Easily, the biggest addition to iOS 16 has been the ability to customize the lock screen on your iPhone, changing not just the wallpaper, but even the font and color of the time and date. In addition, you can also add widgets to your lock screen, bringing more glanceable info to your phone than ever before.
Think of widgets as little glimpses into an app's features — the upcoming appointments from a calendar app, a weather app's current temperature or your current status toward reaching a fitness goal. Breaking that info out into a separate box makes it easy to view without forcing you to launch an app to look up one piece of information. Even better, with widgets on the iPhone's lock screen, you don't even have to unlock your device.
During the summer-long iOS 16 beta process, iOS 16 lock screen widgets were restricted to ones from Apple's own apps. But now that iOS 16 has been released, many third-party apps have been updated to support lock screen widgets as well. When you customize your iOS 16 lock screen, you can choose widgets from a wider variety of apps than ever, and that number only figures to grow as more apps are updated to take advantage of iOS 16's features.
But which apps have done the best job with their initial attempts at creating lock screen widgets? More importantly, which apps should you seek out for a coveted space on your iPhone's lock screen?
We're focusing on the area of the lock screen that's just below the clock, which can house both square and rectangular widgets. There's also room for a small widget next to the date, but the amount of information contained in that widget is pretty small and best suited for things like the current temperature, the status of an alarm or a launcher shortcut.
This isn't a complete list of iOS 16 lock screen widgets, and we'll add to it, as we find more great examples. But these widgets have caught our eye by bringing greater productivity and functionality to our iPhone's lock screens.
Overcast
Category: Podcast player
Price: Free, with $9.99/year Premium tier
One of our picks for the best apps for a new iPhone, Overcast brings it podcast managing powers to the iPhone's lock screen, giving you a choice of three different widgets. You can add a rectangular Recents widget that displays unfinished or newly published episodes. Square images include an icon that launches Overcast from the lock screen or a Playlist icon that plays a playlist of your choice.
Download Overcast
Carrot Weather
Category: Weather app
Price: Free, with $19.99/year Premium tier
Carrot Weather, one of the best weather apps, embraces the concept that variety is the spice of life, offering you an extensive choice of widgets showing current conditions, the hourly forecast, a daily forecast, precipitation, humidity, wind, the UV index, air quality, air pressure, visibility, dew point, cloud cover, sunrise/sunset tines, tides and moon phase. You can also customize your own widget with two data points for your current location. Still, we think the Snark widget will prove the most popular among Carrot's premium users, as it combines current conditions with the nasty attitude that people love about this app.
Download Carrot Weather
Launcher
Category: Utility
Price: Free, with in-app purchases
The Launcher lock screen widgets do exactly what you think they would — you've got a shortcut for launching apps directly from the lock screen of your iPhone. Consider this the "Pass Go and Collect $200" shortcut of iOS 16 lock screen widgets. Launcher also lets you set up lock screen shortcuts for specific tasks like launching tasks within app, jumping to a specific website or initiating a call with a favorite contact.
Download Launcher
Fantastical
Category: Calendar app
Price: Free, with $4.99/month Premium tier
Calendar apps are a natural for lock-screen widgets, and Fantastical delivers with a trio of widgets that keep your upcoming appointments close at hand. An Up Next widget shows the next event on your calendar, while a Calendar widget provides a more complete look at your week and month. Quick Action lets you create a task or event straight from the lock screen. Even better, Fantastical's iOS 16 support includes support for Focus Filters, which let you tie in certain calendars to different iOS 16 Focus modes.
Download Fantastical
Halide Mark II
Category: Photography app
Price: Free with $2.99/month subscription
There's already a shortcut to your iPhone's camera app on the lock screen. But if you've upgrade to Halide for that app's pro photography tools like ProRAW support, you can now add a shortcut to the Halide camera from your lock screen. Just customize your iPhone's lock screen with the Halide widget, and you've got one-tap access with no need to unlock the phone and launch the app. Other lock screen widgets include shortcuts to the Auto Exposure, Manual Exposure, Macro, Wide and Ultrawide modes.
