A screenshot is an easy way to share a portion of your iPhone screen with others, and it’s a feature that iOS makes available across all devices. Whether you have an iPhone X, an iPhone 11 or even a previous-generation model, taking a screenshot is an essential skill to master, and it’s one of the most basic operations on your iOS device.
Depending on your device, the process of capturing a screenshot can vary a bit, but all models of the iPhone from the original release to the latest iPhone 8 and 8 Plus use the same steps to take a screen shot. For the iPhone X, 11, and 12 lines, you simply press and hold the Side button to the right of the screen (for the iPhone SE, it’s the sleep/wake button) and Volume Up button at the same time.
Once you’ve taken a screenshot, it will appear as a tiny thumbnail in the bottom-left corner of your screen. You can swipe the thumbnail to the left to dismiss it or tap on it to edit and share the image.
You can then crop or annotate the image, markup it with digital pen tools, or directly share the image via Messages or other social apps. You can also choose to save the screenshot in your Photos app or iCloud Drive, if you want it stored there permanently.
If you’re having trouble capturing a screen shot on your iPhone, here are some tips to help you get started:
First off, make sure that there’s no other app open in the background. If there is, you might have a lot of interference from the apps you’re trying to capture a screenshot with. You can also try closing the app that’s causing the issue and restarting your iPhone to see if this solves the problem.
Secondly, you can try turning on the AssistiveTouch feature to let your iPhone know that you’d like to capture a screen shot. Located under the Settings menu, AssistiveTouch is a single-tap or double-tap option that lets you take a screenshot on your iPhone without having to touch the home button.
To turn on AssistiveTouch, open your Settings app and go to Accessibility -> Touch -> AssistiveTouch. In AssistiveTouch, choose “Single-Tap,” “Double-Tap,” or “Long Press” to decide how you’d like to take a screenshot on your iPhone with this button.
Once you’ve turned on AssistiveTouch, you can then tap the AssistiveTouch button on any screen you wish to capture a screenshot of. This will allow you to quickly capture a screenshot of any part of your screen.
Once you’ve captured a screenshot on your iPhone, it will appear as a tiny thumbnail at the bottom-left corner of your screen. If you tap the thumbnail, a special editing mode will open. This allows you to easily markup the image, rotate it, or crop it for a different look. You can also share or delete the image, and it will automatically be saved in your Photo library and iCloud Drive, if you choose to save it that way.