Music

MediaBar14 augments the Home Bar with powerful media controls

All of Apple’s notched devices, iPhones and iPads alike, come equipped with a software alternative to the Home Button known as the Home Bar — the thin line that manifests itself at the bottom-center of the display.

I love the Home Bar as an alternative to the antiquated Home Button, especially when paired with the bigger edge-to-edge displays that modern iPhones and iPads now possess. But with a jailbreak, it’s possible to make the Home Bar even better than it already is.

Jailbreakers can customize the Now Playing widget with aquarius

If you’re jailbroken and listen to lots of music, then chances are you interface with the Lock Screen’s Now Playing widget rather often and might take an interest in customizing it.

iOS developer Nico Carbone has just released a new and free jailbreak tweak called aquarius that permits jailbreakers to personalize the Now Playing widget with minimal effort.

Vinyl shrinks iOS’ oversized Now Playing widget and makes it more customizable

I’ve got nothing against the iPhone’s Now Playing widget; after all, it’s a convenient tool for controlling media playback from the Lock Screen without going through the process of unlocking your device and launching the Now Playing app every time you want to make a small adjustment.

Praise aside, I also agree with anyone who says that the Lock Screen’s Now Playing widget is larger than it needs to be, and that’s one reason why I’m excited about a new and free jailbreak tweak release dubbed Vinyl by iOS developer Lightmann.

TinyWidget14 puts the Lock Screen’s Now Playing widget on a diet

Most iPhone users are familiar with the Now Playing widget. It’s the thing that pops on your Lock Screen whenever you have any type of media playing in the background.

While it’s useful for granular playback controls, the Now Playing widget certainly takes up a lot of vertical screen real estate on the Lock Screen, which severely limits available space for missed notification banners. Fortunately, a new and free jailbreak tweak dubbed TinyWidget14 by iOS developer P2KDev puts the Now Playing widget on a diet.

MusicGesture upgrades the Now Playing interface with gestures & full-screen artwork

It’s no secret that in addition to being a venerable smartphone, the iPhone is still one of the world’s best portable music players. Still, that doesn’t give Apple a free pass for the somewhat stagnant music interface experience that we’ve all been using for the past several years.

Those in the market for an augmented Now Playing user experience might be interested in picking up a newly released jailbreak tweak called MusicGesture by iOS developer Antony_M. This tweak not only provides jailbreakers with a new way to interact with the Now Playing media controls, but it also allows for configuration of the Now Playing interface in ways that Apple would never permit on a stock handset.