How to alphabetize your iPhone apps and keep everything under control

If you're one of those people who stare at their iPhone screen and feel a sense of chaos, organizing your apps can become a healthy little obsession. Having all your iPhone apps arranged in a logical order not only looks cleaner, but it also helps you find them in seconds without having to swipe through pages like there's no tomorrow.

Apple offers several ways to keep everything under control, but the one many users seek is the ability to automatically sort apps alphabetically . This trick exists, though it has nuances depending on your iOS version, and it's best to understand it thoroughly before making any changes to avoid surprises with your existing icon arrangement.

Reset the home screen to force alphabetical order

In iOS versions where this option is clearly available, the system allows you to reset the home screen and rearrange all apps according to Apple's original layout, and then sort them alphabetically. It's not a magic button that simply sorts the apps alphabetically, but it comes pretty close.

The first thing you should do before touching anything is save your current home screen layout . When you reset the design, you lose the manual placement of icons and folders, so if you're someone who puts effort into creating a nice layout, it's useful to be able to manually revert to your previous settings using the screenshots as a reference.

To save your current layout, the easiest way is to take screenshots of each page on your iPhone or iPad . You can then review them if you want to restore your previous layout. It's a very simple step, but it can save you a lot of trouble if you change your mind.

The reset process always works the same way: the first screen will show only Apple apps as they were when you first turned on the device, and from the second page onwards the rest of the third-party applications will be placed, usually following the alphabetical order according to their name.

To quickly take screenshots, the button combination varies depending on your iPhone model. On models with Face ID, press and hold the side button and the volume up button simultaneously . On models with a physical Home button, press and hold the Home button and the power button. Repeat this process on each page of your Home screen until you have taken all the screenshots you need.

Once you've secured your "visual backup," you can proceed to restore the home screen layout from the system settings. This step triggers the reorganization of icons and the alphabetical order of apps.

To activate this option on iPhone or iPad, follow this sequence of menus within the Settings app:

• Enter the app Settings from the home screen.
• Access the section General and scroll down.
• Tap on Resetting (in more recent versions it may appear as “Transfer or reset iPhone”).
• Choose the option Reset home screen and confirm when the system asks you to.

After accepting, the iPhone will reset the home screen layout, and you'll see that Apple apps appear first , while the rest of your installed apps are redistributed alphabetically starting from the second page. If you're not happy with the new order, you can always use the screenshots you took to put everything back more or less as it was before.

What changes in iOS 14, iOS 15 and later versions

With the arrival of iOS 14, Apple introduced significant changes to how apps are organized, such as the App Library and the ability to hide entire pages from the Home Screen . With iOS 15 and later versions, these settings have been refined, leading many users to wonder where the option they previously used to arrange apps alphabetically has gone.

Although the home screen reset function still exists , the way Apple displays reset and organization options is somewhat different, and the old guides often don't exactly match the current menus. This is why many users, after updating to iOS 15 or later, feel like they "can no longer" organize their apps the way they used to.

What's really changed is that the focus is now more on the App Library and integrated search , rather than having every page of icons perfectly organized by hand. Apple assumes you'll use app name search a lot, which reduces the obsession with strict alphabetical order across all screens.

Even so, it's still possible to perform a home screen reset and achieve that massive icon rearrangement . What disappears is the feeling of a "dedicated button just for alphabetical sorting," since that order is automatically generated by resetting the standard layout.

Some users report that, especially since iOS 15, rearranging all their apps from scratch has become a real chore without resetting the home screen. Moving icons one by one, dragging them between pages, and in and out of folders can be quite tedious when you have dozens or even hundreds of apps installed.

Hence the frequent requests to Apple to implement a more powerful organization system, with automatic sorting options and bulk tools that allow, for example, reordering all apps according to their use, category or name without having to drag icons as if we were playing Tetris.

Use the App Library to find and manage applications

Since iOS 14, the iPhone has included the App Library at the bottom of every Home screen . This section acts as a smart container where the system automatically groups apps by category, such as Social, Productivity, Games, Entertainment, and many others.

To access it, simply swipe left from the bottom of the home screen, and you'll immediately see the Library with its various sections. Each section will display several featured apps, usually the ones you use most often within that category, along with a small group of smaller icons representing the rest.

The apps are automatically categorized by type, and the ones you use most often tend to appear first within each category. It's a dynamic organization system that doesn't depend on how you arrange the icons, but rather on the actual usage patterns detected by the system.

Another advantage is that all apps you install from now on will also be added to the Library. Depending on your home screen settings, these new apps may appear only in the Library or also have an icon added to your home screen . This allows you to keep your home screen fairly clean and use the Library as a central hub for all your installed apps.

If you want to quickly locate a specific application in the Library, you can use the built-in search:

1. Go to the App Library swiping left from the last page.
2. It touches the field of search that appears at the top.
3. Type the name of the app you need until you see it in the list.
4. Tap on the app to open it directly from there.

You can also tap the search field without typing anything to open a complete list of all installed apps , usually already sorted alphabetically, giving you a very clear view of your iPhone's app inventory. From there, you can locate apps, see which ones you've never even heard of, and start cleaning up if you need to.

Delete apps from the Library or from the home screen

Besides finding apps, the App Library is a very handy place to quickly remove apps you no longer use . Instead of scrolling through each page on your home screen, you can do it directly from the full list of apps.

To delete an application from the App Library using the alphabetical list, the process is very simple and allows you to perform selective cleaning in just a few seconds.

These are the steps to remove an app from the Library:

1. Access the App Library.
2. Tap the search field to display the sorted list of applications.
3. Press and hold the icon of the app you want to delete.
4. In the menu that appears, select Delete app.
5. Tap Delete again when it asks for confirmation.

