‘You just made my life better’ say iPhone fans after finding free iMessage upgrade and cheer ‘y’all are magicians’

TWO genius iPhone tricks make iMessage so much easier to use – especially if you don’t love the latest update.

If you’ve upgraded to iOS 17 on your iPhone, you’ll have noticed a major change to iMessage.

Now when you want to share a photo, you tap on the plus icon to reveal a pop-up side menu.

This has proved controversial, with one owner creating a Reddit thread they “hate this kind of interface”.

The thread has received hundreds of upvotes, but also a number of great replies revealing how to instantly make things better.

One savvy user replied: “You can hold down and move any of the items you use up or down to make them more accessible”

Yes, it’s possible to hold and drag on any of the items on the pop-up menu to re-order them.

And if you tap on the More option, you can drag other items onto the menu that aren’t already there.

An Apple fan replied: “You just made my life a little better, thank you!”

Another said: “Wish I could fling gold at you.”

SNAP HAPPY

But there’s an even better trick that helps you share photos specifically.

You might find it annoying to have to tap the plus sign and then choose the Photos option before you can even start selecting images to share.

Well, it turns out that you don’t need to do that at all.

An iOS whiz in the thread said: “Tap and hold the + to access Photos without even seeing the extra menu at all!”

Try it: open an iMessage chat and simply hold down on the plus icon.

That will instantly replace your keyboard with your photo album so you can quickly choose images to share.

One impressed iPhone owner: replied “If I could give you more up votes I would.”

And another said: “Y’all are magicians. Ty for this one.”

If you’re not seeing any of these menus then it likely means you haven’t installed the latest iOS 17 update.

This free upgrade dropped in September 2023, and brings dozens of improvements to your iPhone.

To check if you’ve got it (or to install it if you haven’t), go to Settings > General > Software Update.