It was something Android OS had for a long time but iOS 14 did refine it offering much more on the table. The iOS 15 straight-up beefed it in terms of functionalities. Soon, a lot of third-party apps mushroomed allowing for impeccable widgets but one of the apps did stand out. I am walking about Widgetsmith and as the same suggests, it has both characteristics. It offers a wide collection of widgets that users can edit to the pixels. Widgetsmith offers a huge range of widgets from date, photos, weather, health, activity, tides, astronomy, and more. Also, Read: How to Get Water Out of iPhone? Here’s more about Widgetsmith and how you can use it on iOS 14/15.
Types of widgets that Widgetsmith supports?
In general, there are 12 types of widgets that you can use each with numerous free and paid options, a tonne of customizations, and fine-tuning ability. Here are all the categories of widgets available on Widgetsmith.
AstronomyBlank SpaceCalendarCustom TextDateHealth & ActivityTidesTimePhotosPhotos in AlbumRemindersWeather
How To Use Widgetsmith on iOS 14/15?
For the purpose of ease of use, I have bifurcated setting up Widgetsmith in two sections i.e. how to set up a new widget and how to customize it. This section deals with how to set up a Widgetsmith widget.
Setup Widgetsmith widget on iOS 14/15
Step 01: Open the Widgetsmith app on your iPhone. Step 02: Select the size of the widget you want to add. Widgetsmith has Small, Medium, and Large depending upon which one you need. Step 03: Once you decide the size of the widget, tap on Add (Small, Medium, or Large) Widget, Say “Add Medium Widget”. Step 04: Tap on the new widget created. It will be named “Medium #2” if there’s a Medium widget available already that you can delete. Step 05: Tap on the new widget and you have two options:
Default Widget: This is the current widget that you can save as it is by hitting the “Save” button on the top-right corner. If you want to change the information shown such as “Calendar” to “Steps”, tap on Default Widget, scroll between categories, and find the one that you want.Tap on “Add a Timed Widget” if you want the newly created widget to appear on the home screen at any given time.Hit the “Save” button to save the newly created widget.
How To Customise Widgetsmith Widgets Font and Colors?
You just created a widget with the right type (such as date, health, activity, and so on), it’s time to customize it.
Select the widget on Widgetsmith that you want to customize.You will see a bunch of options at the bottom of the screen i.e. Style Font, Tiny Color, and Background Color.Style: You have a long list of styles to choose from. In fact, there are many ways you can personalize a widget with the style itself. Tap on the styleFont: You can choose from various fonts available for the specific type of widget you choose such as System, New York, Rounded, SF Mono, among others. Tint Color: It is basically the color of the text written on a widget. It could be anything from total steps, day, date, calendar, temperature, and so on.Background Color: This option lets you change the background color of the widgets so if you want the temperature widget to have a Red background with Yellow Tint Color, you can use these two options to personalize it.Border Color: It is a sub-option under “Background Color” that lets you customize the color of the border you want. Once you have used the above-mentioned features to customize the widget, swipe back to the main “Medium #2” window (back to step 1).Tap on the “Save” button and you have saved a newly created and customized widget.
How To Place Widgets on the Home Screen with Widgetsmith?
Now that you have the widget you want to use, here’s how you can place it on the home screen.
Long-press on your iPhone’s home screen. This is when it will enter Jiggle mode where all the icons jiggle (for some reason).On the top left corner, tap on the “Plus (+)” button.Search for Widgetsmith which should be at the bottom of the page or use the search bar.Scroll on the right to find the size of the widget you created. Since you created “Medium” here, you can select the “Medium” sized widget. Tap on “Add Widget”.The widget will appear in the jiggle mode that you can drag to any page of the home screen as you like.
To change the widget, long-press on it and select “Edit Widget”.Next, the default nomenclature is Widget-size #1 aka Medium #1, Medium #2. Tap on the serial number of the widget and change to the one that you created. Refer Widgetsmith app to note down the serial number of the custom widget.This is all you need to know about adding widgets on iOS 14/15 using Widgetsmith.
How To Set up Timed Widgets in Widgetsmith?
Apart from setting up widgets manually on Widgetsmith, you can use Timed Widgets as well. This is an ephemeral widget that shows up on the home screen of your iPhone, stays put for a short while, and vanishes. You can set the specific period the timed widget should stay. Here’s how it works.
Open Widgetsmith on your iPhone.Next up, select the widget/custom widget you want to use, and instead of tapping on “Default Widgets”, tap on “Timed Widget”.Now, you can specify the period of time you want it to stay. Use the Time Selector tool to do it.Next up, tap on a black widget grid, select the widget that you want to push through on the home screen and use the Aesthetic feature to customize.Back up a bit and hit “Save”.Now you have set a timed widget to appear and disappear at a specific time.
Closing Phrases
Well, that’s how you can use Widgetsmith on both iOS 14 and 15. The app is available for free on the App Store. Certain widgets/features are paid up so you will have to use the in-app subscription to add those paid widgets/features but that’s all. There’s a counterpart app for your Apple Watch as well called the Watchsmith that you can use to customize the face of the Apple Watch. Also, Read: How to Change Instagram Icon on Android and iOS
