Have you ever wanted to access your iPhone’s Control Center or Notification Center without having to swipe down from the top of the screen? Or instantly activate Shazam to identify a song before it changes? What if there was a way to launch your camera or turn on your flashlight without touching or even looking at your screen?
All this is possible thanks to a secret “button” built into the back of your iPhone. You can activate it by tapping anywhere on the back of your smartphone, including the camera module. And the best part is that it works even if your iPhone has a fairly thick case.
This feature is called Touch the back of the device And, like the Action button on newer iPhones, it gives you an additional way to interact with your smartphone without touching the screen. Tapping the back of the device is available on iPhones as old as the iPhone 8, as long as they’re running iOS 14 or later.
What is the iPhone Back Touch feature?
Back Tap is an iPhone feature introduced in iOS 14. It allows you to run shortcuts on your iPhone by double-tapping or triple-tapping the back of the device.
You can customize the feature on your iPhone to easily perform common actions like opening Control Center or Notification Center. This is especially useful if you have a large iPhone and have trouble swiping down from the top of the screen. You can even set it to do two separate things at once: Tapping the back of your device can be the difference between Double-Tap and Triple-Tap.
Depending on how often you tap the back of your iPhone, you can set Double-tap to open the Camera app and Triple-tap to take a screenshot. Or, you can set Double-tap to open Control Center and Triple-tap to launch the Magnifier app. You can experiment with Back-tap to find the combinations of taps and features that work best for your needs.
And you’re not limited to the tapping options available by default. Thanks to the app Shortcutsyou can configure Back Tap to perform specific features or launch any app. For example, you can create a simple shortcut that opens Shazam or starts a voice recording, then activate it with a quick double or triple tap. You can also use Back Tap to trigger a more elaborate shortcut, like automatically sending photos and videos to specific albums.
How do I set up Touch Back on my iPhone?
To enable the Touch the back of the device feature, go to the app Settings. Then go to Accessibility → Touch → Touch the back of the device. There you will find a list of options to configure Double Tap or Triple Tap.
Here is the full list of features you can associate with Double Tap or Triple Tap:
- Accessibility Shortcut
- Application Switcher
- Camera
- Control center
- Flashlight
- Welcome
- Orientation Lock
- Lock screen
- Silent Mode
- Notification Center
- Screenshot
- Shake
- Spotlight
- Volume Bas
- Volume Skin
Accessibility:
- AssistiveTouch
- Background sounds
- Classic inversion
- Color filters
- Control Nearby Devices
- Dim Flashing Lights
- Live Subtitles
- Live Speech
- Loupe
- Inversion intelligente
- Make the screen speak
- VoiceOver
- Zoom
- Zoom Controller
Scrolling gestures:
- Scroll down
- Scroll up
At the bottom of the menu, you’ll also find a list of shortcuts. These options will vary depending on what’s available in your Shortcuts app.
The only potential downside to Back Tap is that you don’t get any tactile feedback when you use it, so you might accidentally trigger it without realizing it. For example, you might accidentally Double Tap and accidentally trigger the flashlight. In that case, you can reassign Double Tap to a less noticeable function. Or, you can turn off Double Tap and only use Triple Tap, which is less likely to be activated accidentally.
