The Phone App, Front to Back

The Phone App and Its Five Tabs

Open the green Phone app and look along the bottom. You will see up to five little buttons — these are your tabs, and each one is a different room. Tapping between them is how you get around.

You cannot hurt anything by tapping between these tabs. Poke through all five now, just to see what is in each one. The tab you are looking at is the one lit up in color.

• Favorites — your handful of most-called people, one tap away.
• Recents — a running list of calls you made, answered, and missed.
• Contacts — your full address book (covered in its own guide).
• Keypad — the number pad, for dialing a number by hand.
• Voicemail — messages people left when you did not pick up.

Making a Call — Two Ways

There are really just two ways to place a call: tap a name you have saved, or type a number by hand. Most days you will use the first.

• Open Phone and tap Contacts (or Favorites).
• Find the person and tap their name.
• Tap the call button, or the phone number itself. It starts ringing them.

When to Use the Keypad, When to Use Contacts

Both make calls — the difference is simply whether the person is already saved in your phone.

• You already have the person saved — which is nearly always, for family and friends.
• You want the phone to show their name on future calls instead of a number.
• You want the call to be one easy tap, with no chance of a wrong digit.

Answering and Ending a Call

When a call comes in, what you see depends on whether the phone is awake in your hand or locked in your pocket. Both are easy once you know the difference.

If the phone is ringing at a bad moment but you do not want to send the caller straight to voicemail, press the side button once (or either volume button). The ringing stops, but the call keeps trying — you can still answer, or let it go to voicemail on its own.

• Phone awake: tap the green Accept button.
• Phone locked: slide the green handset from left to right.
• Not now? Tap the red Decline (or press the side button twice) to send them to voicemail.

The Buttons You See During a Call

Once a call connects, a grid of round buttons appears. They look busy, but you will only ever use two or three. Here is what each one does, so none of them can surprise you.

A button glowing or filled-in means it is turned on. Tap it again to turn it back off. Nothing here is permanent — it all resets when the call ends.

• Mute — turns off your microphone so they cannot hear you. You still hear them.
• Keypad — brings up the number pad for 'press 1' menus.
• Speaker (or Audio) — plays the call out loud so you can set the phone down.
• Add Call — brings a third person onto the line (page 18).
• FaceTime — switches to a video call, if you both have iPhones.
• Contacts — look someone up mid-call without hanging up.

Speakerphone and Turning Up the Volume

If you strain to hear on calls, this page alone is worth the book. Two simple adjustments — speaker and volume — make a world of difference.

While you are on a call, press the volume up button on the left edge of the phone. This raises the call volume specifically. Do it during the call, not before — the buttons control different volumes at different times.

• During a call, tap the Speaker button (it may say Audio).
• The caller now comes through the phone's loudspeaker — set it on the table and talk hands-free.
• Tap it again to go back to holding it at your ear.

Muting Yourself and Putting a Call on Hold

Two useful ways to step away from a call for a moment without hanging up — and they are easy to mix up, so here is the plain difference.

To put someone on hold, press and hold the Mute button for a moment. The call pauses for both of you — handy if you need to answer the door. Tap it again to come back. Not every carrier offers Hold, so do not worry if you do not see it.

• Tap the Mute button (a microphone). It fills in to show it is on.
• You can still hear them; they just cannot hear you — a cough, a comment to your spouse, background noise.
• Tap Mute again to un-mute and rejoin the conversation.

Favorites — Your People, One Tap Away

Favorites are the short list of people you call most. Once set up, calling them is a single tap, and their calls can ring through even when the phone is set to stay quiet.

In Favorites, tap Edit at the top. Drag the three-line handle to move someone up or down, or tap the red minus (-) to remove them. Removing a favorite does not delete the person from your contacts.

• Open Phone and tap the Favorites tab.
• Tap the plus (+) at the top and pick a person from your contacts.
• Choose how — Call, Message, or Video — tap Call if unsure.

Recents — Who Called, Who You Missed

The Recents tab is your call history — every call made, answered, and missed, newest at the top. It is one of the handiest lists on the phone.

To clear the list, tap Edit and remove entries, or swipe a single one to the left and tap Delete. Clearing Recents does not delete any saved contacts — it only tidies the history.

• Red names or numbers are calls you missed.
• Tap any name or number to call them right back in one tap.
• Tap the little i beside an entry to see details, or to save the number as a contact.
• Tap Missed at the top to see only the calls you did not catch.

Setting Up Voicemail and Recording Your Greeting

Voicemail lets people leave you a message when you cannot pick up. The first time, you set a password and record a short greeting — then it just works from then on.

• Tap the Voicemail tab. If it is your first time, tap Set Up Now.
• Create a voicemail password (a few digits) and write it down somewhere safe.
• Choose Custom to record your own greeting, or Default for the standard one.

Listening to Your Voicemail

The best part of voicemail on the iPhone is that you can see your messages as a list and play them in any order — no dialing in and listening through all of them to reach the one you want. This is called Visual Voicemail.

Many iPhones also show a written transcript of the message beneath it, so you can read what someone said. It is not always perfect, but it is wonderful for catching a number or a name.

