How To Hide iPhone Home Screen Pages In iOS 14 – The BEST Way

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Way back in the day when you needed to use iTunes to manage your iPhone, you used to be able to reorder individual home screen pages on your iPhone with a few clicks of the mouse. With iOS 14, Apple is bringing that functionality back–but on the iPhone itself. Not only that, but you can also HIDE entire home screen pages in iOS 14, as well.

How The Home Screen Is Changing In iOS 14

iOS 14 is shaping up to be one of the biggest overhauls to the iPhone operating system in years–at least as far as the main user interface navigation goes on the iconic home screen.

The home screen has been a mainstay of iOS since the iPhone debuted in 2007. This is the screen, of course, that shows you your apps displayed in rows of icons. Over the years, the look and feel of the home screen changed very little. But that all changes with iOS 14.

First up, iOS 14 will allow you to display widgets right on the home screen right next to your app’s icons. Not only that, but iOS 14 also introduced the App Library feature, which is ANOTHER page on your home screen that automatically sorts your apps into categories. These categories are displayed as folders that you tap to see that collection of apps. The categories are also “smart” in that they can show you the apps you’re most likely to want to access next.

But there’s one big final usability feature coming to the iPhone thanks to iOS 14. That’s the ability to completely hide individual home screen pages.

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Why Would You Want To Hide Or Rearrange Home Screen Pages?

I know–why would you want to hide home screen pages on your iPhone. After all, that’s how you access the apps you have downloaded on it. If an app is on a home screen that’s hidden, how do you launch it?

That’s where the new App Library feature comes in. The App Library is a new home screen page that is always just one swipe to the left of your last home screen page. It doesn’t matter if you have two home screen pages or ten, the App Library will also be just one swipe left past the final one.

So how does the App Library page help the ability to hide other home pages? Because the App Library can’t be hidden. It’s always visible with a swipe left past the final home page. So, even if you hide other home pages, you can still access the apps on them via the App Library page.

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So why hide home screen pages at all? Mainly to declutter your iPhone interface and eliminate pages and pages of apps that you probably rarely use. Now that you can hide home screen pages in iOS 14, you can choose to only display the one or two home screen pages with the apps you use most frequently and then hide the rest. And, as stated, if you need to access apps on those hidden home screen pages–you can always do that from the always-visible App Library page.

How Do You Hide Home Screen Page On The iPhone In iOS 14?

So, you want to hide some home screen pages, you say? Or you just want to quickly reorder them? iOS 14 allows you to do just that. Here’s how:

1. Long-press anywhere on your home screen where you have a blank space. It doesn’t matter which one screen page you are on as long as there is somewhere to tap and hold. Long-press until all your app icons begin to wiggle on the screen.
2. Once your app icons are wiggling on your home screen, tap the home screen page dot icons just above the dock. This is the row of dots that each represent one home screen page. Tapping this will take you to the “Edit Pages” screen.
3. On the Edit Pages screen, uncheck any home page you want to hide. Alternately, recheck it to display it again.
4. On the Edit Pages screen, you can also tap and hold the icon for any page and drag it around to reorder your home screen pages.
5. After you’re done hiding or reorganizing your home screen pages, tap the Done button on the Edit Pages screen.
6. Now, tap the Done button in the top-right corner of the home screen to exit wiggle mode.

And that’s it! You now know how to hide or reorganize your iPhone home screen pages in iOS 14.

And check out the 3 best ways to organize apps on your iPhone!

Michael Grothaus

Apple expert and novelist, Michael Grothaus has been covering tech on KnowYourMobile for the best part of 10 years. Prior to this, he worked at Apple. And before that, he was a film journalist. Michael is a published author; his book Epiphany Jones was voted as one of the best novels about Hollywood by Entertainment Weekly. Michael is also a writer at other publications including VICE and Fast Company.