One of the changes made by Apple in iOS 7 is the move to single-minute increments when setting event times in the Calendar app, a departure from previous versions of iOS that used 5-minute increments by default. Some users are thankful for the increased precision, but most events and appointments don’t start at odd times, leading to unnecessary scrolling for many users.
Thankfully, you can return to 5-minute increments in the Calendar app with a quick gesture. While creating a new event that’s not “all day” and has a specific start and end time, simply double-tap on the time selector wheel and you’ll see the minute intervals change from 1-minute to 5-minutes. This can make entering appointments just a tad quicker, a time savings that can add up. Check out the video below for a demonstration.
Unfortunately, your change to 5-minute increments won’t persist between the creation of new events. Every time you create or edit another event, iOS will revert back to the single-minute increments. It’s also worth noting that this trick only works in the Calendar app; it doesn’t work with other apps that use a similar time selection mechanism, like the Clock app.
While it still may change before the public launch, it appears that Apple is switching back to 5-minute increments by default for iOS 8. This trick still works in Apple’s upcoming mobile OS, however, and double-tapping will switch to 1-minute increments in that scenario.
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