Enabling Assistive Touch on your iOS Device

This is a key feature that I ignored when I enabled it the first time on my iPhone 4S. I enabled it again last night after reading some posts in PhilMUG and realizing it's potential. But first, here's how to enable Assistive Touch on your iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch. Please note though that this feature is only available on iOS 5.0 which is the latest iOS from Apple.

Assistive Touch

To enable Assistive Touch, go to Settings > General > Accessibility. Look for Physical & Motor then turn on Assistive Touch. So, what then is the main purpose of this setting? Well, what's truly great with this setting is that you now avoid the physical buttons on your iOS device. You can now prevent pressing the Home Button because you can just touch it on the screen, you can mute or un-mute your device, lock and rotate the screen or control the volume. You are also shown touch gestures but I find the Home and Device touches really helpful. 

Enabling Assistive Touch

Assistive Touch options in Device

Touch gestures

Now I use the Assistive Touch for Home so that I don't use the physical Home button a lot. I'm thinking that this will be one of the first problems I'll have on my iPhone in the future because the Home button is used for going back to the default page and displaying the running applications on the multi-task bar. But I'm very pleased with my 2nd generation iPod Touch since it's Home button is still very responsive. It will be three years old already in January which is a testament on how durable Apple products are. For those who have problems on their Home button or want to prevent problems from occurring on it, you might want to enable this setting on your iOS device.

Assistive Touch when not in use

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About Carl

An Apple () addict, bookworm, moviegoer, photography enthusiast, rocker and blogger! Proudly Filipino!