System Enhancements

Overcome built-in iOS limitations with this selection of awesome add-ons

Launch Center pro $2.99 Platform iPhone, iPad (separate apps)

More or less a speed dial for regularly performed tasks, Launch Center Pro can be a huge timesaver. It takes complex sequences of actions and turns them into tappable items. You can create shortcuts for things like posting an update to Tumblr, sending your most recent photo to Twitter, adding items to list-making app Clear, and opening a specific view in Google Maps, and you can arrange your shortcuts in groups. Launch Center Pro is an essential purchase, and well worth its low price tag if you regularly use even just a few of the apps that support it. Check out the list of those apps, and the actions that Launch Center Pro can automate in each, at bit.ly/2mXZqmy, and you’ll begin to see the value of this tool.

AnyFont $1.99 Platform iPhone, iPad

From its earliest days, the Mac was in part a product of Steve Jobs’s obsession with typography. Although iOS includes a large range of fonts, it lacks the easy font extensibility of a Mac, which is where AnyFont comes in. It enables you to pull in new fonts from your Mac via iTunes or Dropbox, making them available to the likes of Pages, Keynote, and Microsoft’s Office suite. Sadly, there’s no bulk Dropbox import, and the app must create a separate profile for each imported font. These limitations initially irk, but also force a sense of focus, encouraging you to add only the fonts you really need rather than a collection of thousands.

WiFi Priority $0.99 Platform iPhone, iPad

This app deals with a shortcoming of iOS itself: with several Wi-Fi networks available, your iPhone may sometimes automatically join the wrong one – and there’s no way of setting an order of priority for them. To save you going into Settings to correct it, this app lets you select and sign in to a network, and then block it from being autojoined. (You can still connect to it manually in Settings.)

Hiya Free Platform iPhone

Hiya uses iOS 10’s Call Kit technology to add extra info to your iPhone’s incoming call screen to identify likely spam and scam calls before you answer them. That info is gathered from the app’s users, and you also have the option of blocking either or both types of unwanted call altogether. Turn to page 108 for a tutorial on using Hiya.

Calendars 5 $6.99 Platform iPhone, iPad

We’re big fans of Fantastical as a replacement for Calendar and Reminders, but this alternative is more conventional. It has clearer calendar views than Apple’s app, natural-language event input, and a task center that makes Reminders look truly abysmal. It also works with existing data in iCloud and various other services.