Shortcuts is a stock app that allows you string together actions to do any task you need to do. They’re called “shortcuts”. Then, you can call these shortcuts from anywhere - Siri, the lock screen, the Home Screen, a back tap on the phone… What is really nice is that many apps add their own actions to Shortcuts, so you can have access to their resources or control them in anyway you need do.

An example: I made a shortcut called It’s time to run”. Whenever I step outside, and I’m ready to jog, all I’ve got to do is say, “it’s time for a run” (while holding the power button) and my iPhone will immediately

• start a workout on my watch

• choose a random address from my “running locations” notes and give the directions to run there

• Start tracking “Running” to time tracking app, Toggl (I like to track how I spend my time)

• Set the volume to 0

• Shuffle my running playlist and play it

• Slowly automatically crank up the volume as I get running

Then, when I come back home, my iPhone automatically runs a location based shortcut to stop my time tracking and log that I ran that day with my habit tracking app.

It’s easy to link all these half a dozen apps together with one tap of the finger or spoken word.

If you want to do more complicated things, you can, too. A few months ago, I saw someone make a shortcut that they could activate while in Photos to quickly send the photo they were looking at to an external AI so it’ll tell them what car model they were looking at. I’ve seen shortcuts to download YouTube videos right in Safari, some to schedule WhatsApp or iMessage messages. It’s limitless (and you can share shortcuts too).

No coding is required. All you need to do is drag a few actions and link them together. It’s like playing with virtual Legos.

There is also Shortcuts for macOS and iPadOS, watchOS, and all the shortcuts you create on one device are generally usable on other devices.

There’s doesn’t exist a mechanism in Android that comes close to Shortcuts.