How To Make Ios 14 Aesthetic With Custom App Icons

iOS 14’s most popular feature has quickly become the all-new widgets that can give your iPhone a personalized touch. However, going further than that, custom iOS 14 aesthetics have become a huge trend. We’ve already covered how to create ultra-customized widgets with Widgetsmith. The other big part is making your app icons tie everything together. Follow along for how to make an iOS 14 aesthetic with custom app icons.

Update 12/14: Using custom icons has been nicely improved with iOS 14.3 (available now). The Shortcuts app doesn’t have to launch each time you tap a custom icon before opening the corresponding app. As it turns out, a banner alert still triggers for the Shortcuts app but it’s still a lot better situation overall.

We’ve also got a roundup of sharp icon packs that you can use to give your home screen a fresh look.

Here’s where to find custom app icon packs you can use with iOS 14.3 + iPadOS 14.3

Going for an iOS 14 aesthetic can create a really unique look for your iPhone‘s home screen. There are a couple of ways to go about it: you can find the icons/images you want to use yourself or you can buy an icon set that has the aesthetic you’re looking for. We’ll cover some of the options below as well as the full process of using the Shortcuts app to actually create your new custom app icons.

Also, be sure to check out our hands-on tutorial walking through creating custom iOS 14 widgets with Widgetsmith:

Hands-on: Widgetsmith brings ultra-customizable widgets to your iOS 14 home screen

How to make iOS 14 aesthetic with custom app icons

Something to keep in mind when you make an iOS 14 aesthetic with the Shortcuts app/custom icons, when you tap them to launch an app you will briefly see the Shortcuts app on your iPhone before it opens the app linked to it (no longer the case with iOS 14.3!). It’s a bit clunky, but it’s the price we have to pay for a custom iOS 14 aesthetic for now.

In the example below I’m using the free images available at icons8.com. On iPhone, you can long-press on images and choose the Add to Photos option.

More options are available on Etsy and Pinterest with many of them ranging from $5-$30.

Tap the “+” icon in the top right corner — Tap Add Action — Search for Open App, and tap it — and then tap Choose highlighted in blue

After picking the app, tap the three-dot icon in the top right corner — tap Shortcut Name at the top and enter one — now tap Add to Home Screen

Now tap the icon to the left of the name you just entered — now tap Choose Photo (or Choose File if you downloaded an icon to your iPhone)

You can adjust it in the frame to make sure it’s centered or zoom in by pinching and dragging — tap Add in the top right corner — now tap Done

Press and hold the app to enter jiggle mode to move it wherever you’d like

Repeat the process for all the apps you’d like — you can also tap the three-dot icon on any you’ve already done to change the icon or name

How to make iOS 14 aesthetic with custom app icons#

Read more iOS 14 tutorials#

How to make iOS 14 aesthetic with custom app icons

Read more iOS 14 tutorials