Set Up a Phone or Tablet the Whole Family Can Help With

A phone or tablet should make life easier, not harder. With a handful of settings you can make any device easier to see and use, and set things up so a family member can help you from across the country instead of across the kitchen table. Here's the plain-English version.

Make it easier to see and tap

• Turn up the text size. Both iPhone/iPad and Android let you make all text larger under Settings, usually Display or Accessibility. Bump it up until it's comfortable. You can change it again anytime.
• Raise the contrast and brightness for easier reading, and turn on bold text if your device offers it.
• Switch on zoom or magnification so you can enlarge anything on screen with a tap when you need to.

Simplify the home screen

You don't need a hundred apps. Put the five or six you actually use, like phone, messages, camera, weather, and a photos or video-call app, on the first screen, make them large, and move the rest out of the way. A clean first screen clears up most of the confusion. On Android, some phones have a built-in "simple" or "easy" mode that does this for you.

Set up help before you need it

This is the part most people skip, and it's the most useful one.

• Save your emergency contacts and medical info so they're reachable from the lock screen.
• Turn on screen sharing or remote help. Apple's FaceTime and Google's built-in tools let a trusted family member see your screen, with your permission, and walk you through anything in real time. This single feature ends most "I'm stuck" phone calls.
• Write down the passwords for the device and your main accounts and keep them somewhere safe at home, not on the phone itself.

Stay safe while you're at it

A simpler phone is also a safer phone. Turn on automatic software updates, use a screen lock, and learn to spot the scams that target phones and inboxes. We cover those in how to spot and stop scams. And if you're adding smart-home devices, our smart-home guide pairs well with this setup.