Smartphones Features
How To: View & Manage Your Location History on Google Maps to Track Where You've Been & What You Were Doing
With so much stimuli in today's world, it can be hard to keep track of all the places we've visited and the events we've attended. Thankfully, a great feature in Google Maps lets you view a detailed log of your phone's location history to help you remember where you were at almost any given point in time.
Outlook 101: How to Customize Notifications & Alert Sounds for Individual Accounts
With email, one size does not typically fit all. You have multiple email accounts, each for different purposes and with varying levels of importance, so it only makes sense to customize the way your phone alerts you to each account's incoming emails. Luckily, Outlook allows you to do just that.
Snapseed 101: How to Save Photos in Full Quality
If you want to take your iPhone or Android photos to the next level, Snapseed is one of the best options. When it comes time to share pictures with friends and family, you want them to look as good as possible, so a little post-processing is in order. The problem is that Snapseed, by default, saves your edited photos at a lower quality than it first came in. What gives?
VLC 101: How to Use Gestures to Control Playback
For a long time now, VLC has been the go-to media player for Windows and Mac — but it's fast becoming the best third-party video player on Android and iOS, too. Aside from its ability to play virtually any file type, one of VLC's best features on mobile is the fact that you can control playback using simple swipe gestures.
How To: Hide What You're Listening To on Spotify So Your Friends Don't Make Fun of You
There's nothing wrong with indulging in guilty pleasures on Spotify every once in a while — we all need a little Coldplay and Creed in our lives. The only problem is, all of your friends and family might be watching. Anyone that is following your Spotify account can potentially see what you're listening to, but there are several ways to hide this shameful and embarrassing activity from the world.
How To: Temporarily Disable Your Instagram Account When You Need to Take an #InstaBreak
When you don't want certain friends viewing your account or just need to take a break from social media, Instagram lets you do so. While you can completely delete your Instagram account, then start over when you're ready again, it makes much more sense to just disable your account temporarily. Doing so will hide your profile, photos, comments, and likes from everyone, including your friends.
Signal 101: How to Disable Read Receipts So People Can't Tell When You've Seen Their Messages
After receiving many requests for the feature, Signal introduced read receipts last year to its mobile apps. However, some users don't like the idea other people knowing when they've read messages. Luckily, Signal lets you disable this feature and reclaim a little privacy.
Snapseed 101: Use Portrait Mode & Head Pose to Get the Perfect Selfie
Google's Snapseed app has a plethora of editing tools to help make your photos even better. But did you know it has specific tools designed to edit your face? Not that it needs any help, of course!
How To: View blocked phone numbers on your iPhone, Android, or other cell phone
Getting tired of prank phone calls from blocked numbers? Check out this video to learn how to view a blocked phone number on any phone. Visit Trap Call to learn more about the service described in this how to video.
How To: Make Your Own 'Avatar' — Facebook's Answer to Memoji & Bitmoji
Snapchat popularized personalized stickers for social media and messaging with Bitmoji, followed by walled-garden versions from Apple with Memojis and Samsung with AR Emojis. Even Google has gotten into the game, integrating an emoji generator for Gboard.
How To: Disable the Photo Auto-Enhance Feature in Facebook's Mobile Apps
Facebook is really good at two things: connecting people all over the world and force-feeding changes to its users (ahem...Facebook Messenger).
How To: Transform Gift Card Balances into Cash from Any ATM with Google Wallet
Most people don't ask for gift cards, but they're always a popular gift choice for notoriously hard-to-shop-for people—or the time-constrained gift-giver. While most gift cards are attached to certain stores, many folks will get a prepaid Visa or MasterCard card that allows them to make purchases wherever those companies are accepted.
VSCO 101: How to Save Photos to Your iPhone or Android Phone's Camera Roll or Gallery
Whether you use VSCO to take all of your photos or you use it primarily to edit photos you take with others apps on your iOS or Android phone, you're at some point going to want your VSCO pics to end up in your Camera Roll or Gallery. VSCO doesn't add them there by default, but there's a couple of ways to get them there.
How To: Check This Setting if You Don't Want Your Friends to See What You're Listening to on Apple Music
You shouldn't care what other people think, but sometimes, it's unavoidable. Take your music tastes, for instance. Sure, you might want your friends to think you only listen to the coolest songs, but we all have our guilty pleasures. If you're uncomfortable with your peers seeing your listening history in Apple Music, know there's something you can do about it — on iOS or Android.
