How to Remove Recent Contacts from the iOS 8 App Switcher

iOS 8 comes with a lot of great new features, but it also comes with its fair share of annoying new features. Most notably, the app switcher now includes a section where your recent contacts show up at the top, but you can easily remove this section.

Recent Contacts in the app switcher allows you to quickly get a hold of your most frequently-contacted friends or family members. Simply just tap on the contact that you want to get in touch with and several options pop up from there, including calling them, texting them or sending them a FaceTime request.

Some users may find this section in the app switcher to be helpful, allowing them to quickly contact their most frequently-contacted friends and family, but most users already have their own shortcuts set up on their iPhone, whether it’s using the Favorite section in the Phone app or using Launch Center Pro to quickly call a favorite contact.

This makes the recent contacts section in the app switcher unneeded most of the time. Plus, we feel that the app switcher should remain only the app switcher, as any other additions to it makes it feel bogged down a bit.

If you don’t like the addition of the recent contacts section in the app switcher, here’s how to disable it for good.

I’m So Lonely

Whether you have a ton of friends or none at all, the recent contacts section in the app switcher is annoying for the most part, mostly because there are numerous other ways to quickly access your contacts. If you want to disable this section and make it disappear from the app switcher on your iOS 8 device, follow these simple steps.

• Open up the Settings app and navigate to Mail, Contacts, Calendars > Show in App Switcher.
• There will be two options to choose from: Phone Favorites and Recents. Turn off both options.
• You’ll no longer see recent contacts in the app switcher.

It’s pretty simple and doesn’t take a whole lot of effort to disable, and once it’s done, you’ll be back to a clean and simple app switcher in iOS 8 just like how it was in iOS 7.

Alternatively, you can have your favorite contacts displayed in the app switcher instead of just your recent contacts. This is probably more preferable to a lot of users, as making a one-time phone call to your insurance company or something will have them show up in the recent contacts section in the app switcher.

However, having your favorite contacts only displayed there makes that empty space more usable, allowing you to quickly get a hold of a friend or family member.

In any case, I still prefer to use Launch Center Pro for quick shortcuts to favorite contacts. The app allows you to create shortcuts to anything on your iPhone, and gives you quicker access to app and settings.

If you have a small group of contacts who you call or text frequently, you can set up actions in Launch Center Pro that allow you to instantly call or text a friend or family member without having to open up the Phone app or the Messages app.

Of course, that’s only a small example of what you can do and that doesn’t even scratch the service. There’s so much more you can do with Launch Center Pro and I highly recommend that you buy it.