There are many ways to make your iPhone or iPad easier to see. This document highlights some of the options available on the iPhone or iPad. There are endless combinations using these settings to adjust your phones display so it may take a little bit of testing to find out what is the most useful for you. Not all of the settings mentioned in this document will be helpful for everyone.
This page will go through many of the options that are currently available and explain what each option does.
Bold Text
Bold text makes fonts thicker and a heavier typeset, it can aid readability.
To turn bold text on first you need to open the settings app and follow the step by step on page two.
- Go to settings, then accessibility
- Open display and text size
- Tap the bold text button and turn it on
NOTE: your device may need to restart to turn this setting on as it changes all the fonts on the device.
Large Text (dynamic type)
This is a bit of a hidden gem within the accessibility menu you can toggle a switch to make the iPhone or iPad font even larger than its normal maximum. Apple have called this feature Dynamic Type.
Unfortunately, not all apps support large text, but all apple applications like notes and messages do support this feature. Depending on the device you are using it can make fonts up to 300 times bigger!
- Go to settings, then accessibility
- Tap display and text size
- Tap larger text – this opens a new menu page
- Tap the ‘larger accessibility sizes’ button to turn on larger text
- Some demo text now appears in the centre of the screen with a slider at the very bottom
- Sliding the slider to the left makes fonts smaller sliding it to the right makes them larger, find the font size that is most comfortable for you
Reduce Transparency
This setting is hard to describe, in some screens on the iPhone or iPad the background is semi-transparent almost like frosted glass of whatever is behind it with text on top of that image. Reduce transparency makes these elements no longer see-through and can help with readability.
Increase Contrast
When you turn on ‘Increase Contrast,’ your iPhone makes things easier to see by sharpening the difference between the background and the text or buttons. For example, instead of light grey words on a white background, in which can be hard to read. It will use darker text and clearer outlines, so everything stands out more. This helps make menus, messages and screens easier to read.
Note: The definition above was created using AI.
To turn on increased contrast you first need to open the settings app and follow these steps:
- Go to settings, then accessibility
- Tap display and text size
- Scroll down and tap the button that says increase contrast
Reduce White Point
Reducing the white point on screen makes colours less vibrant and, in particular, changes the colour white to a more muted grey, it affects all on screen elements. It can be useful if you struggle with glare and the brightness of your phone.
Reduce white point is in the same menu as bold and increase contrast to find it open the settings app and follow the steps below.
- Go to settings, then accessibility
- Tap display and text size
- Scroll down to the option for reduce white point
- Tap the button to turn it on
- After tapping the button, a slider appears underneath that allows you to adjust the strength of this effect
- Set the slider to the point that works best for you
Dark Mode
Dark mode changes your device to have pale text on a dark background instead of the traditional white or light grey background with dark text. It can be really helpful for reducing glare and making things easier to read however not all apps support dark mode.
To turn on dark mode first you need to open the settings app and follow these steps:
- Go to settings
- Tap display and brightness
- Tap the option for dark mode
- If you want to use dark mode all the time, turn off the setting that says Automatic
Display Zoom
In the same menu as dark mode there is an option called display zoom this allows you to make your home screen icons a tiny bit larger and also makes other on screen elements like larger buttons. It is not the built-in screen magnifier and does not make a huge difference but can be useful.
To set the display zoom to larger text first you need to open your settings app and follow these steps:
- Go to settings
- Tap display and brightness
- Scroll down to the option at the bottom of the page labelled display
- Tap display zoom
- Tap on the option for larger text
This is an overview of the most commonly helpful settings there are also specific settings to adapt for things like colour blindness, not mentioned in this guide. If you are using the largest font size and bold text already and struggling to see your iPhone or iPad don’t panic – there are many more options available like using magnification or getting started to with screen reader.
For more information please contact OpenSight:
Tel: 023 80 641 244
Email: [email protected]
