Keeping up with the latest smartphone technology can be overwhelming. Manufacturers often prioritize features that help them sell more units rather than making your life more productive.

Surprisingly, around 43% of smartphone users are unaware of what “App Tracking” means, according to a study by the University of Bath’s School of Management, U.K. In the research published in the journal of The ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, nearly a quarter of participants (24%) misunderstood tracking, associating it solely with revealing their device’s physical whereabouts rather than understanding its true purpose of monitoring app and website usage.

Delve deeper into the study’s revelations, where participants believed that granting tracking permissions was necessary for essential services like food delivery, assuming their location was pivotal for these apps’ operation.

But we’ve got you covered! It’s time to prioritise your productivity and take control of your interaction with tech. So, here are a few tips and tricks you can learn in this edition of “How To Tech!”

Notification History

Are you getting bombarded with texts and notifications from apps that care for you more than your own mother? Are you aimlessly spending hours swiping away unnecessary notifications only to realise you might have missed your boss’s message but never knew about it? Here’s how you can avoid that.

If you are using an Android phone, here’s how you can stay on top of your game;

1. Open Settings, tap Notifications,then tap More Settings. 

2. Tap Notification history and then toggle it on. Next time you get a notification, it will appear there for 24 hours.

Note: Android only saves 24 hours of notifications.

Back Tap For Extra iPhone Controls

Do you wish the iPhone had an extra button to map for additional features? With the latest iPhone 15 series, Apple has provided a physical button that replaced the infamous mute slider and can now be mapped for extra features. However, you may or may not know that you can access even more with a tap at the back of your iPhone?

With this feature, you can use the back of your iPhone as a trackpad to assign shortcuts like switching on the flashlight or pulling down the notification drawer.

1. To enable Back Tap, open the Settings app and tap Accessibility. 

2. Next, tap Touch, then tap Back Tap. 

3. Tap Double Tap or Triple Tap to assign functions to each.

With your smartphones tweaked to give you the best output, it’s time for you to head out there, be the most productive you have ever been and conquer the world.