7 Hidden Settings You Should Change On An Older iPhone

Apple just released the iPhone 18 Pro and the all-new iPhone Duo, the company’s first approach on foldable phones. On top of new hardware, Apple also introduced iOS 27 as the latest software update for iPhones, which now takes advantage of Siri AI. In addition to finally bringing Siri AI to users, this update includes several bug fixes, performance improvements, and better battery to any user from iPhone 11 to the latest models.

With that being said, if you have an older iPhone that doesn’t support the latest software, you should be aware of some hidden settings that you could change to make your phone perform better and work more reliably. If you’re wondering how old is too old, this applies to users with an iPhone XS or older, but it also could be helpful to users with newer iPhones that theoretically could be receive the software update but their device doesn’t have the required 64GB of storage to download the latest versions.

If your iPhone has been struggling to switch between apps, everything is slow and unreliable, you can deactivate some animations on your device to make it run better. On iPhones running iOS 26 or iOS 27, deactivating Liquid Glass can be of great help. This new design language was introduced with iOS 26, which Apple touted as its biggest design revamp on iOS since iOS 7, but it has divided users, as the Liquid Glass interface seems heavier to load on older devices. To minimize the impact of this feature, on your iPhone, go to Settings > Appearance > Liquid Glass. Move the slider until it gets tinted You can also choose Reduce Motion in the Accessibility Options in the same page.

On iPhones that can’t run iOS 26 or iOS 27, meaning that you don’t have to worry about Liquid Glass and how your iPhone handles that extra layer of UI, you can go to Settings > Accessibility > Display & Text Size and turn on Reduce Transparency and Reduce Motion. These settings increase legibility and get everything running faster as Apple is not adding some extra flair of how things should open, close, and so on. Deactivating Liquid Glass and turning on Reduce Transparency and Reduce Motion can save battery life and make the devices easier to use.

If you haven’t replaced the battery of your old iPhone or you just feel it has been slower than usual, there are two settings that you need to keep in mind: Background App Refresh and Significant Locations. For example, for the third setting you need to change, you should go to Settings > General > Background App Refresh. While on newer phones checking which apps are running in the background isn’t an issue, especially because Apple has very capable processors with at least 12GB of RAM, older models have less RAM and the processors are now showing their age. With that in mind, you should turn off the background app refresh for mainly every app, except those you really use, like Messages, Mail. All the other options, on the other hand, will require you to actively open the app to get the latest updates

The fifth setting you should change in your older iPhone is Significant Locations. Under Settings > Privacy & Security > Location Services > System Services > Significant Locations, you can prevent Apple from logging everywhere you spend your time. Even though this feature is meant to power reminders and Maps suggestions, if you have an aging iPhone, which prevents you from taking advantage of your device, this feature is doing more harm than good, and turning it off will make your iPhone work slightly less in the background — improving battery and general performance.

With iOS 16.1.1, Apple changed how AirDrop works. At first, this update was made due to Chinese government pressure to prevent protesters from sharing propaganda through AirDrop to as many people as they could. With that, users would have to actively long-press AirDrop in Control Center > choose Everyone For 10 Minutes as the default option would be Contacts Only. However, as the years went by and hacker attacks became more sophisticated, actually having AirDrop set for Contacts Only is a way to prevent users from getting zero click attacks or even being bombarded by kids trying to spam iPhones in public locations.

With that, if you have an iPhone that hasn’t been updated to iOS 16.2, you should go to Settings > General > AirDrop and switch the Everyone toggle for Contacts Only. This way, you can ensure you’re safeguarding your device against possible attacks or just spam. For iPhone users on the latest software available, they even have access to an extra layer of protection, which even if you set AirDrop to be available for Everyone For 10 Minutes, you still need to type a PIN that is available on the other person’s device, so you can choose whether they can send you a file once or unlimited times for 30 days. While this might sound a bit annoying at first, it’s a way Apple found to secure people’s devices.

In iOS 13, Apple killed 3D Touch support in favor of Haptic Touch. This under-used technology was introduced with the iPhone 6S and users could apply different pressures on the iPhone display, which would be translated as a way to open a link preview, see a Live Photo in action, or even work as an additional button for games. Still, eventually Apple decided to remove this feature for newer iPhones and completely disable it for iPhones that actually supported it. On its place, the company added Haptic Touch, which kept a few of the features of 3D Touch, like previewing a link or seeing a Live Photo, but basing the interaction on how long users pressed the display, and not the intensity. However, if you have an older iPhone, general wear can make touch input less crisp than it was on day one. With that, the fixed “default” Haptic Touch duration calibration might not work the same way as it did so many years ago.

To ensure you can still take advantage of Haptic Touch to take a look at messages, photos, and link previews, go to Settings > Accessibility > Touch > Haptic Touch and switch between Fast, Default, and Slow. There’s a preview icon, which you can long press to see how it feels before firing off context menus by accident when you’re just trying to tap an icon. That said, slow can give your touch more room before it registers a hold, while if long-presses feel sluggish or unresponsive, the fast option can improve that.

Last but not least, the seventh setting you should change in your old iPhone is Optimized Battery Charging, as there are simple settings that can make your battery last longer. Under Settings > Battery > Charging you can toggle Optimized Battery Charging. With this feature on, the iPhone can wait to finish charging until the time you need to use it. With that, if you leave your phone charging over the night, it will only get to 100% by the time you’re waking up, meaning it will charge slower after 80% ensuring that the battery will degrade slower than if this feature wasn’t on.

As mentioned before, replacing the battery can also greatly improve an old device. For newer iPhones, Apple kept adding new battery features to make this aging better. With iPhone 15 devices or newer, the company says that these phones can take up to 1,000 cycles before they require a battery replacement, while previous models would normally need a replacement after 500 cycles. On latest iPhone models, for example, users can also go to Settings > Battery > Charging and set a Charge Limit between 80% and 100%. By doing that, especially if you have a new battery, you can delay the phone to reach a full cycle every time you charge it, which, in the long term, makes the battery last for longer.