So, you want to make Dynamic Island do something, right? Or simply show it off to someone curious about it. But how do you activate Dynamic Island when you want? Well, this post will help you with this.

The new Dynamic Island feature is one of the main driving factors behind the staggering iPhone 14 Pro sales lately. It’s Apple’s take on hiding the notch on the new iPhone 14 Pro and Pro Max. And it does look great, so much so that you often want to activate and use it.

The iPhone 14 Pro models feature a 30% smaller notch, allowing for more screen real estate. Instead of stopping at the slightly smaller notch, Apple decided to blur the lines between hardware and software using Dynamic Island, which overlays a software pill over the display cutout so that you can interact with it and view ongoing notifications and alerts. But many users around the world have been reporting that they are unable to use the Dynamic Island feature. Well, read below to find ways to activate and use Dynamic Island on your iPhone 14 Pro and Pro Max.

Why won’t Dynamic Island do anything?

Dynamic Island is designed to look like your camera cutout and thus it remains static until you have an app working in the background that can actually use the feature and its notification system. Dynamic Island is supposed to aid multi-tasking by minimizing the time you spend switching between apps. Remember how the only way to track timers, music, deliveries and more was by either opening the dedicated app or by using dedicated widgets? Well, now all these activities directly show up in Dynamic Island. This helps you focus on the task at hand while ensuring that you do not have to switch apps or visit your home screen to track ongoing activities. 

However, if you do not have any background activities going on, then your Dynamic Island will be static and won’t do anything. It is likely that you’re facing a similar issue as you haven’t used a supported app with background activity to fully utilize Dynamic Island on your new iPhone 14 Pro or Pro Max. 

How to activate Dynamic Island?

You can test and activate Dynamic Island by using any app with supported background live activity that can be shown in Dynamic Island. Use the section below to help you use a supported app to test Dynamic Island on your iPhone 14 Pro or Pro Max. 

Use a Supported app

We recommend you start by using a stock app that supports Dynamic Island. This will help you verify its functionality and activate and use it as intended. Use the steps below to help you along the way. 

Open the Clock app on your iPhone and tap Timer at the bottom.

Set any timeer you like on your iPhone by swiping on the numbers. We will set a timer of 15 minutes for this guide. 

Once you’re done, tap Start.

The timer will now start on your iPhone 14 Pro or Pro Max. Swipe up from the bottom to close the Clock app on your iPhone. Your timer should now move to your Dynamic Island and you should be able to track it using the same. 

Tap and hold on your Dynamic Island to view a larger widget for your timer. You can now tap the Pause icon to pause the timer.

You can also tap the X directly from the Dynamic Island to dismiss the current timer. 

And that’s how you can use a supported app to activate Dynamic Island on your iPhone 14 Pro or Pro Max.

Supported App List

Here’s a list of apps that currently support Dynamic Island. If you use either of these apps, you should be able to track ongoing background activities on your iPhone 14 Pro or Pro Max using Dynamic Island.

  • Apple Maps
  • Apple Pay
  • Apple Music
  • Clock
  • Phone
  • FaceTime
  • Wallet
  • Voice memos
  • Shortcuts
  • AirDrop
  • Focus
  • Battery levels and charging
  • Connected devices like AirPods
  • Lyft
  • Flighty
  • Apollo
  • Hit the Island
  • Audible
  • NPR One
  • Overcast
  • Spotify
  • Amazon Music
  • Pandora
  • YouTube Music
  • SoundCloud

In addition to these apps, the following system alerts and background activities will also show up in Dynamic Island on your iPhone 14 Pro and Pro Max.

  • Live Activities
  • On-going calls (Voice and Video)
  • SharePlay activities
  • Timers
  • Voice Memos
  • Screen Recordings
  • Personal Hotspot
  • Mic and Camera indicators
  • NFC interactions 
  • Silent Switch toggle
  • Airplay
  • Bluetooth accessories
  • Focus mode changes
  • Airdrop
  • Sim card alerts
  • Find My network alerts
  • Face ID
  • Apple Pay
  • CarKey
  • Low Battery alerts
  • Charging alerts

All these system alerts and apps will show up in your Dynamic Island which should help you activate and use the same on your iPhone 14 Pro and Pro Max.

When will other apps support Dynamic Island?

Third-party apps should soon start supporting Dynamic Island with future updates. This feature is quite new and third-party app developers are getting accustomed to and using Dynamic Island. Many apps will have to come up with new ways to interact with Dynamic Island which can take some time. You can expect to see many third-party apps support Dynamic Island by the end of this year.

We hope this post helped you easily activate and use Dynamic Island on your iPhone 14 Pro and Pro Max. If you face any issues or have any more questions for us, feel free to reach out using the comments below.