Technologies
My Best iPhone Hack: Turn Off Your Camera Control Button for Good. Here’s How
Commentary: I hated the camera control button on my iPhone, so I used these settings to make it entirely decorative.
As a lifelong Apple fan, I was excited to finally upgrade to a newer iPhone after my beloved but worn iPhone 11 died. There’s a lot to like about the newer models, including the iPhone 16, with one major exception. One feature continually harassed me and made my phone difficult to use. Disabling this one feature has made all the difference for me to enjoy using my phone again, and it can for you, too.
Coming from an older iPhone model, I was surprised to see two new buttons on the 16: the action and camera control buttons. The action button is a small button above the volume adjusters. It was introduced with the iPhone 15 Pro models and is a customizable button that can do anything from turning your ringer on to ordering coffee from Dunkin’ to go. It’s small, demure and minds its own business. It’s the camera control button that caused all the chaos.
Camera control is a new button on the iPhone 16 lineup that does what exactly the name suggests: It controls your camera. It’s meant to help you quickly snap photos and serves as a shortcut to launching your camera app. You can slide your finger on a mini settings menu to adjust camera zoom, among other settings. But there’s one true reason for its existence: AI. All of the iPhone 17 models have this button as well.
Like every other tech company, Apple is heavily investing in artificial intelligence. Apple Intelligence has been the driving force behind much of the company’s innovation, with lots of AI updates in the new iOS 26. But there’s no bigger sign of Apple’s deep dive into AI than the camera control button. It’s the physical pathway to Visual Intelligence, a new AI-powered feature that allows you to use your camera to scan objects in the real world to get more information on them. It sounds snazzy, but this is completely pointless to me, and it’s a feature I have never been enticed to use.
There are other use cases for the camera control button, including ways to customize button settings, as my colleagues have found through their testing. But that doesn’t change the fact that my camera control button is so completely annoying.
It’s a long button, about the size of the power button, located on the lower right side of the device. And it’s very, very easy to tap by accident. I’ve opened my camera while putting my phone in my pocket, while I’m driving and using navigation apps and once as I was turning off my phone for the night, which left the camera app open the whole night and drained my phone’s battery.
And if that wasn’t annoying enough, every time I actually intended to open my camera via camera control, it took several taps to do so. Go figure. While I had camera control enabled, my camera roll included stunning shots like these:
My question: What is the point of a button that works when you don’t need it and doesn’t work when you do? There are already three different ways to access your iPhone camera from the lock screen that take  just seconds to use. Camera control is a very expensive and very unreliable addition to the newer iPhones, all for the sake of AI features that many people don’t need or use. And there hasn’t been one moment since I turned camera control off that I’ve missed it.
I realize that my gripes with camera control are minor complaints among what has been an overall positive experience with a new phone. But as an AI reporter, I can’t help but see this as a troubling sign. So many tech companies have overhauled their software and devices to be AI-friendly, whether it’s Google spamming us with Gemini pop-ups in every single Google app, the new Copilot button on Microsoft Windows laptops or Apple’s camera control button.
Tech companies too eager to get on the AI train and haven’t given enough thought to whether those features enhance or just derail our experience using their products. And not enough offer opt-out options. Thankfully for me and my camera roll, Apple does. But I hope in the future, such drastic measures won’t be necessary as companies become more intentional with their AI-enabling features.
If you want to join me in making your camera control button obsolete, navigate to your iPhone settings and select camera. Then, tap camera control. Within camera control, select accessibility, then toggle off camera control. If you’re also experiencing the hyper-sensitivity, you can adjust how many taps (and the pressure needed) to trigger the button in that same accessibility page under light-press force.
For more, check out our hands-on experience with the iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max.
Technologies
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Technologies
U.S., Iran hold separate mediator talks as Mideast oil exports hit war-time high
Iranian and U.S. officials reportedly met separately with mediators Monday to push for a ceasefire, as Middle Eastern crude exports rebounded to war-time high.
Iranian and U.S. officials reportedly met separately with mediators Monday to push for a ceasefire.
Middle Eastern crude exports rebounded this month to around their highest level since the war began in February.
An outright export ban by Washington on diesel would keep roughly 1.2 million barrels a day at home, and risks overwhelming Gulf Coast storage, according to Kpler.
The building of the destroyed Shajareh Tayebeh primary school is pictured surrounded by rubble in Minab in Iran’s Hormozgan province on August 10, 2026. Six months on, a team of AFP journalists obtained rare access to the school which has remained largely in ruins, its collapsed walls and twisted steel now surrounded by portraits of the children killed as Iranian flags flutter above the rubble. Iran says the attack on the school involved two separate US Tomahawk missiles but neither the United States nor Israel has officially claimed responsibility for the strike. (Photo by ATTA KENARE / AFP via Getty Images) /
Atta Kenare | Afp | Getty Images
U.S. and Iranian officials have reportedly held separate indirect talks with mediators on Monday, reviving efforts to end seven months of war as Tehran presses for a response to a revised ceasefire framework and Middle East crude exports climb to their highest level since the conflict began.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi met Qatari mediators in New York, where he remained after the United Nations General Assembly, and reportedly said he expects Washington’s reply by Tuesday. “We talked about ideas and how to find solutions to fulfil Iran’s conditions,” Araghchi said, adding that he planned to return to Tehran once a response arrives. “Whenever the Qataris have a response, they know how to get it to us.”
Iran’s proposal, first presented on the sidelines of last week’s General Assembly, calls for a four- to five-day U.S. timeline to release frozen Iranian funds, lift sanctions on Iranian oil and end the naval blockade of Iranian ports, with nuclear talks beginning within seven days. Tehran has tied any reopening of the Strait of Hormuz to those steps.
President Donald Trump had on Sunday called the plan “unacceptable” and rejected it, telling reporters Iran wants a swift deal because of the economic pressure it is under. Speaking at the White House Monday, Trump said U.S. officials had spoken separately with mediators but gave no further details, adding: “We’re going to win. It’s going to go pretty quickly.”
The diplomatic push comes as physical supply data shows the war’s toll on the oil market easing. Middle Eastern crude exports rebounded this month to around their highest level since the war began in February, Kpler data showed. “Middle East crude exports at just under 80% of pre-conflict levels,” the tracking firm said in a note on Monday.
The Strait of Hormuz itself remains far from normal. Kpler’s real-time tracking showed total clearance through the strait at 10,591 kilobarrels a day on Saturday, against a pre-war baseline of 17,133.
Technologies
Oil prices fall as crude exports recover at Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea ports
Saudi Arabia has restored flows through the pipeline to around 3.5 million barrels per day, according to media reports.
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