How to To Use Airplane Mode on the iPhone

The iPhone is a great tool for keeping us connected, but what about when that connection needs silenced? While do not disturb mode is great for eliminating notifications it still has the cellular service enabled, which is a problem when riding on an airplane.

Luckily the iPhone has a built-in setting for scenarios such as these. It is ironically called airplane mode. With airplane mode turned on all connections such as Cellular, WiFi and Bluetooth are off so that you can use or stow the iPhone without causing any interference.

While there has been debate whether cell phones do actually cause problems for airplanes, it is best to comply to the rules just for safety. When airplane mode is on, the setting stays in place even if you turn the iPhone off. This is handy to know, so if you are overly cautious and turn the iPhone off before boarding, airplane mode will stay enabled when you turn the iPhone back on during or after the flight.

How to enable Airplane Mode.

Tap Settings.

At the very top of the screen is the option for airplane mode.

Set the slider to ON to enable airplane Mode.

With airplane mode enabled, all data connections remain inactive, so leaving the iPhone locked instead of fully turned off on an airplane is acceptable. An option to consider is using the iPhone’s WiFi if in fact the plane offers this service. Thankfully more and more planes have this service, and to use it is important that airplane mode remains enabled. By keeping airplane mode on, cellular service does not function, but you can turn WiFi back on with these steps.

Underneath Airplane mode tap WiFi.

 

Set the slider to ON.

 

Choose the network you are connecting to and enter the password, if necessary.

 

Up in the top left of the screen you will notice that both the Airplane mode icon and WiFi are both present, which verifies that the steps were properly completed.

 

As a reminder: receiving any phone calls or SMS messages is not possible while using airplane mode. Be sure to turn this setting off once the plane lands to re-enable this essential part of the iPhone.