Jan 3, 2020

2020: Home Screen

#home-screen

I missed doing this for the past couple years, but starting again. Here are the 2016 and 2017 posts.

Note: these screenshots were originally inspired by M.G Siegler, so check out his home screen also.

2020

2020 home screen

  • The top half remains pretty much the exact same. Clock, Settings, Safari, 1Password, Photos, News, Music, Podcasts, Maps, Swarm, and Phone are almost exactly in the same locations.
  • The Home Row is also the same. I still love TIckTick as my TODO app and Calendar, Messages, and Notes are still the most convenient to use.
  • YouTube is gone. It's still on the second screen hidden inside an "Entertainment" folder, and I can verify that I usually forget it's there. As much as I hate to admit it, most of the time, I land on a YouTube video through an in-app browser.
  • I'm a bit surprised that the Health folder is still there. I seem to remember not having that on the Home screen in the last couple years, so either it went away and came back or I have a bad memory. If you look closely though, the apps inside the Health folder have some changes.
    • There's the 10 Percent meditation app, which is an incredibly rich featured app with all sorts of Meditation guides and tips and tricks that I use as a timer for Transcendental Meditation.
    • There's WaterMinder, which I saw featured in the App Store and I use more on my Watch to track drinks of water. I've only been using it for a couple weeks, but it's been pretty painless to use.
    • There's the Oura Ring app that pairs with the ring I wear to sleep at night. The scores from this app and the Gyroscope health score have been surprisingly useful to gauge how well I'm taking care of myself.
    • Lastly, I've switched from the Strong app to Fitbod, which generates workouts for you on the fly based on your history. It's been a great way to show up at the gym without having to prepare something in advance, which is what I used to do with Strong.
  • The Transportation folder is a grab bag and most of it doesn't need to be on the home screen, but I do use the Transit app and Uber fairly often. Transit is one of the best-designed apps I've used.
  • I have a special PWA folder becuase I'm currently interested in web apps that can be used like native apps, and these are all the apps I could find that are configured to be used as standalone apps.
  • I've put Day One front and center (again?), and I use it a bit sporadically. I still find myself hesitating to journal, but I do enjoy reading old notes, so I think I'll continue with it.
  • Amisha and I just subscribed to New York Times both to support journalism and to get used to staying up-to-date in a more formal sense, so that's front and center also.

There's not much else that's too interesting here. I'm wondering how much longer I'll stick with Gmail though. It's a great app, but I've considered switching to Fastmail more than once. Maybe in 2020 or 2021 you'll see that go away.

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