iOS 7

FaceOff 7 is the sensor-based equivalent of Activator for iPhone

When the Moto X was announced last year, I was admittedly somewhat jealous of its various sensor-based contextual awareness and voice recognition features. In layman's terms, the handset is one of the more interesting Android smartphones on the market to say the very least. But as someone that has been a loyal iPhone user for several years, it wasn't quite enough to make me jump mobile platforms.

Thankfully, a new package has arrived on Cydia that allows me to experience the best of both worlds… 

Eclipse: add a system-wide dark mode to iOS 7

Eclipse is a new jailbreak tweak that brings a system-wide dark mode to iOS 7. The tweak, which should be available shortly on Cydia's BigBoss repo, will cost $0.99.

Dark mode, or nighttime mode as it is often called, is beneficial when using the iPhone at night. It reduces eye strain caused by using a light (and bright) screen while in a dark environment.

Lots of standalone apps incorporate some sort of dark mode; Tweetbot is the one that instantly comes to mind, but iOS itself has never featured a true dark mode at the system level. Eclipse is seeking to change that. It's not perfect, but the developer is on the right track. Full video walkthrough after the jump.

Icon Masks tweak takes your Home screen to the next level

If you've been following our blog closely over the last few weeks, you'll notice that we have covered quite a number of different themes that have been released or updated for the iOS 7 jailbreak. While themes are definitely the main option that most iOS users use to customize their devices, other methods exist to change the look and feel of an iPhone, iPad or iPod touch.

All that leads into Icon Masks, a new jailbreak tweak that redefines the look of your Home screen icons… 

Blurpaper adds blurred effect to Home and Lock screen wallpapers

Translucency is at the heart of iOS 7 design, with blurred elements throughout the mobile platform. Often times it can be hard to find a wallpaper that looks nice with the all-new user interface, and a new jailbreak tweak called Blurpaper helps make that process easier.

The tweak takes your current Home screen and Lock screen wallpapers — here's some nice ones — and overlays a blurred effect on them automatically, with no respring necessary. If you want, give it a test with the wallpaper I'm using in the screenshots above. The package has a number of options to configure… 

How to remove the ‘Store’ button in the Music app on iOS 7

In an effort to generate iTunes sales on iOS devices, Apple has long placed a Store button in the top menu bar of its Music app. As you would expect, tapping on Store exits the Music app and brings you to the iTunes Store for everything from songs and albums to movies and TV shows. It's a convenient link from one app to another on iOS devices, but some users might not find use in it. If you're one of those people, a new jailbreak tweak called NoStoreButton7 is a quick fix for you…

FolderEnhancer: the legendary folder tweak comes to iOS 7

FolderEnhancer used to be one of the first jailbreak tweaks that I installed on my newly jailbroken iPhone. Before iOS 7, you could only have one page of app icons in a folder, and I used FolderEnhancer to get around Apple's arbitrary limits.

With iOS 7's release, Apple has relented, and incorporated some of the features, like paging within folders, that made FolderEnhancer such a great release. For that reason, the new FolderEnhancer for iOS 7 may seem a bit underwhelming for those of you whose jailbreaking experience goes back some time.

That said, FolderEnhancer is still worth checking for. In fact, FolderEnhancer (iOS 7) is a free download for those of you who purchased the original version, and it's only $0.99 for newcomers. Have a look at our video walkthrough inside to see what the latest version of FolderEnhancer is all about.

How to make the Lock screen Status Bar match the size of the Home screen Status Bar

SameStatus is a new jailbreak tweak that does something incredibly simple: it allows you to make the size of the Lock screen status bar match the size of the Home screen status bar.

I'm not sure if you've noticed, but the information contained on the status bar on iOS 7's Lock screen is a bit larger than the same info shown on the Home screen status bar. SameStatus is tweak that allows you to "fix" this issue.

HideMe7: a tweak designed to hide UI elements in iOS 7

HideMe7 is a new jailbreak tweak that's aimed at folks looking to remove specific UI elements from iOS. The tweak, which is presented as a long list of toggles broken up into various UI related sections, works in some areas, but fails in others.

HideMe7 is a decent way to simplify the look of your iOS installation, but you'd probably be better off holding off for the upcoming release of Springtomize 3, and save your $0.99 to go towards it instead. Have a look at our video walkthrough inside to see what I mean.

How to simplify the look of the Lock screen on iOS 7

One of the better looking Lock screen tweaks for iOS 6 now has an iOS 7 counterpart. SubtleLock (iOS 7) is a brand new jailbreak tweak that allows you to make subtle changes to the Lock screen in iOS.

The idea behind the tweak is to make the Lock screen appear simpler, less cluttered and easy to read. SubtleLock was one of my favorite lock screen tweaks available for previous iOS firmware, and I'm happy to report that this new tweak works just as well as past iterations. Full video walkthrough inside.

How to remove the numbers and letters from the passcode buttons on the Lock screen

Interested in removing the letters and numbers from the passcode buttons on the Lock screen? If so, then SimplePasscodeButtons is a tweak that was created just for you.

SimplePasscodeButtons is an extremely simple tweak (hence the name) that allows you to hide the letters on the passcode screen, or both the letters and numbers. The end result is a a bunch of circles on the passcode screen with nothing inside them. Have a look inside for our video walkthrough and more details.

How to slim down banner notifications in iOS 7

TinyBar is a brand new jailbreak tweak that allows you to slim down the look of incoming banner notifications in iOS 7. The tweak, which is configurable from the stock Settings app, also features the ability to implement scrolling for messages that eclipse the width of the iPhone's screen.

TinyBar is an interesting way to go about customizing the look and feel of banner notifications. Take a look at our video walkthrough inside for a demonstration of how it works.

How to fix Status Bar issues after jailbreaking iOS 7

Jailbreaking an iPhone, iPad or iPod touch provides many benefits that otherwise aren't possible on a stock device, although there are occasionally a few bugs that may be encountered along the way. One prominent issue that users have been facing with the iOS 7 jailbreak is the status bar turning black and not disappearing in stock apps like Calculator, Camera, Photos and Weather. This was an annoying nuisance that I was facing on my own iPhone up until this morning, when I discovered StatusBarFix2…Â