7 Ways to Make Your Smartphone Easier To Use as You Age

Few things have woven themselves into our daily routines as completely as the smartphone. But as the years go by, small changes in vision, hearing, or dexterity can make tapping, swiping, and reading on a tiny screen a little more frustrating. Fortunately, most smartphones come with built-in accessibility features designed to make them easier to use. Here are simple settings you can adjust to make your device smoother and more comfortable to use — at any age.

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Change Is Inevitable

As we age, it’s normal for vision to become less sharp up close, hearing to become less sensitive, and fingers to become less steady. The good news is that smartphones can adjust to these changes—so you don’t have to struggle just to use your device.

Most of these features live in the “Accessibility” section of your device. But instead of digging through your Settings section, the easiest way is to use the search bar on your home screen or inside “Settings.”

1. Increase Text Size

If you notice yourself holding your phone farther away, bringing it very close to your face, or rereading lines because you lose your place, increasing text size can make reading much more comfortable.

As people enter their 40s and beyond, the eye’s lens gradually loses flexibility, making it harder to focus on close objects — a condition known as presbyopia. Increasing text size reduces eye strain and makes reading feel less tiring.

Text size adjustment usually has a slider that you can drag left or right. On your iPhone, look for Text Size. If it’s not enough, search for Larger Text, tap it, toggle Larger Accessibility Sizes on to access additional text sizes. On your Android, search for Font Size.

You can also bolden the text by toggling Bold Text. Bold text makes letters thicker and darker, which makes them easier to see and reduces the effort your eyes need just to read.

2. Enlarge Buttons and Icons

Sometimes it’s not the words that are hard to see — it’s the buttons that are hard to tap. If you keep pressing the wrong icon or feel like everything is too small, you can enlarge the entire display.

Just search for Display Size on your Android device and move the slider. If you’re using an iPhone, search for Display Zoom and choose Larger Text to make things a bit bigger. This makes icons, buttons, and menus bigger and easier to tap.

Another option is magnification — like a small magnifying glass for your screen that you can turn on only when needed.

On Android, search Magnification, toggle Magnification shortcut, and select the action you want to use to trigger the function.
On the iPhone, search Zoom and toggle it on. Doing so magnifies your entire screen. Move around by dragging three fingers around and double-tap using three fingers to enter and exit Zoom mode.

3. Add Contrast

Another trick is to increase contrast. This makes text and buttons stand out more from the background, making words darker and clearer. This is especially helpful when you’re in bright sunlight, glare, or very bright places like supermarkets or outdoors, where screens can look washed out. Higher contrast makes content easier to see, reducing the need to squint and lowering eye strain.

For iPhones, just search for Increase Contrast and toggle the switch. On an Android, that’s equivalent to toggling High-contrast text.

4. Pair Your Hearing Aids

If you use hearing aids, you can connect them directly to your phone. This allows calls, music, and videos to play directly through your hearing aids, making conversations clearer and easier to hear.

On the iPhone, first ensure that both your hearing aid’s and iPhone’s Bluetooth are turned on. Search for Hearing Devices—your iPhone will automatically search for your device. Tap the device name when it appears. On an Android, search Hearing Devices, Hearing Aids, or Hearing Enhancements, then pair your hearing aids through Bluetooth like you would wireless earphones.

5. Set Up Voice Control

Age-related changes like arthritis, tremors, or hand pain can make tapping and swiping difficult. Voice control allows you to control your phone using your voice instead of your fingers. You can open apps, scroll, go back, type messages, or call someone just by speaking.

On your iPhone, search for Voice Control. On your Android, search Voice Access. Another helpful tool is the built-in voice assistant—Siri (iPhone) or Google Assistant (Android). You can tell them to:

Call someone
Send a message
Set an alarm
Ask for directions
Open an app
Check the weather
Turn on the flashlight (which helps locate it at night!)

If you have smart devices at home, you can also use your voice to turn off lights, adjust the fan or air-conditioning, or lock doors.

6. Reduce Motion and Eye Strain

Reducing motion makes the screen feel steadier because it removes some animations and moving effects. On your iPhone, search Reduce Motion. On Android, search Remove Animations.

If your screen feels too bright, too busy, or makes your eyes tired, you can reduce motion and adjust brightness automatically:

On iPhone, search for Auto-Brightness. This automatically adjusts your screen brightness based on the lighting around you—brighter when you’re outside, and dimmer when you’re in a darker room—so your eyes don’t have to keep adjusting.
On Android, search Extra Dim or Night Light. Extra Dim makes your screen darker than the normal lowest brightness, which is helpful at night. Night Light adds a warm tint to the screen, which can feel gentler on the eyes in the evening.

7. Turn On Captions for Audio and Video

Captions are helpful not only for people with hearing difficulty, but also when:

People are speaking softly

You’re in a noisy place
You don’t want the volume too loud
You’re watching videos with unclear audio

On your iPhone, search Subtitles, then turn on Closed Captions + SDH, which enables closed captions or subtitles when available. On Android, search Live Caption.

Some phones can even automatically caption speech during videos and calls. On Android, Live Caption can automatically caption media and some calls. On iPhone, Live Captions may be available on newer models and in certain languages. Because it relies on on-device intelligence, accuracy may vary.

Let Your Phone Adjust to You and For You

If your phone has started to feel harder to use, it doesn’t mean you’re bad at technology. It usually just means your phone is still set up for the eyes, ears, and hands you had years ago.

Smartphones are smart for a reason—they’re designed to adjust to you.

Once you know which words to search for, a few small changes can make your phone much easier—and much more comfortable—to use every day.

7 Ways to Make Your Smartphone Easier To Use as You Age