Icon Mosaic

Step by step

How to add your new icons to your iPhone, and remove them later

Every custom icon on an iPhone works through a shortcut. Icon Mosaic makes those shortcuts for you, and there are two ways for them to reach your iPhone. Here is each one, tap by tap, where the shortcuts live afterward, and how to take the icons off again.

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Why there are shortcuts at all

Apple lets an iPhone have only one icon of its own for each app. A custom icon is a Home Screen shortcut that opens the app, with a picture of your choice. Since iOS 18, the Shortcuts app can add such icons for you, each with its name and picture, and an icon that only opens an app goes straight to that app. So Icon Mosaic makes one small shortcut for each app, gets them to your iPhone, and a single run of its Add Icons shortcut puts all the icons on your Home Screen.

Way 1: through iCloud, from a Mac

This is the quickest, and it is what Icon Mosaic suggests on a Mac. Your iPhone and Mac need to use the same Apple Account with iCloud turned on for Shortcuts.

  1. Give Icon Mosaic Full Disk Access. The first time, Icon Mosaic asks for it and opens System Settings for you. Turn on Icon Mosaic under Privacy & Security, then Full Disk Access. If your Mac offers to quit and reopen Icon Mosaic, let it: it opens again with your icons just as you left them.
  2. Send Through iCloud. Icon Mosaic adds its shortcuts to the Shortcuts app on your Mac, in a folder named Icon Mosaic.
  3. Wait a minute or two. iCloud brings the shortcuts to your iPhone.
  4. Open the Shortcuts app on your iPhone. Scroll down to the Icon Mosaic folder, below your own shortcuts, and tap Icon Mosaic · Add Icons. In a few seconds your new icons appear on your Home Screen, each with its picture. If it says your shortcuts are still on their way, wait a minute and tap it again. Tap it only once otherwise, since each time it finishes it adds the icons again.
  5. Put them in place. Back on your computer, click I Added the Icons. Icon Mosaic finds the new icons and sets up your first page, and you press Apply to iPhone.

Way 2: one setup shortcut

This works with any Apple Account and needs no Full Disk Access, and it is the way on a Windows PC. It takes one tap for each icon on your iPhone.

  1. Make the setup shortcut. Icon Mosaic makes one shortcut that carries all of your icons. On a Mac, send it to your iPhone by AirDrop or email. On Windows, scan the code Icon Mosaic shows with your iPhone’s camera, then tap Open in “Shortcuts”.
  2. Add it, and run it once. Shortcuts shows the setup shortcut: tap Add Shortcut. When the run button appears, which can take ten seconds or so, tap it. It adds a Finish Setup icon to your Home Screen and tells you what comes next. Tap OK, and then tap Add Shortcut.
  3. Tap Finish Setup on your Home Screen. It is usually on your last page.
  4. Tap Add Shortcut each time Shortcuts asks. That is once for each new icon. When the last one is in, your icons appear on your Home Screen. If you miss one, tap Finish Setup again, and it picks up where it left off.
  5. Put them in place. Click I Added the Icons in Icon Mosaic, and then Apply to iPhone. Once your icons are in, you can delete Finish Setup: touch and hold it, and remove it from your Home Screen.

Where these shortcuts goShortcuts added this way land in All Shortcuts, because Apple does not let anything outside the Shortcuts app choose their folder. To tidy them, tap Select in the Shortcuts app, choose them, and tap Move. On a Mac with Full Disk Access, Icon Mosaic moves the ones it made into its own folder for you.

Removing the icons later

A computer can rearrange your Home Screen, but it cannot delete the icons the Shortcuts app added. Your iPhone deletes them for you when you remove a Home Screen page that holds them, so the trick is to put them all on a page of their own.

  1. Go Back to the Original Icons. In Icon Mosaic, choose it in the More menu, and choose Gather Them to Remove. You can also put every page back the way it was before the theme. Then press Apply to iPhone. The custom icons move to a last page of their own, and your apps take back their places.
  2. Edit your Home Screen pages. On your iPhone, touch and hold the Home Screen until the icons jiggle, then tap the page dots.
  3. Remove the last page. Uncheck it, tap its –, and tap Remove on Remove This Page?
  4. Confirm once more. Your iPhone asks Keep Bookmarks?, because the page holds shortcuts that cannot go to the App Library. Tap Remove again. The custom icons are deleted, and your apps are not.

Rather keep them out of sight? Hide Them in the App Library puts them there instead, to delete one at a time whenever you like. With Full Disk Access on, Icon Mosaic also removes the shortcuts it added for your app icons from the Shortcuts app. Your wallpaper stays as it is: to change it, touch and hold your Lock Screen and swipe to another.

Common questions

Why does Icon Mosaic need Full Disk Access on my Mac?

To send your icons through iCloud, Icon Mosaic adds its shortcuts to the Shortcuts app on your Mac, and macOS only lets an app do that with Full Disk Access. Icon Mosaic only adds and removes shortcuts of its own, whose names begin with Icon Mosaic, never changes yours, and does not open your files, mail, messages or photos. You can turn it off again in System Settings, under Privacy & Security.

Where are Icon Mosaic's shortcuts in the Shortcuts app?

When they come through iCloud, they are in a folder named Icon Mosaic, which the Shortcuts app lists below your own shortcuts. Shortcuts added with the setup shortcut go into All Shortcuts, because Apple does not let anything outside the Shortcuts app choose their folder. You can move them into a folder yourself: tap Select, choose them, and tap Move.

Can I delete the shortcuts after my icons are on the Home Screen?

The setup shortcut can go once your icons are in place, and Icon Mosaic removes it for you when it sent your icons through iCloud. The icons that call, text or FaceTime someone run their shortcuts, so keep those. When you go back to your original icons with Full Disk Access on, Icon Mosaic removes the shortcuts it added that no icon still uses.

How do I delete all of my custom icons at once?

Put them on a Home Screen page of their own, then remove that page. Touch and hold the Home Screen until the icons jiggle, tap the page dots, uncheck the page, tap its minus button and tap Remove, and then tap Remove again when your iPhone asks about its bookmarks and shortcuts. Icon Mosaic's Go Back to the Original Icons gathers them onto their own page for you.

Will removing a page delete my apps?

No. Apps on a removed page stay on your iPhone, in the App Library. Only the custom icons on that page are deleted, which is why it is a good way to remove them.

Do it all on your Mac or PC, in minutes.

Icon Mosaic shows every page of your iPhone’s Home Screen side by side on your computer, so you can drag apps anywhere, sort them by color or from A to Z, make folders, and send the result to your phone in one step.

Download Icon MosaicLearn more about Icon Mosaic

Free to download and try, on a Mac or a Windows PC. A one-time $19 license puts your new layout on your iPhone.

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