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Top 10 Settings to Change on the iPhone 5

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Whether you’re a new iPhone user or the iPhone 5 is just another iPhone to add to your collection, we have some simple changes that you can make to make your iPhone 5 experience a much better one.

We have already shared our iPhone 5 Setup and Security Guide as well as tips on How to Get Better iPhone 5 Battery Life and now it’s time to share some settings that iPhone 5 users should change right after receiving the brand new iPhone 5.

These changes will not only make your iPhone 5 experience a much better one as a whole, but some of them will also prevent you from annoying those around you with your smartphone habits.

Here are our top 10 settings to change immediately on the iPhone 5.

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iphone52Change Ringtone

Plain and simple, the stock Marimba ringtone in iOS is tired and played out. So you’ll want to do yourself and everyone else around you a favor by changing your ringtone to something new.

To change your ringtone, follow these steps.

  • Tap Settings.
  • Choose Sounds.
  • Tap on Ringtone.
  • Choose a standard ringtone.
  • Or, select Store from the very top and buy a new ringtone.

You are also able to create custom ringtones using your music library in iTunes. This way, you won’t have to pay money for the cost of a new ringtone for your iPhone 5. If that’s what you wish to do, check out our How to Create Custom Ringtones and Alerts For the iPhone.

Turn off Keyboard Clicking

The clicking of the iPhone 5’s virtual keyboard drives me nuts and it will do the same to those around you should you leave the option enabled. If you don’t want to do that, you should at least know where the option is should you need to turn it off when you’re somewhere that demand silence.

To turn off keyboard clicking, follow these steps.

  • Head into Settings
  • Tap on Sounds
  • Scroll to the bottom and toggle Keyboard Clicks to Off.

iphone53Turn on Battery %

When you get the iPhone 5, it’s battery meter won’t show you one of its more useful features which of course is the percentage that you have left to work with. This is extremely important now that the iPhone 5 features 4G LTE which can suck up battery life when used. It’s also just nice to have one so that you can better manage your battery life.

To get the battery life % to appear in your battery life icon, simply do this.

  • Tap Settings.
  • Choose General.
  • Tap Usage.
  • Scroll down and flip the Battery Percentage toggle On.

Once you follow these steps, you’ll now see a % in your battery icon in the upper right corner.

Set up Passcode Lock

Those who have owned a smartphone in the past may have already set up a Passcode with the iPhone 5. If you haven’t done this yet though, it’s smart to do that right now to better protect your iPhone 5’s contents in case of theft.

It’s also able to prevent friends or unwanted eyes from snooping on your information. To set up a Passcode on your iPhone 5, follow these steps.

  • Tap Settings.
  • Choose General.
  • Scroll down to Passcode Lock.
  • Tap on Passcode Lock.
  • Choose to Turn Passcode On at the top.
  • Enter a 4 digit code you can remember.

Once that’s complete, your iPhone will be more secure. Keep in mind, if you enter the wrong Passcode too many times, the phone will lock you out for a short amount of time.

iphone54Change Passcode Lock Timeout

If you use your iPhone 5 often, and I assume most of you do, you will want to adjust the Passcode lockout time so that you don’t have to enter the iPhone’s Passcode every time you pickup your iPhone 5 for use.

Fortunately, the process to change this is simple.

  • Tap Settings.
  • Choose General.
  • Scroll down to Passcode Lock.
  • Tap on Passcode Lock.
  • Tap Require Passcode.

I generally like to use five minutes because I am constantly on my phone but you are able to adjust it to anywhere from immediately to four hours.

Link Up iMessages and FaceTime

Linking up your iMessages and FaceTime features across multiple devices is an extremely easy way to keep in touch with the people you care about, across your Apple products. For instance, because I have this set up, iMessages that are sent to my iPhone 5 phone number are also sent to my MacBook Air which means I don’t need to pick up the phone to response.

Likewise, for FaceTime, my account is set up so that FaceTime calls come to my iPhone 5 as well as to my MacBook Air.

iphone55Setting this up is fairly simple.

For iMessages:

  • Tap on General.
  • Scroll down to FaceTime.
  • Tap on Send & Receive.

Here, you can select where you want to receive your iMessages. Options include your phone number or an email address associated with your Apple ID. You’re also able to add other email addresses as well should you need to.