If you try to delete a non-Apple app and don't see the delete option, you may have parental controls or restrictions enabled . In that case, you'll need to go into Settings and temporarily disable those restrictions before trying to delete the app again.

From the home screen, you can also delete apps or simply hide them by pressing and holding their icon. The context menu will let you decide whether you want to uninstall the app completely or just remove its icon from the screen, keeping it available in the App Library.

To hide an app from the home screen without deleting it from your iPhone, you can follow this process:

1. On the home screen, press and hold the app you want to hide.
2. Touch on the option Delete app from the menu that appears.
3. In the popup window, choose Remove from home screen instead of uninstalling it.

This removes the app from your desktop but keeps it accessible in your App Library , so you can continue using it when you need it without it taking up visual space on your home pages.

Hide, show, and move entire pages of the home screen

With iOS 14 and later versions, Apple added the option to hide entire pages of the Home Screen . This feature is very useful if you want to reduce the number of screens you see when swiping without having to delete icons one by one, or if you prefer to keep almost everything in the Library and only maintain one or two very basic pages.

To hide a page, the first step is to enter edit mode on the home screen, which means making the icons start to "shake." From there, you can manage which pages are displayed and which are hidden with a couple of taps.

The process for hiding a page is as follows:

1. Press and hold an empty area of ​​the home screen until the icons shake.
2. Tap the small dots that appear near the bottom of the screen, just above the dock.
3. You'll see a thumbnail view of all your pages; tap the circle below the page you want to hide.
4. Press on Ready (or the option that appears to accept) to save the changes.

If you want to show a page you had hidden again, simply repeat the same steps and reactivate the circle under the corresponding thumbnail. It's a very flexible system for having "backup screens" without having to delete them completely.

You can also remove an entire page if you no longer need it. This doesn't delete the apps; it simply removes that page from the home screen and leaves the apps accessible from the App Library, so you don't risk losing anything important.

To delete a page from the home screen, follow these steps:

1. Press and hold an empty area of ​​the home screen until the icons start to jiggle.
2. Tap the page markers that appear at the bottom.
3. Uncheck the page you want to remove by tapping its circle, and then tap the delete button.
4. Confirm by clicking Delete when prompted by the system.

After deleting the page, the apps that were on it will still be present in the App Library , so only the visual layout is lost, not the apps themselves.

With iOS 15 and iPadOS 15 came the ability to rearrange page order , something previously impossible without manually moving all the icons. Thanks to this feature, you can easily rearrange the layout of entire pages.

To change the page position:

1. Press and hold an empty area of ​​the home screen until edit mode is activated.
2. Tap the dots that represent the pages at the bottom of the screen.
3. Press and hold one of the page thumbnails and Drag it to place it in the desired position.
4. Tap on Ready to confirm the new organization.

Thanks to this system, if you've used the reset function to make your apps appear in alphabetical order starting from a certain page, you can rearrange the order of those pages until you find the layout that best suits you, without having to reposition icons one by one.

Choose where new apps are installed and how they are displayed

When it comes to maintaining order, how your iPhone behaves when you install new apps also plays a big role. If every time you download an app an icon is added to your home screen, it's easy for your home screen to become a jumbled mess in just a few weeks.

Starting with iOS 14, you can choose whether new apps are automatically added to your Home Screen or only to the App Library . This way, you can use the Library as your main storage location and keep only the apps you actually use daily or want to keep visible on your Home Screen.

To change this behavior, you need to go into the home screen settings:

1. Open the app Settings on your iPhone.
2. Enter the section Home screen and App library (may appear as “Home screen”).
3. In the new apps section, choose between Add to home screen or “App Library Only”.

If you choose the option to have them go only to the Library, each app you install will not generate a new icon on the home pages , which helps maintain the order you've decided on for much longer without you having to do constant maintenance.

In that same settings section, you can also configure how notifications are displayed within the App Library . This lets you decide whether you want to see notification badges on the Library icons or only on the home screen, which can help maintain a cleaner or, conversely, more informative experience.

Reorganize apps from folders and improve usability

While resetting the home screen and app library helps a lot, you still often end up with folders full of icons that are hard to remember . Sometimes you just want to move a specific app out of a folder to have it more readily available on your home screen, without changing everything else.

To move an app from a folder to the home screen so it's easier to find and open , the system works as always: simply use icon editing mode and drag.

These are the steps to remove an application from a folder:

1. Go to the home screen of the iPhone.
2. Locate the folder where the app is located and touch it to open it.
3. Press and hold the app icon until the others start to shake.
4. Drag the app out of the folder and drop it in the position on the home screen where you want to place it.

If you take advantage of the screen reset to get all the apps more or less in alphabetical order, you can then fine-tune certain details by hand , such as creating themed folders (banking, work, leisure, etc.) or putting the apps you use most often on the front page, so you don't lose them among so many letters.

Many users also find that when things get really cluttered, the most effective solution is to delete a number of apps they no longer use . Taking advantage of the Library's alphabetical list and the home screen reset feature also helps identify unused apps and free up space on your device by removing unnecessary icons and notifications.

By combining the option to reset the home screen to a basic alphabetical order , the extensive use of the App Library as a smart drawer, and the tools to hide pages and control where new apps are installed, it's possible to keep your iPhone or iPad very well organized without going crazy. While Apple still has room to offer a more powerful and flexible management system, with these current features you can keep your apps fairly organized and easily accessible with just a couple of taps.

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Isaac

Passionate writer about the world of bytes and technology in general. I love sharing my knowledge through writing, and that's what I'll do on this blog, show you all the most interesting things about gadgets, software, hardware, tech trends, and more. My goal is to help you navigate the digital world in a simple and entertaining way.