Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Phones
  3. Apple
  4. Mobile
  5. Evergreens

How to unlock your iPhone without a PIN or face recognition

By
Add as a preferred source on Google
 

There are times when your iPhone’s facial recognition utterly fails and you have no free fingers to tap in a PIN. For example, you’re at an amusement park, the sun is baking your brain, your sunglasses are on so your eyeballs don’t melt, and your iPhone has no clue who you are. Wonderful.

Recommended Videos

In this guide, we show you how to unlock your iPhone without a PIN or face recognition. It’s a neat trick that makes the iPhone enter your PIN for you after speaking a command. This method should never entirely replace face recognition or entering a PIN manually, but it’s helpful when you’re out and about. Just remember to turn it off again when not needed.

This guide is based on iOS 14.4.

Set up voice control

Chances are your iPhone doesn’t even have Voice Control turned on. Follow these steps to get started.

Step 1: Tap to open the Settings app.

Step 2: Scroll down and tap Accessibility. It’s located just under General.

Step 3: Scroll down and tap Voice Control. It’s located in the Physical and Motor section.

Step 4: Toggle on Voice Control or tap Set Up Voice Control if you’ve never used this feature before now.

Create the command

The tricky part will be emulating the way you enter the PIN. When you get to that point, the screen goes black, so there are no numbers. The best advice here is to first clean the screen, eat a plate of chicken or greasy fries, and then unlock your phone with a PIN using your nasty fingers. Press hard so you get nice, thick smudges you can see.

Once you’re asked to emulate your PIN entry gesture, angle the phone until you can see those fingerprints, and then tap in those spots.

Step 1: Tap to open the Settings app.

Step 2: Scroll down and tap Accessibility. It’s located just under General.

Step 3: Scroll down and tap Voice Control. It’s located in the Physical and Motor section.

Step 4: Tap Customize Commands.

Step 5: Tap Custom on the following screen.

Step 6: Tap Create New Command.

Step 7: Tap in the phrase you want to speak and then tap the blue Done button.

Step 8: Tap Action listed further down the screen.

Step 9: Tap Run Custom Gesture.

Step 10: Emulate your PIN entry by tapping on the black screen.

Step 11: Tap Stop in the bottom right corner to complete the recording.

Step 12: Tap Save in the top right corner to save this gesture.

Step 13: You return to the Action screen. Tap New Command in the top left corner to go back.

Step 14: Tap Save.

Disable the command

You can keep the command stored in an iPhone and simply toggle off Voice Control when it’s not needed.

Step 1: Tap to open the Settings app.

Step 2: Scroll down and tap Accessibility. It’s located just under General.

Step 3: Scroll down and tap Voice Control. It’s located in the Physical and Motor section.

Step 4: Toggle off Voice Control.

Kevin Parrish
Kevin Parrish
Former Contributor
Kevin started taking PCs apart in the 90s when Quake was on the way and his PC lacked the required components. Since then…
Topics
Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra: Everything we know about Samsung’s next flagship foldable
Though it will feature improvements across the board, the memory crisis might not spare Samsung’s Fold 8 Ultra.
Electronics, Speaker, White Board

The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra is not the phone that reimagines what a foldable looks like. As that job falls to its sibling, the wider-screen Galaxy Z Fold 8, the Ultra could come as the direct successor to the Galaxy Z Fold 7, with the same tall, narrow design and the same book-style proportions, for the same audience. 

If you've used a Samsung Galaxy Z Fold in the past and think that the shape is perfect for you, the Fold 8 Ultra could be just the right phone for you. It has a redesigned inner display, a substantially larger battery, faster charging, and the new Flex Titanium technology designed to minimize the crease that has troubled Samsung's foldables for years. 

Read more
Your OnePlus phone is switching to ColorOS, whether you like it or not
OnePlus has confirmed that OxygenOS is being phased out, and eligible devices will get the option to update to ColorOS 17 once it becomes available.
Person holding OnePlus 15.

OnePlus has confirmed that OxygenOS, the Android skin that helped define the brand for more than a decade, is being retired in favor of ColorOS. The confirmation came buried in the community forum post announcing its exit from North America and Europe.

ColorOS replaces OxygenOS worldwide

Read more
Personal Intelligence in Search now connects to Google Calendar
Google Search AI can now read your Calendar and add events automatically
Google Calendar

Google is taking another step toward making Search feel less like a search engine and more like a personal assistant. The company has announced that AI Mode's Personal Intelligence can now connect directly to Google Calendar, allowing it not only to reference your schedule but also to create calendar events on your behalf.

Until now, Personal Intelligence mainly pulled information from apps like Gmail and Google Photos to provide more relevant responses. Calendar changes the equation because it becomes the first connected Google app that doesn't just provide context. It can actively act. The feature is rolling out now to users in the United States, with a wider international rollout planned later.

Read more