Send a message or phone a friend from your Today screen with Widget Dial
Time is precious, and every second you can save when you need to make a phone call or send a text message is valuable. App developers recognize this, and there are a number of choices available to put a phone widget right into your Today screen. Widget Dial aims to be the best of these widgets, allowing you to quickly call or message a contact as well as access a keypad.
After you install Widget Dial, you can choose your favorite contacts to show up in the widget. Unfortunately, there is no way to import your favorites from the Phone app on your iPhone, so you have to add them in by hand. Once you’ve got your favorites selected, you should edit your Today screen to enable Widget Dial and then move it so it’s easily accessible.
From the widget, you can make a call by touching your favorite briefly, or send them a text message by pressing and holding the contact until the message screen pops up. Widget Dial works flawlessly for me, allowing me to quickly find the person I want to contact and either call them or send them a text message.
After you’ve been using Widget Dial for a while, you can find your call history in the recents list. This is an excellent way to find someone you’ve called before and call them again.
If you want to dial a number by hand from the widget, a keypad is available to use. You still have to unlock your phone to dial the number, though, so I don’t see any real added benefit to this over simply entering my passcode or using Touch ID and then launching the Phone app.
Widget Dial is available on the App Store for $0.99, and requires iOS 8.0 or later. The app does not use in-app purchases, so your $0.99 will get you Widget Dial’s entire set of features without any hidden costs.