How To: Lock OneDrive Files with Your Fingerprint or Face ID
If you're concerned about someone accessing your OneDrive files, you may want to upgrade your protection by enabling fingerprint or Face ID unlocking. Your sensitive information deserves to be protected, and now you can do so easily. Worry no longer — if you need to let someone else use your phone, with a password-protected OneDrive, sneaky file grabbers will be out of luck.
How To: 14 Tips Every New TikTok User Should Know About
By now, there's no way you haven't stumbled upon a TikTok video, whether it was on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or YouTube. Just watching these addictive short-form videos is enough to make you want to join up and make your own, and when you do, we've got some tips that will help get your TikTok account in order.
How To: 10 Things You Should Do to Improve Your Privacy on WhatsApp
WhatsApp is the go-to messaging app for millions worldwide and its easy to see why. The app can be considered the Swiss Army Knife of texting thanks to numerous features like Group Chats and Status Stories, in addition to striking a great balance between ease of access and overall security.
Snapchat 101: How to Use Memories to Save Snaps, Edit Old Snaps & More
Snapchat is an app built on sending quick-to-disappear pictures to your friends and family. Sure, this is the primary function of the app, but sometimes users want longer-lasting Memories while interacting with Snapchat. While My Story allows snaps to stick around for 24 hours, they still disappear in time. This is where Memories come in handy.
TIDAL 101: How to Cast Music to Your Google Home or Chromecast
With so many Chromecast-powered devices available, chances are, you're near something with casting abilities right now. Whether it's Android TV, Google Home, or any one of the various gadgets with Chromecast built-in, you can use a more powerful speaker to play media from your smartphone. The only caveat is that the app you're streaming from needs to support Google Cast, but thankfully, Tidal does.
How To: Send Private Instagram Stories to 'Close Friends' Only
Stories make sharing your day-to-day highlights fun on Instagram. However, other than choosing who to hide stories from, by default, stories don't have much privacy control, especially if your Instagram account happens to be public. Instagram recognizes this flaw, which is what its "Close Friends List" is all about.
How To: Block Artists or Songs You Hate on Tidal
From XXXTentacion to R. Kelly, many artists have been accused of inappropriate actions, so some of us just don't want to hear their music anymore. However, each time streaming services attempt to ban such artists, they face heavy backlash. Recognizing this, Tidal decided to offer a different solution.
How To: Enable (Or Disable) Dark Mode in the IMDb App
With iOS 13 and Android 10 adding built-in dark modes, app developers are working tirelessly to make their apps match the rest of your phone. Several are ahead of the curve, such as IMDb, who already offers a dark theme in their app.
How To: Set Custom Chat Wallpapers in Signal for All Conversations & Single Threads
Popular chat apps like Facebook Messenger and (these days, sadly) WhatsApp might not cut it when it comes to privacy and security, but they sure do offer some fun ways to customize your chats. If you're worried that moving to Signal Private Messenger means you lose these features, don't — the privacy-focused app also lets you choose custom chat wallpapers for all your threads.
How To: Use Adobe Fill & Sign to Electronically Fill Out & Sign Important Forms on Android or iOS
Adobe is best known for its photo and video editing software, but they also have a number of lesser-known apps that you may be interested in. Adobe Fill & Sign, available on iPhone and Android, is the best way to electronically fill out important documents on your smartphone with a third-party app.
Pocket Camp 101: How to Get Your Animal Friends to Come to Your Campsite in Animal Crossing
Friendship has always been a staple of Animal Crossing games, and Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp makes no exceptions. Check out this guide if you're interested in how to maximize time with your furry friends.
News: FaceNiff App Allows Android Users to Hack Facebook
Firesheep caused quite a stir when it was released last October, giving both hackers and non-hackers instant access to people's account information when on a public Wi-Fi connection. When logged into an insecure website on the same network as someone with Firesheep, you're giving them access to the cookies that keep you logged in. This is called session hijacking, and grants them easy access to your accounts, like Facebook, Flickr and Twitter. Now, there's an even easier way to do this—a mobi...
How To: Replace the Goals Function in Google Calendar After Google Kills It for Good
If you use Goals in Google Calendar, you've probably already received the notification that Google, in typical executioner fashion, has marked the feature for death. As of November 2022, you can't create new goals, and your current goals won't repeat anymore. Google suggests switching to repeating events or tasks, but there's a better option to use on your Android and iOS device.
Snapchat 101: How to Create & Use Your Own Personal Bitmoji
Bitmojis are not only a good way to personalize your Snapchat account, but also a really fun Snap addition to play around with. A bitmoji is basically like your little avatar, letting you design your mini-self whichever way that you desire.
