For what it’s worth, I use 3D Touch pretty much every day. The number one usage for me is moving the cursor around while editing text. I actually did it while writing this post; I decided I wanted to add a comma after “worth” at the beginning and did so easily with this feature.

This exact function is duplicated by long pressing on the space bar. This has been there since iOS 11, I believe.

So you don't actually need 3D Touch to have the benefit of the awesome cursor UX.

Whaaaat? I'm on my 3rd iPhone and I never found this, I just assumed that Apple was punishing people who wouldn't upgrade to 6s by denying them this feature.

Drag space bar is new in 12, but two finger drag on iPad has been around a bit longer.

It’s a bonus for SE users without force touch. Seems obvious to include this, but I assume the reason they went back and bothered with it is the new XR taking force touch back out.

> but two finger drag on iPad has been around a bit longer

Since iOS 9. Early in the betas this feature existed for non-3D Touch iPhones as well, but then it was removed and restricted to models with 3D Touch.

Fun fact, before Apple so graciously incorporated this feature into their software, it was a tweak you could install after jailbreaking the previous versions of iOS. Same with the "quick reply" from notifications and a dozen other actually useful features. This behavior from Apple reinforced my belief that all they do is absorb other's innovations, make them shiny, and then sell at a ridiculous markup.

I agree with the author that the iPhone is hard to use

To use more charitable marketing speak Apple definitely strongly uses a second mover advantage, maybe with some secret sauce thrown in.

3D Touch is great when it works. But sometimes it just doesn't. I know on my 6S, there are times where 3D Touch stops working until I restart my iPhone. It is so frustrating that it sometimes works/sometimes doesn't and if you push to hard it's another gesture altogether.

Did you get your screen replaced by a third-party? My friend has this same issue and the only thing we can think of is that it's his mall kiosk screen replacement.

No. It happens on two iPhones I have, one has the original screen and the other has had the screen replaced by Apple twice.

I also use 3D touch many times every day. Mainly for mobile payments, example: 1. Pay for bus fare: unlock->find app->3d touch->select "show payment barcode" 2. Instant payment in restaurant: unlock->find app(e.g. wechat)->3d touch->"show payment barcode"/OR "scan barcode" to scan restaurant's bar code for payment

Without 3d touch you need one more step to open the app, and maybe more steps to find menu for payments(depends on apps you use)

edit: just found some apps(not all) provide widget to access features like payment...

Most (all?) 3D Touch actions can be handled by a long-press these days.

Whoa. I just thought to check my train ticket app for 3d touch options and sure enough, I can launch straight to my ticket!

Since iOS12 you can do this by holding the spacebar on devices without 3D touch

That's amazing, thank you. I had no idea this was possible on my iPhone SE. I'm assuming that there is a lot of other things that my phone can do that I am completely ignorant of.

Tried it on my iPhone 8 (by disabling 3d touch). It seems to be a lot less precise for whatever reason. And one issue is also that the swipe always starts at the lowest end of the screen and it's not easily possible to scroll downwards with it, since one starts at the spacebar which is at the very bottom of the screen. With 3d touch one starts the gesture somewhere in the middle of the keyboard, which provides room in every direction.

On devices with 3D Touch you can also press harder to activate text selection, which is something I use daily.

With the spacebar alternative method you can also activate text selection.

Long press does this.

But you are already long-pressing in order to use the cursor?

iPhone X with 3D Touch enables: the space bar longpress worked for me. This is actually more convenient as the 3D Touch hurts my finger and sometimes activates the alternate letter options.

That’s odd. On my iPhone, moving the cursor is activated with long touch, and 3D Touch does nothing...and yet I do have 3D Touch

You need to do 3D touch on the keyboard itself.

This is really great, thank you. I wish Apple’s weird “intuitive” gestures were more discoverable, on both macOS and iOS. They are often good, but they lack the visual hinting that you get from keyboard shortcuts.

I had no idea that existed and it is a game-changer. Thank you!

Ditto. I complain a lot about Apple software lately, but have to admit I'm turning on 3D touch for this.

This is one of the best things I've learned this month! Thank you

The long touch cursor movement is different than the 3d touch cursor movement.

With a long touch, it brings up a loupe that magnifies the text. With 3d touch it lets you use the keyboard almost as a trackpad to move the cursor around.

That's not the full story. From iOS 12 you can do the long touch on the spacebar and get the same functionality as the 3d touch on the rest of the keyboard.

Great for me as 3d touch is so flaky on my iPhone since I got the screen replaced.

I also use it every day, but for apps. Many of the apps I have on my home screen, have "shortcuts", not in the new siri way, but in the "do something/go somewhere quickly in the app" way. I used it to call a person, I use it to open a new tab on Firefox, I use it to add a new todo item, I use it to go to a specific tab on an app. I would be very sad if it goes away at some point..

Samsung manages to include the "shortcut" functionality you mention AND the ability to reorganize apps through a simple long press. Like a commenter above already mentioned, 3D touch was most likely a solution looking for a problem.

Same here. I was really surprised to find that most people don't use/know about/want it.

The ideal scenario imho would be for every interaction to require pressure.

That's a great idea! With a configurable amount of pressure and haptic feedback, preferably.

"3D Touch seems to be the Touch Bar of the mobile world."

No, it is the right-mouse click of touch interfaces.