One of the best new features is standby mode

apple’the big iOS 17 update for iPhone is coming this fall. I’ve been testing the beta version for the past few weeks, and while there’s no shortage of new features, my favorite is called StandBy. It turns your iPhone into a night clock to look at, though it’s much better than a regular alarm clock.

This requires a phone with MagSafe, which means you’ll need an iPhone 12 or newer.

Standby can do all kinds of things. For example, you can get out of bed and swipe to see upcoming calendar events, swipe to check the weather for the day, or view notifications right away. Or, if you’re more of a traditionalist, you can just leave it on the nightstand, displaying different dials.

It works well on your desk too. Users can set the standby mode to display a rotating array of photos from an image library, similar to smart home hub devices from Amazon or Google. And whether your phone is on your nightstand or on your desk, you can always say, “Siri, how long will it take me to get to work?” Or, “Siri, turn off the bedroom lights and put on some Miles Davis music.”

You also don’t have to worry about a bright screen. Your iPhone will automatically dim the screen or turn off the display when you turn off the light. And Apple borrowed a feature from the Apple Watch Ultra: there’s a special night mode that changes the clock, calendar and text to red for less eye strain.

You can also enable notifications that show detailed information from your apps. In my example above, UPS tells me that my garden gloves can arrive around noon.

Standby mode works best with the iPhone 14 Pro, which has an always-on display. If you have a different model, the screen turns off, but you can quickly turn it back on with one tap.

Pro tip if you’re interested in using this feature when it rolls out to everyone this fall: buy a MagSafe charger stand to keep your iPhone next to your bed while charging. I use something similar to this $40 Anker stand that charges your AirPods at the same time.

You can wait until iOS 17 is available to everyone, or if you want to work out some system bugs now, you can try it out in the public beta version of iOS 17. Once you’ve installed it, just:

• Open Settings on your iPhone.
• Click Standby.
• Turn it on.
• Select Always On under Display if you don’t want your screen to turn off. It works on iPhone 14 Pro and Pro Max.
• Select “Night Mode” if you want the text to have a red tint.
• Choose whether you want to see notifications.

Then, when you go to bed, simply place your iPhone on the charging stand in landscape or sideways mode and it will automatically remember to put it to sleep and show you the last screen you used, whether it’s the clock, photo gallery or calendar.

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