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iPad User Guide

Add, edit, and remove widgets on iPad

👁 The iPad Home Screen. At the top of the screen are customized widgets for Clock, Journal, Photos, Reminders, and Calendar.

What are widgets?

Widgets give you an easy way to view information from an app at a glance—today’s headlines, weather, reminders, battery levels, and more. You can view widgets in Today View and add them to your Home Screen or Lock Screen to keep this information at your fingertips.

Tip: A Smart Stack (a widget with dots next to it) is a combined set of widgets that uses information such as the time, your location, and activity to automatically display the most relevant widget at the appropriate time in your day. You can add a Smart Stack from the widget gallery to the Home Screen, then swipe up and down through it to see the widgets it contains.

Add a widget to your Home Screen

  1. Go to the Home Screen, then find the Home Screen page where you want to add the widget.

  2. Touch and hold the background until the apps begin to jiggle, tap Edit at the top of the screen, then tap Add Widget.

  3. Scroll or search to find the widget you want, tap it, then swipe left and right through the style and size options.

  4. When you see the size you want, tap Add Widget.

  5. While the apps are still jiggling, move the widget where you want it, then tap Done.

To learn how to add a widget to your Lock Screen, see Edit your Lock Screen or create a new one.

Turn an app icon into a widget

You can quickly create a widget from an app icon.

  1. Touch and hold the app icon on your Home screen.

  2. To choose the size of the widget, tap one of the icons at the top of the pop-up menu.

To change the widget back to an app icon, touch and hold it, then tap 👁 the Grid View button
(the leftmost icon at the top of the pop-up menu).

Interact with widgets

You can perform tasks by tapping widgets on your Home Screen or Lock Screen. Tap an item in the Reminders widget to check it off, tap 👁 the Play button
in the Podcasts widget to play an episode, or tap the Home widget to turn on your living room lights—all without opening an app.

Edit a widget on your Home Screen

You can customize most widgets right from your Home Screen so they display the information you want to see. For example, you can edit a Weather widget to display the forecast for your location or a different area. Or you can customize a Smart Stack to rotate automatically through its widgets based on your activity, your location, the time of day, and so on.

  1. Touch and hold a widget.

  2. Tap Edit Widget (or Edit Stack, if it’s a Smart Stack), then choose options.

    For a Smart Stack, you can turn Smart Rotate or Widget Suggestions (below the widget) off or on, drag a widget from the Smart Stack to the Home Screen, or remove a widget by tapping 👁 the Remove button
    in its upper-left corner.

    When you turn on Widget Suggestions, widgets for apps you already use automatically appear in your Smart Stack at the right time based on your past activity. An option lets you add the widget to your stack so it’s always there when you need it.

  3. Tap Done.

View widgets in Today View

To view widgets in Today View, swipe right from the left edge of the Home Screen, then scroll up and down.

View widgets in Today View when iPad is locked

  1. Go to the Settings app 👁 Image
    on your iPad.

  2. Tap Face ID & Passcode (on an iPad with Face ID) or Touch ID & Passcode (on other iPad models).

  3. Make sure Today View and Search is turned on (below Allow Access When Locked).

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