iPhone 15 Pro Max Action button is dumb with one action.

[eyoungren]

Can you explain useless? You never walked into a meeting, quickly mute. Go to a school, class, church, dinner, graduation, movie….literally anything that you need to mute your phone with literally no thought. That switch action, up/down could be done in any situation and you’d know immediately what was happening.

Worked great, just as you describe.

Except for alarms.

Which is fine if you work a 9 to 5 job. Not so fine if you work odd hours and your alarm goes off when the mute switch is ON. It's great (not) fumbling for your phone in the dark trying to turn alarms off in a crowded movie theater.

I've just taken to opening the clock app and shutting off my alarms every day - then turning them back on before bed. This is one of the biggest things I had to get used to, switching from Windows Mobile in 2009 to iOS.

Windows Mobile, you hit the mute switch, you actually got 100 percent silence and that included alarms.

 

[TechnoMonk]

Can you explain useless? You never walked into a meeting, quickly mute. Go to a school, class, church, dinner, graduation, movie….literally anything that you need to mute your phone with literally no thought. That switch action, up/down could be done in any situation and you’d know immediately what was happening.

I rarely toggle mute button, most folks I am around have mute on all the time. If a phone does ring, it’s surprising.

 

[Johnny London]

But why camera? There’s two ways to access that. Just asking

Should be useful when wearing gloves

 

[zach-coleman]

Can you explain useless? You never walked into a meeting, quickly mute. Go to a school, class, church, dinner, graduation, movie….literally anything that you need to mute your phone with literally no thought. That switch action, up/down could be done in any situation and you’d know immediately what was happening.

I turn on mute when I leave the house if it is ever turned on. Doubly so now because I made a focus mode to do so. I rarely had ringer on before.

 

[MrGimper]

Remember you can also assign shortcuts to “back tap” double and triple tap in Accessibility.

 

[adrianlondon]

Remember you can also assign shortcuts to “back tap” double and triple tap in Accessibility.

I should give that another go.

When the option first appeared I configured it, but too many false positives meant I turned it back off.

 

[HackMacDaddy]

How do you hear your phone ringing when it‘s always muted??? Do you carry it in your (tight) pocket at all times? Do all of you have Apple Watches to notify you??

 

[Night Spring]

How do you hear your phone ringing when it‘s always muted??? Do you carry it in your (tight) pocket at all times? Do all of you have Apple Watches to notify you??

My iPhone vibrates and also flashes lights when a call comes in. I think the settings to get it to flash lights is somewhere in Accessibility.

 

[neuropsychguy]

Can you explain useless? You never walked into a meeting, quickly mute. Go to a school, class, church, dinner, graduation, movie….literally anything that you need to mute your phone with literally no thought. That switch action, up/down could be done in any situation and you’d know immediately what was happening.

I take my phone off silent mode maybe once every couple of years. I'm looking forward to a useful button rather than the almost never used switch.

 

[AlixSPQR]

I know the mute switch is a physical button, of course, but does it mute the phone physically? Is it different that way than the new action button?

 

[OneBar]

Can you explain useless? You never walked into a meeting, quickly mute. Go to a school, class, church, dinner, graduation, movie….literally anything that you need to mute your phone with literally no thought. That switch action, up/down could be done in any situation and you’d know immediately what was happening.

I've never used it on my 11PM. If I want my phone muted I use the screen widget. The button is so small and doesn't have a positive click when engaged so it's hard to tell. Have used the screen widget since it became available and have never looked back. Personally I would probably have it set to camera as screen slide isn't always reliable and everything else is more gestures to get there.

 

[OneBar]

Worked great, just as you describe.

Except for alarms.

Which is fine if you work a 9 to 5 job. Not so fine if you work odd hours and your alarm goes off when the mute switch is ON. It's great (not) fumbling for your phone in the dark trying to turn alarms off in a crowded movie theater.

I've just taken to opening the clock app and shutting off my alarms every day - then turning them back on before bed. This is one of the biggest things I had to get used to, switching from Windows Mobile in 2009 to iOS.

Windows Mobile, you hit the mute switch, you actually got 100 percent silence and that included alarms.

Unless you need sound on your alarms, set them to vibrate only.

 

[Spock]

Useless as in he probably always has his phone on mute, as most people probably do 😝

Exactly this, people got so excited that Apple added new ringtones and I am not sure why...

 

[Gix1k]

I've never used it on my 11PM. If I want my phone muted I use the screen widget. The button is so small and doesn't have a positive click when engaged so it's hard to tell. Have used the screen widget since it became available and have never looked back. Personally I would probably have it set to camera as screen slide isn't always reliable and everything else is more gestures to get there.

Odd…I thought it had a nice click when set. Have not tried widget you’re referring to. Which?

