Status Bar

Emerald: A new Status Bar experience that Apple needs to take notes on

Anthony Bouchard ∙ January 19, 2021

Your iPhone’s Status Bar is intended to provide useful information at a glance, and while it definitely seems to have the basics covered, Apple could have went so much further in terms of implementing an immersive Status Bar-centric user experience. Given what an iPhone costs these days, wouldn’t you think they’d give this some thought?

While it seems unlikely that Apple will be upgrading the iPhone’s Status Bar any time soon, those lucky enough to have a jailbroken handset at their disposal won’t need to put up with the stock Status Bar experience any longer. Why, you ask? Just have a look at a newly released jailbreak tweak dubbed Emerald by iOS developers LaughingQuoll and thetimeloop, and all your questions will be answered.

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LottieStatusBar brings Lottie-inspired animations to the Status Bar

Anthony Bouchard ∙ Updated May 30, 2022

It was only a couple of days ago that we showed you a jailbreak tweak dubbed LottieLockscreen by iOS developer MiRO. In a nutshell, it brought fun and quirky Lottie-style animations to the Lock Screen on jailbroken iPhones. The tweak’s popularity rapidly gained momentum following its release, and as such, we knew it would only be a matter of time before the developer expanded the concept to other interfaces of iOS.

LottieStatusBar is the latest of such expansions, and just as the tweak’s rather conspicuous name implies, it ports these Lottie-style animations to the handset’s Status Bar.

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Eliza gives the Status Bar’s battery icon a wider array of colors to use

Anthony Bouchard ∙ Updated May 11, 2023

Apple makes it easy to discern the state of your iPhone’s battery, not only with a convenient icon in the Status Bar that depicts the current charge level, but also with unique colors that hint about its current condition. For example, a green battery icon indicates a good charge, while a yellow battery icon means that Low Power Mode is turned on and a red battery icon suggests a low charge.

Apple has used the same colors to depict battery states for as long as I can remember, and so it tends to be somewhat monotonous. Fortunately, a newly released and free jailbreak tweak dubbed Eliza by iOS developer WilsontheWolf provides the Status Bar’s battery icon with a wider range of colors to help it express your current battery state.

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Diamond re-imagines the iPhone’s Dock and Status Bar in a big way

Anthony Bouchard ∙ November 7, 2020

Two things that remain mostly the same since the very first iPhone launched in 2007 are the Status Bar and the Dock. Despite a few minor tweaks and adjustments by Apple over the years, they haven’t changed much, and it’s apparent that many users demand more from these essential interface elements.

Diamond is a newly released jailbreak tweak by iOS developer SouthernGirlWhoCode that re-imagines these interfaces on the iOS platform, and it does so by combining some of the most important features of the Dock and Status Bar into a single, aesthetically pleasing interface that can be customized in a bevy of different ways.

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Genesis 2 – The new all-in-one jailbreak tweak you don’t want to miss

Anthony Bouchard ∙ October 22, 2020

Given just how easy it is to rack up an expensive bill in the process of buying paid jailbreak tweaks these days, it’s no wonder why all-in-one jailbreak tweaks have become so popular as of late. Not only can they give you more bang for your buck, but they can also free up system sources by reducing the number of tweaks that hook into processes on your device.

In this review, we’ll be taking a closer look at a new jailbreak tweak called Genesis 2 by iOS developer ItzNebbs. Genesis 2 is the latest all-in-one extension to be released for jailbroken devices, and as you’ll soon learn, it offers and slew of powerful tools for customizing various user interfaces found throughout iOS.

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This tweak adds an icon in the Status Bar whenever music is playing

Anthony Bouchard ∙ October 13, 2020

If you’re one to listen to a ton of music via your jailbroken iPhone or iPad, then chances are you could benefit from the likes of a newly released and free jailbreak tweak dubbed NowPlayingIndicator by iOS developer iCraze.

This tweak’s name is particularly telling in terms of what it does. Once installed, NowPlayingIndicator adds a play button-shaped icon to the Status Bar, just to the left of the time, whenever you have music playing. The illustration above depicts how the tweak looks in action.

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Grabbi makes it easier to discern the time or battery level in full-screen apps

Anthony Bouchard ∙ September 9, 2020

The Status Bar is a persistent element that presents itself in the vast majority of iOS apps and user interfaces. The lone exception to this rule of thumb would of course be full-screen apps such as mobile games, video playback, and a small number of other exceptions.

Despite being hidden from the aforementioned interfaces, iPhone users can open Notification Center to view the Status Bar by swiping down from the top of the display to reveal a grabber and then tugging down on the grabber. Unfortunately, this is a multi-step process and rather cumbersome, and that’s the chief reason why a new jailbreak tweak called Grabbi by iOS developer Arielgavrielov exists.

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Access missed notifications via the Status Bar with Minotaur

Anthony Bouchard ∙ August 29, 2020

Notifications are an essential aspect of owning a smartphone, and the iPhone’s Notification Center interface does a fair job of merging all your missed notifications into one convenient place, some would argue that Apple could do better. iOS developer Muirey03 would be one of such people, and consequently, a newly released jailbreak tweak dubbed Minotaur was conceived.

Minotaur was designed to provide a new way of viewing and interacting with missed notifications to your iPhone. It works by letting users quickly view and manage missed notifications via a convenient lightweight interface that lives in your handset’s Status Bar.

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Carrierizer2 can replace your Status Bar’s carrier text with something better

Anthony Bouchard ∙ August 25, 2020

Customizing the Status Bar’s carrier text is a modification that hasn’t lost even an ounce of its popularity since the dawn of iPhone jailbreaking more than decade ago. How you go about it, on the other hand, depends entirely on you.

Carrierizer2 is a newly released and free jailbreak tweak by iOS developer CydiaGeek that lets pwned iPhone users customize their Status Bar’s carrier text in more ways than one. Whether you prefer keeping things simple by replacing the carrier text with a custom text string or something more advanced like your IP address or temperature, this tweak brings a lot to the table that might be worth checking out.

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CCTime13 adds a time indicator to the Status Bar in Control Center

Anthony Bouchard ∙ August 22, 2020

The iPhone’s Status Bar exists to provide users with pertinent information at a glance. Whether you’re checking to see the current time, your handset’s current signal strength, or how much battery life you’ve got left, chances are you look at it somewhat frequently.

One thing that has always sort of bothered me however is that the Status Bar’s time display disappears when you launch the Control Center interface, and that’s a gripe that a newly released and free jailbreak tweak dubbed CCTime13 by iOS developer 0xkuj aims to solve.

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