Since its release last month, iOS 14 has been allowing iPhone users to express their creativity like never before. Custom widgets and icons have turned the device's once utilitarian homescreen into a canvas, and users have been busy sharing their super-cool setups online.
One designer has enjoyed huge success after sharing his own minimalist icons and widgets on Twitter (below), since revealing that he has earned over $100,000 in under a week. The monochrome designs would fit right in on our best iOS app icons list, and it seems hundreds of iPhone users agree.
Current iOS 14 home screen setup. pic.twitter.com/gtFjRnMkq7September 20, 2020
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The designer, known as Traff, shared in a blog post titled 6 Figures in 6 Days that he quickly packaged the icons and made them available to buy after the overwhelming response to his screenshots. Indeed, the tweet has now received thousands of retweets and over a million impressions.
While many of the custom homescreens we've seen have involved fun, bold even amusingly brash displays of colour (perhaps in response to iOS's usually clean design), Traff's are impressively slick, giving the iPhone its first ever all-monochrome look. We wouldn't be surprised if Apple's software designers themselves have taken note.
The collection includes 120 custom icons (Image credit: Traff)
Priced at $28, the set features 120 custom icons (above), covering apps from Slack to Spotify, via Twitter, Tumblr and tons more. Four colourways are available (black, slate, cobalt, and white), and the set is constantly being updated with new icons.
Traff says the sales truly took off when tech vlogger MKBHD shared a YouTube video (below) featuring his custom homescreen. "The next thing I knew, I was making $28 what felt like every 28 seconds," Traff says. "My phone turned into the ultimate dopamine dispenser (if it wasn't already). I had to disable notifications."
While Traff admits this is a case of "the right content posted at the right time," he is quick to stress that this seemingly overnight success is a culmination of years of hard work – the designer began working on custom icons for jailbroken iPhones as far back as 2013.
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And rather than simply revel in his success, Traff has used the opportunity to share a series of tips for other aspiring software designers. He highlights the importance of publishing often, keeping a schedule and, where possible, charging more. "There's no notion of what an iOS icon set should be priced at," he says. "If I would have asked anyone what to price these at, most would have said $2, or maybe $5."
If you're feeling creative, here's how to install custom icons on iOS 14. And if you're looking for a new device to show off a brand new look, check out today's best iPhone 11 deals below. And don't forget to swing by the Apple Amazon Prime Day sale to see what offers are available.
Daniel John is Senior News Editor at Creative Bloq. He reports on the worlds of art, design, branding and lifestyle tech (which often translates to tech made by Apple). He joined in 2020 after working in copywriting and digital marketing with brands including ITV, NBC, Channel 4 and more.
