery. If you find your battery is draining quickly, viewing detailed battery info is a great way to figure out why. You can see which apps use chunks of your battery life, how long the app was active, and how long the app was running in the background. This is also a great way to see how much time you're spending on a particular app; in case you're still in denial about your Facebook habit.

How to Disable Wi-Fi Assist

By Conner Carey

New to iOS 9 is Wi-Fi Assist. When using Wi-Fi, if your connection is unreliable, your phone will automatically boost your signal using Cellular data. This can be extremely helpful and save you a trip to Settings; however, if you’re watching your data usage, there’s an easy way to turn Wi-Fi Assist off. 

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