App Library is here to help you sort through your app clutter
- jun
- 24
Apple is trying to help corral all of your iPhone apps with App Library.
The App Library is one of the tentpole features announced for iOS 14 during WWDC 2020. It's a way to organize your apps that allows you to get away from the ever-expanding pages of apps that you may have had before.
Your applications are collected into automatically-generated categories and are easily accessible from there. You can even turn on a setting that will keep newly-downloaded apps from appearing on your Home screen, and just appearing in the library instead.
Apple occasionally offers updates to iOS, iPadOS, watchOS, tvOS, and macOS as closed developer previews or public betas. While the betas contain new features, they also contain pre-release bugs that can prevent the normal use of your iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, Apple TV, or Mac, and are not intended for everyday use on a primary device. That's why we strongly recommend staying away from developer previews unless you need them for software development, and using the public betas with caution. If you depend on your devices, wait for the final release.
- Finding App Library
- How to add an app to the App Library
- How to set app downloads to only appear in the App Library
- How to open apps from categories in App Library
- How to search in App Library
- How to find the alphabetical app list in App Library
Finding App Library
The App Library is actually very easy to find. Just swipe to the left to move to your last page of apps or widgets, then swipe one more time.
You'll see the App Library immediately, full of pre-populated categories like Productivity or Games. There will also be a category full of your most recent downloads, as well as a set of suggested apps, with suggestions powered by on-device machine learning.
Once you're in the App Library, you can launch apps directly from their categories, or even expand the categories to see all of the apps contained within.
How to add an app to the App Library
While technically, all of your apps are in the App Library already, if you want an app to only appear in the Library, rather than your Home screen, here's how you do that.
- Tap and hold on an app to bring up the context menu.
- Tap Remove App on the context menu.
- Tap Add to Library.
How to set app downloads to only appear in the App Library
If you don't want downloaded apps to appear on your Home screen, you can switch on an option in Settings to make sure they only appear in the App Library.
- Open Settings on your iPhone.
- Tap Home Screens.
- Tap App Library only to keep new apps off of your Home screen.
- Tap the Show in App Library switch on or off to control whether or not notification badges show up in the App Library.
How to open apps from categories in App Library
When you want to open an app from the App Library, you might have a couple of questions about doing that. If you just head over to the library and tap on one of the larger icons you see, that app will launch. But what if you want to dig through a category?
- Swipe to the App Library.
- Tap one of the larger icons on an app category if it's the app you want to open.
- Tap the smaller icons to open the category.
- Find and tap on the app you want to open.
How to search in App Library
If you don't want to dig through categories, you can always search in the App Library.
- Swipe to the App Library.
- Tap the Search Bar at the top of the screen.
- Search for the app you want to use.
How to find the alphabetical app list in App Library
You can also navigate the App Library in an alphabetical list.
- Swipe to the App Library.
- Swipe down on the App Library.
- Tap the app you're looking for on the list. Your apps are in alphabetical order, so whatever you're looking for should be easy to find.
Questions?
If you have any questions about using the App Library, let us know in the comments.