• Tap the Voicemail tab. New messages have a blue dot.
• Tap a message to open it, then tap play. Turn on Speaker if it is hard to hear.
• Drag the little slider to replay a part you missed — a phone number, say.
• Tap Call Back to return the call, or the trash can to delete it.

Live Voicemail — Screen a Message As It's Left

This is a newer, genuinely useful trick. With Live Voicemail, when a caller starts leaving a message, you see their words appear on your screen as they speak — like an old answering machine you could listen to before picking up.

Live Voicemail lives under Settings > Apps > Phone > Live Voicemail. It works on recent iPhones and is a fine way to decide, in the moment, whether a call is worth answering.

• When a call goes to voicemail, tap Voicemail on the incoming-call screen (or just let it ring through).
• As the caller talks, their message appears as live text on your screen.
• If you realize it is someone you want, tap the green button to pick up right then and take the call.

Silence Unknown Callers

If your phone rings all day with numbers you do not know, this one setting can give you back your peace. It sends callers who are not in your contacts straight to voicemail, without a peep.

From then on, only calls from people in your Contacts, your recent outgoing calls, and Siri suggestions will ring your phone. Everyone else goes quietly to voicemail, where you can check them at your leisure in the Voicemail tab.

• Go to Settings > Apps > Phone.
• Tap Screen Unknown Callers, then choose Silence.

Call Screening — Ask Who's Calling First

Newer iPhones can screen calls from unknown numbers for you. Before your phone even rings, it politely asks the caller who they are and why they are calling — and shows you their answer so you can decide.

Look under Settings > Apps > Phone for the call screening options (the exact wording can vary by iPhone and software version). This is a recent feature, so it may not appear on older phones — and that is perfectly fine.

• An unknown caller is asked to say their name and reason for calling.
• Your phone stays silent until they answer — then it shows you what they said.
• You can pick up, or ignore it, knowing who is on the line before you commit.

Let Your Phone Wait on Hold For You

We all know the misery of being 'on hold' with a company for twenty minutes. Newer iPhones offer Hold Assist, which waits through the hold music for you and pings you the moment a real person picks up.

Look for this under Settings > Apps > Phone, and watch for the on-screen offer whenever hold music starts. Like call screening, it is a recent addition, so it may not be on every iPhone.

• When your phone notices you have been placed on hold, it offers to wait on hold for you.
• Tap to accept, then set the phone down and go about your day.
• When a live person comes on the line, your phone alerts you to come back and pick up.

Getting Three People on One Call

Sometimes you want two people on the line at once — you, your sister, and the doctor, say. That is a conference call, and it is just a couple of taps.

You can add another person the same way, up to your carrier's limit. Tapping the red End button hangs up the whole call for everyone. Not every phone plan supports merging, so do not worry if you do not see Merge Calls.

• While on the first call, tap Add Call. The first person waits quietly.
• Call the second person as you normally would.
• Once they answer, tap Merge Calls. Now all three of you are talking together.

FaceTime Audio — Crystal-Clear, Free Calls

Between two Apple devices, FaceTime Audio is a voice call that travels over the internet instead of the phone network. It often sounds noticeably clearer, and it does not use any of your calling minutes.

It works over Wi-Fi or cellular data. On Wi-Fi at home it is completely free and does not touch your plan's minutes — a nice choice for a long, chatty call with family.

• Open a contact who has an iPhone, iPad, or Mac.
• Tap the video or FaceTime button, then choose FaceTime Audio (the phone-handset option) if you want voice only.
• Or, during a normal call to another iPhone, tap FaceTime to switch over.

Phone Scams and Spoofed Numbers

The telephone is a scammer's favorite tool because a voice feels personal and urgent. You do not need to be fearful — you need to know the handful of shapes these calls take. Once you can spot them, they lose their power.

• 'This is the IRS / Social Security' — threatening arrest or lost benefits unless you pay right now. Real agencies do not call and threaten like this.
• 'Your grandson is in jail and needs bail' — a panicked story pushing you to wire money fast. Hang up and call your grandson directly.
• 'This is tech support, your computer has a virus' — asking to get into your computer or for payment. Apple and Microsoft do not call you.
• 'Confirm your bank details / a code we just texted you' — never read a code or password aloud to a caller.

Plain-English Word List

The handful of terms that come up around phone calls, translated into plain talk.

What's in the 27-page PDF

• Pages 3-7: The basics — the five tabs, making, answering, and ending calls, and the buttons on screen
• Pages 8-11: Everyday comfort — speaker and volume, mute and hold, Favorites, and Recents
• Pages 12-15: Voicemail done right — setup, your greeting, listening, and Live Voicemail
• Pages 16-20: Peace and quiet — silencing strangers, call screening, hold help, conference calls, FaceTime audio, and scams
• Pages 21-22: Your everyday cheat sheet and a plain-English word list

Why I wrote this

I write these as printable handouts because a guide you can keep in a drawer beats a web page you have to find again. No jargon, no judgment, no rushing. If you'd rather have someone sit beside you and go through it together, that's a flat $99 first visit with the 30-day follow-up included — serving Portage County from Atwater, Ohio. — Bill