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Samsung Galaxy Note 4 Tips & Tricks

The Samsung Galaxy Note 4 is a pretty powerful smartphone. It’s packed with amazing functionality and sports some of the best hardware on the market.

With that in mind it’s easy to miss a lot of the cool features it offers up, so here are our top ten tips and tricks to get the most out of your Note 4.

Tip 1: Air wake-up

Typically you can fire up the Note 4 with a press of the home button or the power button, but dip into the Dexterity and interaction menu to switch on ‘Air wake up’.

Air wake-up 1 Air wake-up 2 Air wake-up 3

Then when your phone’s on a table you can light up the screen to check the time, your steps or your notifications with a simple wave of the hand.

Settings > Accessibility > Dexterity and interaction

Tip 2: Dynamic lock screen

If you tire of the same old lock screen, the Note 4 has the tools to spruce things up.

Dynamic lock screen 1 Dynamic lock screen 2 Dynamic lock screen 3

When picking a new lock screen wallpaper you have the ability to choose from real-time weather info or your gallery. Here you can choose exactly which images you want to cycle on your Note’s display, how often they cycle and whether you’d like any animations or transitions.

Settings > Display and wallpaper > Wallpaper > Lock screen > Live weather/From Gallery

Tip 3: Disable Flipboard Briefing

The Note 4’s answer to HTC’s Blinkfeed is called Flipboard Briefing and by default it’s a home screen swipe away. Whilst some might appreciate the content it pulls in, those that don’t can disable it.

Flipboard Briefing 1 Flipboard Briefing 2 Flipboard Briefing 3

Pinch together on your homescreen, tap ‘Home screen settings’ and finally untick the box by the Flipboard Briefing option. Then you can cycle your home screens into eternity.

Tip 4: Easy mode

As with many Samsungs, if the TouchWiz interface is a little too convoluted for your tastes, Easy mode is the perfect remedy.

Easy mode 1 Easy mode 2 Easy mode 3

Head into the Settings, toggle ‘Easy mode’ and click ‘Done’ to simplify the look and feel of your Note. You can reverse the process using the same method too.

Settings > Easy mode

Tip 5: One-handed operation

The Note 4 is a big phone so as much as we love its 5.7-inch Quad HD panel, sometimes we don’t want to have to use two hands to operate it.

One-handed 1 One-handed 2 One-handed 3

Thankfully there are a ton of options for one-handed use, including reducing the screen size as a whole with a swipe in, swipe out gesture, offset keyboards or number pads in apps and a floating side-key panel which you can reposition and customise to suit your needs.

Don’t forget that you can also shrink applications by swiping from the top corners for true multi-tasking too.

Settings > Display and wallpaper > One-handed operation

Tip 6: Ultra power saving mode

There’s a pretty impressive, fast-charging 3220mAh battery in the Note 4 that should give you two days of general use on a charge, but if you want to stretch battery life much, much further the ultra power saving mode will dumb things down to guarantee you’ve got charge up to two weeks (based on a fully charged battery and dependant on usage).

UPS 1 UPS 2 UPS 3

You can also customise the screen with a handful of extra apps that you may still want to access whilst in this low power mode, just remember they’ll all be in greyscale.

Settings > Power saving > Ultra power saving mode

Tip 7: Wireless charging

Whilst this feature isn’t enabled out-the-box, the Galaxy Note 4 is capable of charging wirelessly.

Wireless charging

Using either Samsung’s official Qi-enabled S View cover or Fonesalesman’s N4 PWRcard, you can tap into the power of wireless charging, arguably giving you a cooler and more convenient method of keeping your Note 4 juiced up.

Tip 8: Private mode

If you’d rather keep those personal pics or embarrassing tunes away from prying eyes without having to lock off your phone completely, Private Mode lets you select content from the Gallery, Video, Music, Voice Recorder, My Files (file browser) and S Note apps so that they remain hidden during the phone’s normal operation.

Privacy mode 1 Privacy mode 2 Privacy mode 3

Access is only possible by use of a pin, password or fingerprint, so you can rest easy knowing that ‘Hit Me Baby One More Time’ is a track that you and only you can get at.

Settings > Private mode

Tip 9: Increased touch sensitivity

If like us you’re accustomed to colder climes, operating your smartphone’s touchscreen with gloves on may be a frequent, but awkward occurence.

Thankfully the Note 4 boasts an increased touch sensitivity mode so you can swipe in the snow without getting frostbite on your digits. Just tap the ‘Increase touch sensitivity’ option in the Display and wallpaper menu.

Settings > Display and wallpaper > Increase touch sensitivity

Tip 10: Heart-rate sensor as a shutter key

It should come as no surprise that snapping a selfie on such a big device can be a bit tricky, but flipping to the front-facing camera automatically turns the Note 4’s heart rate sensor into a secondary hardware shutter.

Heart rate shutter key

Just hold you finger over the sensor when you’re ready to take a snap.

Read next: Samsung Galaxy Note 4 Review: In-Depth

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