Normally, whenever you get a phone call or FaceTime call, the incoming call alerts are shown as a small banner across the top of the screen when the iPhone is in use or unlocked.
If you’ve been an iPhone user for long, you might recall that earlier versions of iOS had incoming iPhone calls take up the full screen, making them very obvious and impossible to miss.
If you happen to prefer the old style full screen incoming call display, perhaps because you’re missing calls or just don’t care for the banner, you can easily change that in the settings to return to the old style.
And of course you can change it back again to the modern default of showing as a compact banner that can be dismissed with a swipe.
Here’s how to go about it.
How To Set Incoming iPhone Calls To Appear As Full Screen
- Open the Settings app on your iPhone.
- Scroll down and tap Phone.
- Hit Incoming Calls.
- Select Full Screen.
After following the above steps, call alerts on your iPhone should appear as a full screen and you should see the following options:
- Large green call accept button
- Large red call decline button
- Contact profile photo on the entire screen (if you have set it)
- Remind me later button
The only downside to this is you can’t dismiss the incoming call by swiping it away.
You can however still instantly send the call to voicemail by double tapping the power button or tapping the Decline button on screen.
Note: If you want to revert to the small banner style call alert, follow the above steps but this time select Banner instead of Full Screen.
Advantages Of Displaying iPhone Calls In Full Screen
1) If you happen to have small hands, it may be difficult to reach the small call banner while using the phone with one hand. This is because the banner stays at the top of the screen.
2) Some people may have difficulty seeing the small banner, contact name in small font size, and hitting the miniature call accept or decline buttons. So, if you’re setting up an iPhone for your parents, grandparents, and such, this small change will ensure they can pick up calls comfortably.
3) A visually impaired person may not be able to identify and tap the small accept or decline buttons due to other elements present nearby on the screen. A full-screen call interface removes this confusion, making everything more distinguishable.
4) The small phone call banner shows the contact profile picture as a tiny thumbnail. So if you want to see the person’s photo on the whole screen when they call, you’ll have to use the full-screen call banner.
Whichever call display setting you want to use is entirely up to you and your preferences.
It should be noted that the change will apply to all incoming calls to the iPhone, whether from a phone call, a FaceTime call, or even third party apps that have voice calling features like WhatsApp, Skype, Telegram, or Signal.