 

[Gix1k]

I take my phone off silent mode maybe once every couple of years. I'm looking forward to a useful button rather than the almost never used switch.

Never understood the always on mute use case. When I’m home my phone isn’t always near me, so a sound helps me not miss calls/text.
Are you the type that’s always missing calls and returning them?

 

[MarkNewton2023]

The beauty of that slider was to mute phone quickly and effortlessly. Mute should ALWAYS be an action there. Any and everything else should be a double press or something. Plus now I have to learn a haptic feel when phone is in my pocket to know if it’s muted or not.

Every individual has their own preference to set up their action button. I am glad Apple accommodating every to setup their preferred action button so everyone can be happy. 😃

 

[neuropsychguy]

Never understood the always on mute use case. When I’m home my phone isn’t always near me, so a sound helps me not miss calls/text.
Are you the type that’s always missing calls and returning them?

I get an unexpected call that I need to answer maybe once per month. Typically people will text or text first to see if I’m available for a call. If I happen to miss a call, I’ll call back if someone leaves a message and needs me to call back.

Also, my phone is rarely away from my side, even at home, so I generally don't miss calls that I need to answer because it will vibrate. I also have an Apple Watch so that helps as well.

Having a programmable action button is a great option for me and others like me because we can use the button for something.

 

[Gix1k]

That is Apple’s Shortcuts app. This is the best video about using it for the Action Button and how to write the shortcut

This is clever work he did, BUT….now a menu to negotiate when hitting the button!!? I suppose I just have to adapt to this change and realize the ultra quick way of muting my phone is gone, kind of

 

[surfzen21]

Can you explain useless? You never walked into a meeting, quickly mute. Go to a school, class, church, dinner, graduation, movie….literally anything that you need to mute your phone with literally no thought. That switch action, up/down could be done in any situation and you’d know immediately what was happening.

Useless as in he probably always has his phone on mute, as most people probably do 😝

I think I muted my iPhone 3G in 2008 and all phones since have stayed pertinently muted. 🤣

The only time it gets un-muted is when I take off and put my case back on. Then I immediately mute it again.

Being able to assign a different function to that button is welcome in my case.

In contrast, my work phone is always ringer on and then silent mode for a focus for what I consider non work hours.

 

[MrGimper]

With some free shortcut add-ins, you can expand on this. For example I’ve set a shortcut that makes the action button toggle mute when the phone is in portrait, but launches the camera if in landscape.

 

[ArizonaApple]

Can you explain useless? You never walked into a meeting, quickly mute. Go to a school, class, church, dinner, graduation, movie….literally anything that you need to mute your phone with literally no thought. That switch action, up/down could be done in any situation and you’d know immediately what was happening.

My iPhone has been on mute since the iPhone 5 , the only time i have ever touched it was putting on a case and it toggled it on accident.

 

[TechnoMonk]

How do you hear your phone ringing when it‘s always muted??? Do you carry it in your (tight) pocket at all times? Do all of you have Apple Watches to notify you??

I have muted my phone for almost 13 years starting from iPhone 3GS. Rarely missed calls back then, AW is just an icing on the cake. Vibrate worked fine when I was working, and the phone is around me at home. When I am out phone is always in the pocket, vibrate is plenty to get notified.
After I got AW, it’s been super convenient if I am away from the phone.

 

[TechnoMonk]

Never understood the always on mute use case. When I’m home my phone isn’t always near me, so a sound helps me not miss calls/text.
Are you the type that’s always missing calls and returning them?

Who is calling people in this day and age? Lol. My phone calls have gone down drastically over the past decade. I have phone next to me on the desk when working, it’s in my pocket when I am out. I have AW anyways even if the phone isn’t near.

 

[zach-coleman]

Never understood the always on mute use case. When I’m home my phone isn’t always near me, so a sound helps me not miss calls/text.
Are you the type that’s always missing calls and returning them?

I have an Apple Watch now, but even before, I would always leave it on a table if it wasn’t in my pocket and would be able to hear it vibrating. I also don’t receive random calls very often but I was able to hear the ones I received.

 

[bp1000]

Shortcuts.
Thats the key here.
I have my action button open my saved shortcuts of which it displays about 10 or I can press to see more.
Silent mode is the first shortcut, but I have a bunch of other very useful shortcuts all within 1 press of the action button.

This for me is leagues ahead of the toggle switch.

You can even create a shortcut to automatically silence your phone based on events in a certain calendar for example. Or preset to silence at certain times of the day, or for example when you plugin your phone.

Shortcuts are very powerful and can automate a lot but the implementation is still a touch rigid. I'm sure this element once refined will be much more accessible to all and I would personally like to see more complex AND / OR logic easier to setup.