You probably use your iPhone dozens of times a day to text, check email, take pictures or look something up. But tucked behind all of those everyday functions are a surprising number of features that are easy to miss.
Some can save you a few steps. Others can replace an app you may not have realized you no longer need. And a few are simply fun to try.
Exactly what's available can depend on your iPhone model, iOS version, language and region. But if you haven't poked around your phone's settings in a while, these seven features are worth a look.
Your iPhone has buttons on the sides, of course. But the back of the phone can act like one, too.
With Apple's Back Tap feature, a double or triple tap on the back of a compatible iPhone can trigger an action you choose.
You can set it to take a screenshot, open Control Center, activate an accessibility feature or launch a shortcut, among other options.
To try it, go to Settings > Accessibility > Touch > Back Tap. Then choose what you want a double tap or triple tap to do.
Apple says Back Tap is available on iPhone 8 and later running iOS 14 or newer.
See a flower on a walk and have no idea what it is? Your iPhone may be able to tell you.
Apple's Visual Look Up can recognize things including plants, pets, artwork and landmarks in your photos. Apple's current iPhone guide says the feature can also recognize books, popular statues and some foods, including suggesting related recipes.
Open a photo and look for the Info button at the bottom. If the button has a small star or symbol on it, tap it and choose Look Up.
You may see information about the plant species, dog breed, landmark or other object the phone recognizes.
Apple notes that Visual Look Up isn't available in every region or language.
This one can be especially handy when someone sends you a picture of an address, recipe, phone number or long confirmation code.
With Live Text, the iPhone can recognize text inside photos and videos. You can then select that text much like you would words in an email or webpage.
Open a photo that contains text, tap the Detect Text button and select what you need. From there, you can copy it and paste it somewhere else.
Depending on what's in the image, the phone can do more than copy. Apple says Live Text can also let you translate text, call a phone number, visit a website or convert currencies.
That means a photo of a restaurant sign can become a tappable phone number, while text from a printed page can be dropped directly into a note or message.
If you've ever needed to email a signed form, receipt or piece of paperwork, you don't necessarily need a separate scanner app.
The scanner is already built into Apple's Notes app.
Open Notes, start or open a note, tap the attachment button and choose Scan Documents. Point the camera at the page and your iPhone can automatically recognize its edges and capture it.
You can scan multiple pages into the same document, make adjustments and save the finished scan as a PDF.
Apple has step-by-step instructions for scanning documents in Notes, as well as options for viewing, sharing and marking up PDFs afterward.
This may be one of the more satisfying iPhone tricks to try.
Open a photo with a clear subject — a person, pet or object, for example — and press and hold directly on that subject. On supported devices and software, the iPhone can separate it from the background.
Once the outline appears, Apple lets you copy the subject, share it or turn it into a sticker.
You could copy a picture of your dog without the messy living room behind him, for example, then paste the cutout into a text message.
You can also choose Add Sticker to save the cutout for later use in Messages and other supported apps.
No tape measure nearby? Check your iPhone.
Apple's built-in Measure app uses the camera to estimate the size of nearby objects.
Open Measure — it's typically found in the Utilities folder — and slowly move your phone so it can get a sense of the space around you.
You can manually mark the beginning and end of an object to estimate its length. The app can also automatically detect the dimensions of some rectangular objects.
It could be handy for a quick check of whether a small table might fit in a corner or roughly how wide a picture frame is.
There is one important caveat: Apple says the measurements are approximate. In other words, it's useful for a quick estimate, but probably not the tool to rely on before making a cut that needs to be exact.
You've probably had the experience: A song comes on in a restaurant, store or TV show and you know you'll forget to look it up by the time it's over.
Your iPhone can identify it in a few seconds.
Apple owns Shazam, and its music recognition technology is built into the iPhone experience. You can add Music Recognition to Control Center, then tap the Shazam icon whenever you hear something you want to identify.
It can even recognize certain music playing inside another app on your phone, such as a video.
There's an even easier option if you use Siri. When a song is playing, ask something like, "What song is this?"
When Shazam finds a match, the song and artist appear in a notification on your screen.
None of these features requires becoming an iPhone expert. In most cases, they're simply tools Apple has added over the years that are easy to overlook if you weren't looking for them in the first place.
And that's part of what makes them useful: The next time you need to scan a form, identify a flower, measure a table or figure out the name of a song, the answer may already be sitting in your pocket.
Apple maintains a full iPhone User Guide with additional features and instructions. Availability can vary depending on the iPhone model, software version, language and region.
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