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iOS 18 Adds Control Center Options to Action Button on iPhone 15 Pro

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iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max models have an Action button in place of the Ring/Silent switch on older iPhones, and iOS 18 makes it even more useful.

iOS 18 Control Center Toggles for Action Button FeatureScreenshot Credit: Aaron Perris

iOS 18 allows the Action button to be assigned to one of the dozens of controls available in the new Control Center gallery, allowing the Action button to invoke Dark Mode, Airplane Mode, Personal Hotspot, and more. Options like Low Power Mode and Orientation Lock do not appear to be available as of iOS 18 beta 1, but the Shortcut action already allows the Action button to be assigned to those options if desired.

These new options are in addition to the actions that were already available for the Action button on iOS 17, including Ring/Silent, Do Not Disturb, Camera, Flashlight, Voice Memo, Magnifier, Translate, Shortcut, and Accessibility. Some of the new Control Center options were already possible with the Shortcut or Accessibility options.

It has been rumored that the Action button will be expanded to all four iPhone 16 models later this year, so these new controls will come to even more devices.

iOS 18 is currently in beta and should be released in September.

Tag: Action Button
Related Forums: iOS 18, iPadOS 18

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Top Rated Comments

K
kalafalas
23 months ago
ORIENTATION LOCK YYYYAAAAAASSSS

dang I might have to ruin my life and install the beta on my main

edit: seems the writer was wrong :/ oh well. I use shortcuts right now, but I was hoping for something a bit more native with synced haptics and stuff
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)
kirky29 Avatar
kirky29
23 months ago
This is pretty cool, I now wish you could change the volume up and down buttons to whatever, I'd be happy to control my volume manually from control centre and have, say, my volume up button as orientation lock, and volume down as quick access to the home app. Or something like that!
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Joe Rossignol Avatar
Joe Rossignol
23 months ago

ORIENTATION LOCK YYYYAAAAAASSSS

dang I might have to ruin my life and install the beta on my main
I wrote the MacRumors story, and unfortunately I made an error. I thought the Action button could be assigned to ANY control in the Control Center gallery, but it turns out that options like Orientation Lock and Low Power Mode are not available, at least as of iOS 18 beta 1.

Truly sorry to get your hopes up! I messed up that one.

EDIT: But as the comment below me pointed out, you can already map the Action button to Orientation Lock via Shortcuts on iOS 17, so the end result is still completely possible.
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)
FishyFish Avatar
FishyFish
23 months ago
But no way to use the button to actually just bring up Control Center which would be the most useful shortcut of all.
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)
mrat93 Avatar
mrat93
23 months ago

This is pretty cool, I now wish you could change the volume up and down buttons to whatever, I'd be happy to control my volume manually from control centre and have, say, my volume up button as orientation lock, and volume down as quick access to the home app. Or something like that!
Anytime there’s an article about the Action Button, I’m reminded of the Jailbreak app Activator from over 10 years ago. You could assign literally over 100 actions systemwide similarly. It is so sad that Apple is restricting this to one action for one button.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
AppleInLVX Avatar
AppleInLVX
23 months ago
I feel like between adding things to control center, colorizing app icons, and making the Action button more robust, I'll finally be able to reach minimal iPhone using only native functionality, and that will be lovely.
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)
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