One of the nice elements of iOS 14 is the ability to change the look of app icons. However, the process involves the Shortcuts app, and, as of right now, that process can be a bit daunting.
Especially when it comes to launching an app that utilizes a custom icon. Right now, launching an app with the custom app icon involves launching the Shortcuts app, too, so there’s a bit of hopping around just to launch an app. That’s not the easiest process, and it looks like Apple decided to offer a workaround.
As first noticed by users on Reddit (via Apple Terminal), the second developer beta of iOS 14.3, which Apple seeded this week, skips a step. With this software, users will be able to launch an app with a custom app icon and not have to jump through the Shortcuts app in the process.
Tutorial: How to create custom app icons for your iPhone Home Screen
Instead, a compact UI (another new feature of iOS 14) will simply appear at the top of the screen letting the user know of the process. You can see it below in the video published to Twitter today by Federico Viticci of MacStories:
Fantastic change in iOS 14.3 beta 2 – shortcuts added to the Home Screen now use compact UI and don't launch the Shortcuts app anymore.
Which means custom icons like our own MacStories Shortcuts Icons will now run shortcuts in-place, just like widgets 😍https://t.co/9J47uU6ZlN pic.twitter.com/aHAS8iD0BW
— Federico Viticci (@viticci) November 18, 2020
The obvious benefit here is for custom app icons, which have exploded in popularity since the launch of iOS 14. However, it’s not a feature change just for this scenario. This means that users running iOS 14 will no longer see the Shortcuts app launch when they launch any shortcut from the Home Screen.
For fun: 6 ways to customize your iPhone Home Screen for a unique look
Of course, we should note that this is a change in prerelease software. So while Apple is obviously working on it, and it appears to work quite well, there’s no guarantee it will remain for the final release of iOS 14.3 later this year. We’ll just have to hope it sticks around for the public release.
Have you adopted custom app icons? Are you excited for this tweak to the Shortcuts app?