Many people throw away or recycle their old iPhones when they upgrade to new models. Others leave their old devices sitting in drawers for years. Instead of letting your outdated smartphone go to waste, give it another life with one of these four new uses for old iPhones.
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Turn It Into a Cool Clock
Image via iTunes
Instead of throwing out your old iPhone, you can turn it into a cool clock for your home. All you need is a great clock app that will keep time and add a decorative element to a room. Some useful examples include Standard Time, Wake Alarm Clock, and Rise. These apps have attractive backgrounds and diverse alarm tones to match your preferences.
Alarmy is an excellent option for people who have difficulty getting out of bed in the morning. The alarm will not stop until you take a picture of a specific room. For instance, you can set it to recognize your bathroom sink. The alarm will not go off until you take a picture of the sink. No matter how much you want to sleep in, Alarmy will make sure you roll out of bed.
Fill It With Music and Take It on the Road
Your iPhone probably already has iTunes installed on it, so you can fill it with music and keep it in your car to enjoy your favorite tunes everywhere you go. Deleting contacts and old apps will give you plenty of space for music and podcasts.
If your car has an iPhone docking port, keeping it plugged in will make sure your old device always has enough battery power for long drives. You can also get an attachment that plugs into your car’s cigarette lighter.
Since you may leave the old smartphone in your car much of the time, you should reset your iPhone to remove any personal information such as account passwords, credit card numbers, and contacts. If you leave that information on your phone, a thief could steal your identity as well as your music library.
Use It for Home Surveillance
Your old iPhone can become a part of your home surveillance system once you install the right app. Presence is a good app for homeowners who want to turn their old smartphones into surveillance systems without spending much money. The app uses your aging iPhone’s camera to monitor rooms in your home. It even accesses your device’s speakerphone feature so you can take advantage of two-way video calls, which comes in handy when you’re talking to a family member or yelling at a pet that’s jumped on the couch.
You can make your iPhone even more powerful by pairing it with window, door, motion, and water sensors. If anything happens in your home, the monitors will alert you through your current device. You can then access footage from your old phone’s camera to see what’s going on.
The Presence app is free, but you will have to pay for the sensors you want to use. The free app comes with 50MB of cloud storage. Upgrading to the paid version gives you 5GB of storage space. If you want to use motion sensors, you’ll need the paid version.
Create a Remote Control for Your Entertainment System
Most of today’s entertainment systems and streaming media players offer remote control apps that you can install on your smartphone. If you lose your remote, you can always download the app and use your phone instead of buying a replacement.
You can turn your old iPhone into a dedicated remote by deleting all of the files and installing the app of your choice. You can also add a VooMote Zapper to your iPhone to make it a universal remote that can control any device in your home.
Don’t let your old iPhone end up in a junk drawer or landfill. You may not want to carry it everywhere you go, but it’s still a useful piece of technology. You just have to know what to do with it.