For FaceTime:

  • Tap on General.
  • Flip the FaceTime toggle to On.
  • Use your Apple ID or add an email address if necessary.

Those who are able to use FaceTime over Cellular might also want to flip that on at the bottom as well. It will allow you to use the service over 4G LTE or 3G connections.

photoHome Sharing

An extremely useful feature that you iPhone 5 users will want to turn on is called Home Sharing. Home Sharing is essentially a local version of iTunes Match and iCloud allowing you to access your iTunes music while you are on the same network.

If your phone and computer are on the same network, accessing your music is easy. Here’s what you’ll need to do in order to set Home Sharing up.

On your iPhone 5, follow these instructions.

  • Tap on Settings.
  • Choose Music.
  • Enter your Apple ID and Password in the boxes at the bottom of the settings menu.

On your computer, follow these instructions.

  • Open iTunes.
  • Open iTunes Preferences.
  • Click on the Sharing icon at the top of the Preferences.
  • Check, Share my library on my local network.

It’s that easy.

Turn Off Email Notifications

I get a lot of email and if you’re like me, I suggest turning off your email notification sound effect as a way to keep your sanity. Personally, I turn email notifications completely off but you don’t have to do that if you don’t want to.

To change your email notification sound, or turn off the sounds all together, you’ll follow these steps.

  • Choose Settings.
  • Tap on Sounds.
  • Scroll down to New Email and tap it.
  • To turn it off, tap on Choose None.
  • To pick a new tone, choose from the list below or click Store in the top right corner.

This is a great time to shut off other notifications as well. If you wish to do that, head to our How To Remove an App From the iPhone Notification Center.

Automatic Downloads

Turning on a feature called Automatic Downloads is a great way to ensure that apps that you download through iTunes arrive on your iPhone 5 automatically. Setting this up is easy, but it’s going to require you to change some settings on both your iPhone 5 and your computer.

To turn on App auto downloads on your iPhone 5, follow these steps.

  • Choose Settings.
  • Tap on iTunes & App Stores.
  • Switch the Automatic Download toggles for Books, Apps and Music.
  • If you have a limited data plan, make sure that Use Cellular Data is set to off otherwise you may rack up some unnecessary data.

Also, you’ll want to make sure that you have the right Apple ID listed down there at the bottom of the screen.

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Next, you’ll need to enable the setting in iTunes.

  • Open iTunes.
  • Open iTunes Preferences.
  • Click on Store in the middle of the preference icons.
  • Check the Automatic Downloads check boxes.
  • Click OK.

iphone5Sync Facebook and Twitter Accounts

iOS 6 offers powerful integration with both Twitter and Facebook which allow you to post to Facebook or Twitter manually or by using Siri provided you have synced up your iPhone 5 with both social networks.

If you use Twitter or Facebook or both, you’ll want to sync your accounts up with the iPhone 5 and iOS. To do that, follow these steps.

For Twitter:

  • Tap Settings.
  • Scroll down to Twitter.
  • If you don’t have the Twitter app installed at this point, install it.
  • Select Add Account.

Now, you’ll be able to easily post to Twitter using iOS 6’s new Sharing features as well as through Siri, if you have access to her.

For Facebook:

  • Tap Settings.
  • Scroll down to Facebook.
  • If you don’t have the Facebook app installed at this point, install it.
  • Select Add Account and enter your information.

You can down send photos to Facebook using iOS 6’s new Sharing features and you can also post direction from Siri. In addition, iOS 6 can pull information from Facebook itself which will update your phone with relevant events in the calendar or update your contact info.

If you need more help, check out our How to Set Up Twitter in iOS 6 to Tweet & Share Faster and How to Set Up Facebook in iOS 6.

26 Comments

26 Comments

  1. blogovia

    11/20/2012 at 10:40 am

    Thank you. Starting from scratch with an iphone.
    Many annoying things – how does one get rid of them (e.g. unwanted icons on home screen, things like “nike + ipod” on the Settings screen!) ?

