Working without a home button

I use my finger tip and it works well with my 16 pro max. Do not do it to slow. Flick up and you will hear the sound. Also you can setup backtap to go to the home screen if you are having issues. Long live cats and Rachel.

OK, Go to setting, accessibility, touch and slide to the right until you see it. Long live cats.

Hi Rachael, I faced this very same obstacle last year. I just did the dresser so I could figure out the best way I can describe it to you. It’s always the bottom right hand corner of your screen and it’s a fairly quick gesture the sliding motion up the screen I use my right pointer finger to do this and then it will ask you for your passcode to your Face ID however you have it set up. I hope this helps. I just take a little bit to get used to it, but it will make two clicks to go to the home screen and then three clicks to go to the app switcher. I personally think the Apple shooter just left the home button and on phones, but they’re not going to do that so this is the new register they created for us. My phone at the home button is an iPhone 15 that I got last year. I kept my iPhone SE as my secondary device so I could have my music on it. So I just don’t have one at home button on it.

Do it middle speed, like I said just use your finger tips. The more you practise the easy will get, It took time for me to do so. Long live cats and Rachel.

Hi,

I have a friend who has an iPhone 16. She has her voiceover gesture set up like this:
• one finger triple tap equals home.
• Two finger triple tap equals app switcher.

You can set this up by going to Settings, Accessibility, VoiceOver, Commands, Touch Gestures. From there, navigate to the first heading labeled, "TAP: ONE FINGER", and the heading just below that labeled, "TAP: TWO FINGERS".

HTH.

Do not press to hard but just light touch. Similar to a caress with finger tip. Long live cats.

If you have case it does not work all the time. Long live kitties.

I too use this device, and love it. I will eventually have to upgrade, and if I decide to stick with Apple, I'll likely get the 17E as well. I have a little idea of what to expect though, I was a proud owner of an iPhone 15 Pro for about a month and a half. That is a horror story for another day though...

@Holger,

Taps on the screen always work, unless you're using a life proof case, then maybe not so much.

Apple case color sand. Apple hates me. Long live cats.

Apple does indeed.
As for my friend and her iPhone 16, her single finger and 2 finger triple tap choice works really, really well for her. She is always able to access her home screen, or app switcher, without using the default slide gesture. Because, like the OP here, that slide gesture just does not work for her.

Need a good lawyer. So many issues with the iPhone and iOS 26. For me is the worse iOS since unlucky 13. Hope 27 is better. Long live cats.

Get an abacus. I hear they are spot on for accessibility.
As for the OP, I hope you find a system that works for you with your new iPhone. 😊

I do believe you can still access the Control center and Notification center by swiping up or down with three fingers from the status bar. However I just wanted to let you know that there are new gestures for the newer model iPhones. I believe a swipe down from the top left or top right corner will get you notification center, and a little further will get you control center. So long as you don't ever use Reachability, you should be OK. I could never get that function to work on a device without a Home button.

I believe Thomas did a podcast on using the gestures when the home button was remove and we needed to learn how to use the phone without the home button. I am sure someone will share the title of the podcast. Long live cats and down with apple.

I don't remember the exact day, but I got my very first iPhone, the 4S, in July 2012. Had I waited a few more months, I could've gotten the new iPhone 5. Sadly, my first iPhone 5, was a 5C model. Worst.. iPhone.. Ever..
Sometime later though, I picked up a refurbished 5S, and then all was right in the world. 😀

The Holger guy, I appreciate your love for cats!

I use a custom gesture to get to the home screen and app switcher with iPhone 16. Yes long live kitties and German Shepherd guides!

I encourage anyone interested to contact Apple about adding a navigation bar to a feature such as Assistive Touch. I personally find these slide gestures awkward and inefficient, and I imagine it's even worse for those with motor issues. Apple should be able to very easily implement a navigation bar say along the bottom edge of the screen when a feature like Assistive Touch is enabled which could be customized to have controls like home, app switcher, etc. Android does this and it works well.

You can actually setup AssistiveTouch to act as a, "software Home button",. This will allow you to have the home gesture, the app switcher gesture, and even Siri, assigned to the single software button.
What's really neat, is that you can relocate the button to be anywhere on your home screen. Which means you can have it up in your status bar if you want, or down toward the bottom center, where the original home button used to exist. It acts as an overlay, so just keep that in mind that it would float over app icons, etc. Still, it works really well as an alternative to the default Slide gestures on the newer model iPhones.

To set this up, go to Settings, Accessibility, Touch. AssistiveTouch should be the first option here. Double tap to enable it, and follow the prompts to set up the different gestures. By default you get a single tap option, a double tap option, and a tap and hold. For us screen reader users, that would be a double tap, a quadruple tap**, and a double tap and hold. I have personally tested this out on my iPhone SE 2022, and it works really well. The software button persists on pretty much every screen, including the LockScreen.

