Although only iPhone Pro owners can change its brighness, the flashlight on iPhones is a very handy feature. You can set it up to be accessed in a few ways, including on the lock screen or in control center. Tap the icon when you need help getting your key in the door at night or finding something underneath furniture, and the camera flash will illuminate with a steady glow. If you’re fumbling with shopping bags or have your hands otherwise occupied, you can turn on the flashlight with a simple voice command.
Tell Siri, “Hey Siri, turn on/off the flashlight,” and the built-in assistant will toggle the light as instructed. You don’t have to do anything special to enable flashlight control via Siri; as long as the voice assistant is enabled on your iPhone all you need to do is give the command. Activating your iPhone’s flashlight via Siri is especially helpful to illuminate a workspace while your hands are busy. This method also allows you to keep photos, messages, documents, or videos visible on your screen while lighting the flashlight.
Vocal shorcuts and lock screen customization
There’s a way to use voice commands to light and extinguish an iPhone flashlight that doesn’t even invoke Siri. You can configure Vocal Shortcuts in the Settings app under the Accessibility menu and assign words to specific functions. Harry Potter fans might choose to activate their flashlight with the word “Lumos” and turn it off with “Nox,” the words that turn on and off a light at the tip of the spellcaster’s wand in the books and movies. Vocal shortcuts don’t when the phone is locked, though; you’ll have to rely on Siri or a button (physical or on-screen) to toggle the flashlight with your screen locked.
Chris Smith
See our guide on how to change your iPhone lock screen icons if the flashlight doesn’t appear on yours, and there’s an easy way to remove it if you’re not using it. Touch and hold the lock screen, tap customize and then press the ‘-‘ above and to the left of the icon to remove the shortcut. With the customize screen still active, you an also press the “+” sign to add a new shortcut to the lock screen. This can be an app or iPhone action like opening the Apple TV virtual remote. You can also remove shortcuts from the lock screen so they don’t block parts of your wallpaper that you want visible.
iPhone flashlight advanced tips
If your control center doesn’t have the flashlight icon, it’s easy to add. Open the control center by swiping down from the top right corner of a FaceID-enabled iPhone or up from the bottom on models with a home button. Tap and hold in an open spot on the screen to enter customize mode, then tap “add a control” at the bottom of the screen. Find the flashlight icon, tap to add it to your control center, then drag it to an open spot on the grid. European users have the same flashlight icon as everyone else, although it will be labeled ‘torch.’ The flashlight can also be linked to the action button on iPhone 15 Pro and later models. This is one of the best uses for the iPhone action button, but activating it will displace any existing trigger you have set up. Open the settings app, go to action button, and choose the flashlight from the list of actions. Many iPhone users don’t know about the hidden back tap feature, but it too can be used to toggle the flashlight.
Chris Smith
Open settings and go to accessibility > touch > back tap. In this menu you can pair the flashlight switch or a few other actions with a double or triple tap on the back of your iPhone. Enabling Siri alongside one of these hands-on ways to activate your iPhone flashlight gives you options for different situations, although it might take some experimenting to figure out which combination works best for you.