How To: Recover WhatsApp Photos & Videos Deleted from Your Phone's Storage
Thanks to cloud storage's increasing accessibility, permanently losing photos is becoming less and less common. Still, if you accidentally delete a picture from your smartphone without first making a backup of some sort, that data is pretty much toast — unless we're talking about photos from WhatsApp.
How To: The 5 Best Apps for Streaming Movies on Your Phone
There are more than a few subscription-based movie streaming apps available for Android and iPhone, each with different benefits and varying pricing plans. Needless to say, it can get expensive fast if you sign up for multiple services because you can't decide on what's best. Hopefully, we can help you out with choosing the right video-on-demand app to spend your hard-earned dollars on.
How To: Turn Off Your iPhone's Timer and Alarm Just by Waving Your Hand
Whether it's because you're too startled from a sudden awakening or you're elbow-deep in cake batter, turning an alarm or timer off on your phone can be annoying. So why not simplify the process by eliminating the need to even touch your phone? With these free apps by Augmented Minds, you can turn off your timer or alarm with just a wave of your hand. That means no more fumbling in the dark for the right button, and more importantly, no more worrying about getting food on your iPhone.
How To: Hide Your WhatsApp Profile Photo So Other Users Can't See It
WhatsApp, the popular messaging app owned by Facebook, has several important privacy and security-related features, including end-to-end encryption, screen lock, read receipts, and two-step verification. If you're an avid WhatsApp user, you'll be happy to know there are more privacy features you might not know, such as hiding your profile photo from other users.
News: All the Live News Streams You Can Watch for Free on Your Phone, No Accounts Necessary
We're glued to the news now more than ever, but our "free press" isn't necessarily free of charge. Cable news outlets like CNN and MSNBC are locked behind expensive cable TV packages and cord-cutting streaming subscriptions such as Sling TV and Hulu + Live TV. Luckily, there are plenty of alternatives to get your TV news fix, free of any payment, account, or commitment.
Instagram 101: How to Share Posts & Stories to All Your Close Friends' Feeds Only
Instagram is a great platform to share photos and videos with the world, but sharing with smaller groups is near impossible. You can directly message pictures, stories, or post links to friends, but that only works for one person at a time or in group chats you create. To share your content with a small group of people you care about the most, you'll want to use the "Close Friends" list.
How To: The Right Way to Clean Your Dirty Phone or Tablet
I record close-cropped videos and take macro still shots with my smartphones on a daily basis, so as you would expect, I spend a lot of time cleaning these devices. Over the course of a couple years, I've fine-tuned my cleaning regimen, and at this point, it's down to a near-science.
Google Photos 101: How to Make Your Own GIFs Out of Pictures You've Taken
You really can't beat Google Photos. Not only does it give you free unlimited cloud storage and let you search for almost any object in one of your pictures, but it also packs a few powerful editing tools. Among these is a dead-simple way to create your own animated GIFs out of any set of pictures.
How to Play Stupid Zombies: 3 Stars on Levels 1-60 in Chapter 1, Stage 1
Looking for another Angry Birds fix? Well, drop the lame birds and pick up the zombies—Stupid Zombies, that is. You'd think that killing "stupid" undead beings would be easier than knocking off a few "angry" vertebrates, but it's actually more challenging—and more fun! Who wouldn't enjoy killing zombies with a shotgun blast and watching their heads roll? Armed with a shotgun and a strategic mind, your goal is to take out all the living dead with as few bullets as possible, trying to achieve t...
News: What Every Phone Gained by Adding a Notch
If bezel-less was the goal of OEMs in 2017, 2018 seems to be the year of the notch. Thanks in no small part to Apple's iPhone X, more and more smartphone manufacturers are designing their displays with this polarizing cutout. While many are frustrated with the trend, it's worth taking the time to consider what each phone gains with the unique design.
How To: Top 5 New Shooter Games for iPhone & Android in 2019
When it comes to shooting games, battle royale titles like PUBG and Fortnite have come to dominate the scene, leaving other sub-genres like top-down and third-person shooters living in the shadows. They're far from irrelevant, though, as evidenced by all the great games released just in 2019 alone.
How To: Type capital letters on your iPhone
If you can customize your ringtones, you should know how to use capital letters! It’s so simple and easy, and in this video you will learn how to capitalize important names and proper nouns. Watch these two quick steps to successfully capitalize letters on your iPhone. Grammar never looked so good. Type capital letters on your iPhone.