    • etin

      01/04/2013 at 10:44 am

      Touch the icon till it starts to shake then click on the ‘x’ next rt o it to delete it

    • dharminder

      02/04/2013 at 1:05 am

      go to settings>scroll down till the end>then you will see an option click on it and switch it off from on

  2. Ccare

    11/23/2012 at 7:40 pm

    Thank you. Starting from scratch with an iphone.
    Many annoying things – how does one get rid of them (e.g. unwanted icons on home screen, things like “nike + ipod” on the Settings screen!) ?

    Just put them together in a group entitled “CRAP” like I did. You can’t delete them.

  3. jon

    12/07/2012 at 7:55 am

    Uh, “Ask to Join Networks” is the first thing I turn off. I hate getting pop-ups every time I’m in the presence of a new Wifi network

  4. John

    12/07/2012 at 10:31 am

    Great Tips Adam, thank you!

  5. Jill

    01/06/2013 at 10:16 am

    I want my Iphone5 to ring longer than like 4 rings. How can I set it to get like 10 rings before it goes to voicemail?

    • ned

      01/12/2013 at 4:38 am

      Jill, that is something you have to talk to your carrier about, it’s nothing to do with the phone itself.

  6. F.K

    01/16/2013 at 11:26 am

    can you please tell me if i can switch off the repeat alerts in silent mode? i want my phone to notify me once when it is silent, not go on vibrating endlessly till i check it, sucking up my battery life. ive tried everything in the phone..maybe such an application? also is there any app for different profiles- such as Home, office etc( so i can have different profiles like i did in my nokia phone?

  7. Scott Marshall

    01/17/2013 at 4:14 am

    How do I turn up the audio volume when someone rings me or visa versa. It’s on very low and I struggle to hear anything.

  8. Sue

    01/21/2013 at 6:14 am

    I followed the directions to turn off email alert and it continues to “ping”.
    Any additional ideas? My iPhone 4 did not do this.

  9. IPhone

    02/22/2013 at 12:50 am

    Its better to keep your iPhone shut down, it will get long life till iPhone50

  10. Neil Sandford

    03/01/2013 at 3:45 am

    Have changed the incoming e-mail tone to none, yet it still makes a sound

  11. Anita rajpal

    04/04/2013 at 5:54 am

    Thank u :)

  12. CJ

    05/15/2013 at 2:28 pm

    Why am I getting two notifications showing by Facebook icon but when I go into it there is only one?

  13. Renee

    05/24/2013 at 10:37 am

    How do you turn off text and email notifications when talking on the phone?

  14. Ewan

    06/08/2013 at 3:11 am

    When I make or receive a call I have options on my phone mute, keypad, speaker, add call, FaceTime , contacts. Blocking out the picture of the person calling. How do I remove this so it’s just the persons details on my screan?

  15. Fpj van rooyen

    06/11/2013 at 2:43 am

    On my out and incoming calls the digits go on.Very annoing.Please help

  16. Carol

    07/15/2013 at 3:21 pm

    the keyboard is so touchy on the Iphone 5, had a Iphone 3 and could text like crazy no problems, now it’s like going back in time before phones even had a keyboard.
    I can’t believe a phone this advanced makes it so hard to type a text message.
    What am I doing wrong??? It’s driving me crazy, I do more texting than talking on the device, or I use to.

  17. ana

    09/28/2013 at 1:48 pm

    how I can make the iphone went u send a message and next they back and falsh

  18. rocky

    10/31/2013 at 12:22 am

    there is no facetime account on my settings how can i set it up?

  19. Debbie

    02/16/2014 at 11:18 am

    I”m sure I’m missing something basic here, but every time I set my sound settings for text and call notifications, it doesn’t take. I have NO sound or vibration at all. Help!
    Thanks

  20. Andrew White

    05/04/2014 at 5:12 pm

    My music no longer lets me play by song (option is grey and not available). I have to play by albums. How can I fix it?

  21. Bsr

    05/09/2014 at 2:16 am

    can I change seting og ” in-app purchase setting appears to be off ”
    How can I change in the iphone 5 please ?

  22. Wamda

    07/19/2014 at 2:18 pm

    How do I stop sharing all my iOS pics when I want to post like 1 or 2 on Facebook? This is crazy all my pics show up in 1 post thank you

  23. Angela

    09/06/2015 at 3:14 am

    Am I able to set up text templates for when I want to send to several people but not do group texts pls

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