Want your iPhone’s Always On Display to stay active at just specific times? In this tutorial, we will show you how to have your iPhone automatically turn the Always On Display feature on and off on a fixed schedule.
I love having my iPhone’s Always On Display (AOD) activated when I’m working at my desk every day from 9 AM to 6 PM. This is because I keep my iPhone upright on a phone stand, and it makes it easy to glance at the clock, notifications, and Lock Screen widgets. However, apart from my work hours, I don’t really need to have the Always On Display enabled.
Turning AOD on from iOS Display Settings every morning and turning it off in the evening is an unnecessary chore for me. So, I have automated this task, and it works like a charm. Let me share the entire process so you can do this on your iPhone 14 Pro/Pro Max, 15 Pro/Pro Max, or 16 Pro/Pro Max.
Set your iPhone Always On Display to activate automatically
1) Open the built-in Shortcuts app on your iPhone, create a new shortcut by tapping the plus button (+) from the top right of the Shortcuts tab, and tap the search bar.
2) Use the search bar to find the Set Always On Display action and add it to the shortcut you’re building.
3) Leave the shortcut as Turn Always On Display On, and tap Done.
4) Now, go to the Automation tab of the Shortcuts app and tap New Automation or the plus button (+).
5) Since I want AOD to turn on at a fixed time (9 AM), I will select Time of Day. You may set it to Time of Day or some other condition like Alarm (i.e., when you stop your morning alarm), Sleep (i.e., when you wake up), Work (i.e., when your Work Focus activates), and so forth.
6) Now, fine-tune when Always On Display should activate and tweak other settings.
- Time: Since I want it to auto-enable at 9 AM, I will set that accordingly.
- Repeat: Next, I will select Weekly instead of Daily and exclude Saturday and Sunday, as I do not work on weekends. Adjust this based on your use case.
- Auto-run: It’s important that you select Run Immediately so the automation can activate Always On Display automatically without your confirmation. I’d also recommend leaving Notify When Run deactivated so you have one less notification to worry about.
With the above customizations per your liking, tap Next from the top right corner.
7) Select the Set Always On Display shortcut you built in Steps 1 to 3. This shortcut will be visible under the My Shortcuts section. You can also use the search bar to find it.
You have successfully configured your iPhone to activate Always On Display at the set time. Now, the last leg of this process involves creating another automation that will turn off AOD at the specified time.
Turn off your iPhone’s Always On Display at a chosen time
The steps for this are similar to what we explained above.
1) Create another iOS shortcut that’s set to Turn Always On Display Off. You can do this by creating a new shortcut, searching for Set Always On Display, and tapping On to change it to Off. You can rename this shortcut to something like Turn Off Always On Display or leave it as default.
2) Go to the Automation tab in the iOS Shortcuts app and tap the plus button to create a new automation.
3) Select Time of Day and set the time when you want AOD to turn off. Of course, as explained above, you can choose other conditions instead of Time of Day.
Set the Repeat schedule just like you did when creating the first automation.
After that, select Run Immediately and tap Next.
4) Select the Set Always On Display shortcut you built in Step 1 to automate your iPhone to toggle off AOD at the specified time.
Going forward, your iPhone will automatically enable Always On Display and also turn it off at set times.
Delete these automations
If you no longer want your iPhone’s Always On Display to be controlled by these automations, go to the Automation section of the Shortcuts app, swipe left on the automation, and delete them.
Do more with iOS automations: