Apple has a rich history of bringing creativity through its suite of innovative apps. Across various domains like photography, productivity, and entertainment, Apple consistently sets the bar for developers globally with its groundbreaking apps.
Whether it’s design, functionality, or integration, Apple apps usually tick all the boxes, creating immersive and interactive user experiences. Carrying the same legacy, in Apple WWDC 2022, the company announced Freeform – A Virtual collaboration app. Let’s find out what’s Freeform App in iPhone.
Although the app was announced alongside the latest iOS, iPadOS, and macOS Ventura, the official release came with iPadOS 16.2, iOS 16.2, and macOS Ventura 13.1.
Let’s explore the Freeform app, its feature, and use cases and determine whether it can be a valuable productivity tool.
What Is Freeform App In iPhone?
Freeform is a whiteboard app enabling users to jot down notes, save them, and easily share them with friends or colleagues. It provides an ideal platform for gathering inspiration and organizing ideas in one place. However, it’s not your regular notepad where you write information and save it. So what makes it different?
Think of Freeform as a virtual room where people can discuss topics and exchange ideas using a whiteboard and marker. As a smartphone app, it goes beyond this analogy, providing numerous features.
With Freeform, you can incorporate various elements like sticky notes, text boxes, shapes, geometry, stamps, pen, and pencil tools. The app provides an infinite blank canvas, allowing you to arrange and replace items freely, add relevant information and more.
Moreover, you can insert images from Files, web links, document scans, camera captures, or media stored in your Photos library, making it a comprehensive and creative tool for gathering inspiration and organizing ideas.
Freeform App Features:
Freeform app is much like the Notes app, with a couple of important tweaks. Here are some key features of the app:
1. Collect Ideas:
Consider Freeform as an online whiteboard where you can include any file without worrying about layouts or page sizes. Think of an idea? Launch the app and note it down.
2. Work Simultaneously:
Collaborate in real-time by sharing the board with others and inviting them to work together. Also, there is an option to initiate a FaceTime without getting off the board, in case you want to explain something face-to-face.
3. Drawing Tools:
The Drawing Tool in Freeform allows you to unleash your creativity freehand. You can easily draw and write, adjusting the line’s thickness, transparency, colour, and more.
4. Sync With Apple Devices:
All the Freeform boards you save in iCloud, and any modifications you make to them will automatically synchronize across all your Apple devices when you’re logged in with the same Apple ID.
How To Use The Freeform App?
Freeform enables you to transform your ideas into visual form, allowing you: to expand them with as much information as you desire and easily share them with others.
As mentioned before, the app was included in iOS 16.2, meaning if you are using the latest iOS version on your phone, likely, Freeform is already available for you to use.
1. Enable Freeform:
If you have iOS 16.2 or a newer version installed but can’t find Freeform in your app drawer, don’t worry! You can easily locate it by using the app library search option.
Simply swipe down on your screen to access the search bar. Keep in mind that Freeform is part of the iOS package, so you might need to enable it in your phone settings. Follow these steps to do so:
- Launch the Phone Settings by tapping on the gear icon.
- Tap on your Apple ID and then select iCloud.
- In the APPS USING iCloud section, tap “Show All.”
- Scroll down to find the Freeform app and toggle it on to enable it.
Freeform should now be visible in your app drawer and ready to use.
2. Understand The Layout:
Upon launching the app for the first time, you may see some introductory slides that explain the app’s capabilities. After clearing through these slides, you’ll find yourself on a white, empty board where you can add elements and ideas.
At the top of the screen, several options are available to you:
- Back – Use this option to navigate to your workspace to access all your saved notes and projects.
- Share – This option allows you to share the current slides with friends or invite them to join your collaborative session.
- Options – Within this menu, you can perform various tasks like creating a duplicate of the slide, renaming it, searching for specific elements, marking it as a favourite, exporting it as a PDF, or printing it.
- Edit – Use this option to make changes and edit the current element you are working on within the slide.
3. Create A New Board:
When you launch the app, you’ll find 4 options – All Boards, Recents, Shared, and Favourites. Take the steps to create a new project/board:
- Tap on New Board at the bottom of the screen.
- You can start working on the board by adding notes, drawings, shapes, and more.
- You can tap the 3 dots icon on top and assign a name to the board. Also, you can go back to the main menu, tap and hold the board, and tap Rename.
4. Freeform Editing Tools:
After creating the board, you can start adding elements to it. Remember that Freeform is a vector-based app, meaning you can freely place elements wherever you want and resize them without losing the quality. You’ll see five tools on the bottom of the screen – a text box, sticky notes, shapes, drawing tools, and attachments.
Let’s see what you can do with each:
1. Text Box
A text box is where you can write information. Here are the things you can do with it:
- To add a text box to the board, click on the A icon in the middle of the toolbar.
- Once you have positioned the text box at your desired place, double-tap it to start writing.
- To make changes to the text, tap the text box once, and a menu will appear at the bottom, allowing you to modify the text colour, alignment, size, style (bold/italic), and fonts.
- Additionally, you can tap the Options icon, which enables you to copy the current text style and apply it consistently throughout your project, lock it in place, create a duplicate, and more.
2. Sticky Notes:
Tapping left most icon on the bar places a yellow sticky note on the board where you write information through text input.
While working on a big plan, Sticky notes can come in handy as placeholders where you can gather all the data relevant to a particular topic in one place. Here are the options you have:
- Tap the Aa button on the left to change the size of the text.
- The next option allows you to make the texts bold, italic, underlined, or strikethrough.
- You can also change alignment and add bullet points to the sticky notes.
- Tapping the sticky note once will bring out more editing options, allowing you to change the colour of the sticky note, format texts, make a duplicate, lock the place, copy style, or delete the note.
- Remember, there is an Undo icon located at the top-left that you can use to revert the most recent action.
3. Shapes:
Shapes allow you to add 2D and 3D designs to your board, such as geometric shapes, animals, nature, random objects, etc. According to Apple, there are approximately 700 shapes available to play with.
- Tap the second icon on the tray to bring out the options.
- You can the search option to find what shape you are looking for or browse through the available options.
- You can position the shape at your desired place, change the colour, create copy, or delete it.
4. Drawing Tools:
The 4th icon on the tray reveals several markup tools, including a pen, pencil, sketch, eraser, crayon, and more. These tools are similar to what we see in the notes app, except for the ruler and highlighter.
You can use any of these tools on the board wherever you like. Additionally, you can customize the brush stroke, colour, and opacity according to your preferences.
Markup tools offer you the freedom to express and explain things uniquely. Whether you’re giving a presentation or attending an online class, these tools will be very useful.
5. Attachments:
You can also attach your media to the board by tapping the last icon on the list. There are options to take a picture, scan a document, insert a link, or add photos/videos from a specific location on your phone. These attachments can be placed anywhere you desire within the board.
You can integrate relevant visual information into your work by incorporating attachments, such as Maps, website links, contact numbers, and more.
- You can resize the photo by holding and dragging the image at one corner.
- Tapping the image will allow you to change image size, replace, crop, create a duplicate, delete, etc.
- Hitting the Options icon will reveal further editing options such as adding shadows, rounding corners, constraining proportions, and adding descriptions, as well as the usual cut, copy, and paste functionalities.
5. Share/Invite:
The core and essential aspect of Freeform is its sharing feature, which allows you to collaborate and work on the same idea in real time.
According to Apple, Freeform allows up to 100 individuals to work simultaneously on the same board. Furthermore, you can engage in FaceTime conversations with anyone directly from Freeform while continuing to work on the board.
Here is what you can do to invite people to your board:
- Tap the Share icon on the top of the screen.
- Before inviting people, you can choose who you want access to make edits on the board.
- You can also decide whether you want others to have the authority to invite additional people to join the board.
- Next, choose the preferred sharing method from the menu that appears to share your board with others.
The invited members only need to click the provided link and accept the invitation, after which they can access the board from any Apple device.
Is Freeform Useful?
Whether at your desk or on a bus, you can always start working on your project or a collaborative one with Freeform. Note down your instant ideas and share them with others.
Moreover, With the capability to accommodate up to 100 collaborators on the same board, Freeform creates a shared and creative space for group projects or brainstorming. Users can easily drag a Freeform board into a Messages thread, and all members of that thread will be instantly invited to collaborate.
Moreover, Freeform’s integration with FaceTime makes it an ideal app for sharing presentations, conducting meetings, or participating in online classes. The icing on the cake is that all data created in Freeform is automatically saved to iCloud, meaning you can access the boards across multiple devices.
Whether planning a romantic getaway with a partner or pitching a business idea to friends, Freeform provides the tools and freedom to accomplish these tasks efficiently. And the best part is that all of this functionality comes free of charge!
While testing the app, I found the Freeform app iPad to be more convenient than iPhone, mainly due to the additional screen space and the ability to use Apple Pencil.
Frequently Asked Questions:
Yes. Freeform app comes pre-installed as a part of the iOS 16.2 and higher package and is free to use.
Freeform comes preinstalled on iPhone, but you can delete it if you don’t want it. Press the app icon, then hit Remove App and Delete App when prompted.
Freeform provides you with a whiteboard to jot down your ideas or theories to be shared with other people. The app has a collaboration feature where you can share your board with up to 100 people and work simultaneously.
Jamboard is the best Freeform alternative for Android devices. The app integrates well with Google Search and Google Workspace. You can use Jamboard in a browser, through the app, or during a Google Meet call.
There is no need for the Freeform app download on Mac. It is available in every Mac running Ventura 13.1 or higher.
Freeform is available on any device running iOS 16.1 or higher, meaning you can use it on including the 14, 13, 12, X, and 8 series and the iPhone SE 2nd and 3rd generation.
Final Word:
Freeform provides a near-perfect whiteboard experience, allowing you to collect information and ideas seamlessly in a single place. Adding elements to the board automatically expands, providing you with virtually limitless space to work with.
For those who depend on the Apple ecosystem for their work, Freeform is an invaluable tool for meetings, presentations, or engaging in productive brainstorming sessions.
I am an engineer by education, tech writer by profession, and a motor sport fan by heart.