For those of us with kids who use our iPhones and iPads, one of the main complaints has always been finding a way to make sure they stay in the app you set them up with. Here's how to use Guided Access to do just that.
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How to use Guided Access to restrict users to a single app on your iPhone or iPad

Dec 4th 2014 by

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For those of us with kids who use our iPhones and iPads, one of the main complaints has always been finding a way to make sure they stay in the app you set them up with.  However, kids are curious, and many are far more accomplished iOS users than their parents.  In addition, iPads are flooding the service industries.  With iPads located in Airports, restaurants and even waiting rooms, it can be challenging to keep customers from “exploring” areas of these devices meant to be for the administer’s eyes only.

Luckily, Apple has a reasonably easy solution–although, it may be one of the best kept secrets in the iOS settings.  Ever since iOS 6, iPhone and iPad owners have had the ability to temporarily restrict their device to a particular app for as long as they wish.

Here’s how to set up, manipulate and end a Guided Access session on your iOS device.  First open your Settings app on your device.

Settings–>General–>Accessibility–>Guided Access

At this point, you have three options available

  • You can turn Guided Access on or off
  • Determine whether a device is allowed to go into sleep mode during the session
  • Set a passcode to control the settings of Guided Passcode, preventing the user from leaving the app

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Start a Guided Access session 

After you have turned Guided Access on in the Settings, you must now open the app you want to keep the user focused on.  To so this, the default launching action is to triple-press the Home button.  When you do, your screen will look like this…

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Additionally, if there are any areas of the screen you would like to be disabled to the front-facing user, you can now circle them with your finger, and they will become shaded grey.  Furthermore, at this point you can re-size the shaded area, or dismiss it altogether.

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Lastly, you can also indicate that you would like the device to ignore all screen touches, and/or  turn off motion to keep your iOS device from responding to changing the in orientation or other movement while being used.

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How to end a Guided Access session

To terminate a Guided Access session simply triple-press the home button once again, and enter the passcode that you entered (if you chose to in the beginning).

 

 

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