Download Halide Mark II
Things 3
Category: Productivity app
Price: $9.99
Your to-do list doesn't have to be hidden away now that iOS 16 allows lock screen widgets. And Things 3 obliges by adding a trio of widget choices, highlighted by the ability to quickly glance at your to-do lists. You can also select widgets that let you add tasks and chart your progress toward completing your daily goals.
Download Things 3
Todoist
Category: Productivity app
Price: Free, with $4.99/month Premium tier
While we're on the subject of to-do list managers, Todoist also gives users a wide array of choices when it comes to lock screen widgets. You can show your current tasks or next tasks as well as how close you are to reach your task goal. An Add Task shortcut lets you create to-dos from the lock screen, and you can also display your productivity stats as logged by Todoist.
Download Todoist
Agenda
Category: Productivity app
Price: Free, with $35/year Premium tier
The note-taking app Agenda gives you two choices for lock screen widgets in iOS 16. You can either elect to display your most relevant note or a favorite note; tapping the widget will take you straight to that note in the app. In addition, Agenda supports Focus Filters that displays particular notes tied to a specific Focus mode.
Download Agenda
Just Press Record
Product Category: Utility
Price: $4.99
The one-tap recording app brings that functionality to the iPhone's lock screen. With iOS 16, you can place a Just Press Record widget directly on your lock screen to start recordings without first unlocking your phone. Even with the app's transcription and editing features, that widget may be worth the price of admission alone.
Download Just Press Record
FitnessView
Category: Fitness
Price: Free, with $14.99/year Premium tier
Yes, the iOS 16 Fitness app has its own widget that shows you your progress toward hitting your move goal. But FitnessView offers even more with its widget to Premium subscribers. You can configure either the square or rectangular widget to show your activity rings, goals, progress and other features. It's the customizability that makes this app's widgets fit right in with iOS 16's lock screen.
Download FitnessView
Parcel
Category: Utility
Price: Free, with $4.99/year Premium tier
There's no better app for tracking the status of deliveries than Parcel, and now that iOS 16 is here, those capabilities are accessible from your lock screen. You can use either the smaller square widget or the larger rectangular one to let you track the status of deliveries straight from your iPhone's lock screen.
Download Parcel
TripIt
Category: Travel app
Price: Free, with $48.99 Pro tier
TripIt is a good app to have for storing all your travel bookings and details in one place. The widgets added with iOS 16 make sure that place includes your iPhone's lock screen. You can pick from three widgets that link to your upcoming trip, show the current flight information or link to vital information after you land such as hotel and rental car reservations.
Download TripIt
Flighty
Category: Travel app
Price: Free, with $49.99 Pro tier
Like TripIt, Flighty puts trip information right on your lock screen, though here the focus is on flights. The currently available widget offers a countdown to upcoming flights as well as flight status and departure time. Flighty's widget promises a progress bar and baggage information as your journey proceeds.
Download Flighty
Drafts
Category: Productivity app
Price: Free, with $19.99/year Pro tier
Drafts is one of the best writing tools to have on your iPhone, and the new lock screen widgets extend that app's functionality. You can configure a Drafts lock screen widget to run common commands, show workspace status or performan an action. Another widget displays text from a draft, and tapping it takes you to that selected draft. In addition, Drafts now supports Focus Filters to link specific drafts to a particular Focus mode.
Download Drafts
Category: Social networking app
Price: Free
Now you don't have to open up Facebook or even unlock your phone to find out if today is the birthday of any Facebook friends. A new widget brings that info to the lock screen. Facebook also offers a widget for displaying updates from friends.
Download Facebook
Next: Check out these 7 hidden iOS 16 features that will make your life way easier.
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Philip Michaels
Philip Michaels is a Managing Editor at Tom's Guide. He's been covering personal technology since 1999 and was in the building when Steve Jobs showed off the iPhone for the first time. He's been evaluating smartphones since that first iPhone debuted in 2007, and he's been following phone carriers and smartphone plans since 2015. He has strong opinions about Apple, the Oakland Athletics, old movies and proper butchery techniques. Follow him at @PhilipMichaels.
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