** Note that the quadruple tap can be changed under Commands, Touch Gestures inside VoiceOver settings. Just change the last option under one finger tap, the one that controls a genuine double tap which is quadruple tap by default.

HTH. 😁

I use two-finger swipe right for Home and two-finger swipe left for App Switcher. And I just got the iPhone 17 and these settings along with many others all switched over.

I’m doing the same thing as Rachael I’m keeping my iPhone SE until there’s literally no life left in it. Even if they stop updating it, I can still play music on it cause I’ve downloaded everything that I have in my library in my phone. So there was no way I was given that thing back to Apple. Mine is the product red variant in the 256 gig. I hope you’ll find digestion that works for you. Glad I could help.

I am still using the exact same model (and color) as Singer Girl, for my primary device. Love my home button, thank you very much. 😁

That’s awesome Brian. It’s really a great phone. I only got an iPhone 15 at my primary device because I traded in my iPad mini six generation to get that phone and then I just kept the SE as like an iPod. So you know it’s kind of one of those things where like I never had an iPod so this was the chance to get one. Yeah I definitely love the home button. That’s exactly why I’m keeping this as long as I possibly can. I really love the size and design of this too. But that’s why I have to keep it working over as long as possible.

Yeah, I absolutely love the design of these devices. They are thin, yet powerful. Obviously, not as powerful as the latest build of iPhone, but still, even running iOS 26 they hold their own. And right now Apple Intelligence isn't even a blip on my radar, considering I can do most, if not all of the functions through third-party applications and a little Shortcut kung fu. 😇

Same here. I’m really not interested in Apple Intelligence anyway. I don’t feel like it’s really doing that much for us anyway for voiceover users. We never were a lot of people when it first came out of the room and turning it off so I don’t see any point for quite yet. And you’re right there’s definitely third-party ups that will give you that stuff anyway. I really wish the Apple would just go back to this design of the phone though I love it. Well I guess we’ll just have to keep them as long as you possibly can as long as they’re still software updates and I think for me like even if they stop updating it as long as I can get it as my iPad thing and they’re still battery life left and I’m keeping it literally until the day that I can’t charge it anymore or whatever.

That’s awesome that you found your for us. A few years ago, my sister found her iPhone 5. She was literally just like cleaning her room and she was able to charge it out and then she turned on voiceover and gave it to me. It was just like here have fun so I had that even working for a few years I mean not as a phone or anything, but you know basically a little mini web browser or whatever you know, but that one didn’t work anymore either but I’d get it working for a good few years. But my first iPhone, but I actually had as far as a phone was on iPhone 8 and they had like iOS 13.3 something on it when I first got it but yeah, I mean if you keep the iPhone SE after it’s not working anymore. It’ll basically just be a paperweight but yeah, I mean I might do that. Who knows I’ve never even seen anything in iPhones before five so I don’t even know what the other phones look like it was crazy with an iPhone 5 is like the highest operating system it got with iOS 10, so yeah I was honestly surprised how many things were still able to work with that though. I mean heck I was even able to get email on there for a while but yeah.

OK wait, that's not entirely true. I literally tossed my old iPhone 5c into the garbage. Those devices were a joke. Oh, and my iPhone 8 I actually sold to a friend's mother. I still have my old iPhone SE 2020, but all my older iPhone models, I just don't remember what happened to them. Lol

Home button. Therapy on learning to let go and move on. Life is a journey and you can not keep looking back in the past. Just go forward my friend. Long live cats. My 11 pro max, 12 pro and 13 pro gave them to others. 11 pro max, gave it to my friend. She is learning but not happy. My 16 pro max, will go to a lady friend and will get the next phone. Long live cats. PS, Bella said move on and stop saying it but can not help it.

Yeah, I tried that back in 2023. Got an iPhone 15 Pro. I know I've told the story on here quite a few times, but I'll summarize it again for transparency sake. So, got an iPhone 15 Pro. It overheated to the point of bricking. Took it back got a replacement. It also overheated to the point of bricking. Try to take it back, but the Cellular provider told me no, told me I already returned a device, and was simply stuck with this one. Went to a different location, they easily refunded it, and I bought an iPhone SE 2022.

Long live the Home button !!! 😼

I don’t think it’s an issue of people not moving on from using a home button. It’s that it’s actually easier. You only have to use one finger, but just one little tiny button to do what you need to do for the app switcher in home screen. Yes I can deal with the gesture to go home and go to the app switcher but I do think it’s harder. I also have some mild CP in addition to being totally blind, so yeah, this isn’t really the easiest thing to execute. The other things that you could do which I just thought of now is if you wanted to learn how to use voice control with VoiceOver. You can tell the voice control to take you home which I actually may turn that feature back on again because it was kind of hopeful that use my voice to control some of the phone having to swipe everything.

Keep telling yourself that. People still crying over headjack not being in the phone. Long live cats.

If you're not hearing sounds, make sure Voiceover sounds and haptics are turned on.