Over the years, the iPhone has evolved into the perfect everyday carry gadget. You could always make phone calls or text with it, but now you can record high-quality videos using its industry-leading camera system or play AAA titles like “Death Stranding” on the go. Despite the hardware continually improving, it’s the software that unlocks most of what the iPhone lets you do.

The App Store is home to almost two million apps, and it’s pretty easy to find a tool that does exactly what you’re looking for. Anything your iPhone can’t do out of the box, third-party app developers have likely already built a solution for it. That said, as time has passed, Apple’s own library of apps and services has grown. 

The iPhone comes preloaded with essentials like Phone, Messages, Camera, and Clock — but it also has a handful of lesser-known apps tucked away on other pages. Some of them are mundane productivity-oriented offerings like Keynote, Pages, or Numbers — but we’re about to highlight five interesting apps by Apple you should try using on your iPhone.

As our lives continue to move online, the number of credentials we create and manage also keeps on increasing. Using the same password across all your accounts is a terrible idea — but so is jotting them down on a piece of paper or an unencrypted notes app. There are several password managers out there, but if you primarily use Apple devices, you don’t need to chip in extra for a subscription to a third-party service anymore. The built-in Passwords app acts as a secure vault where you can store your login details.

Starting with iOS 18, any password you save will be automatically added to the Passwords app. It can also help you create stronger passwords. Saved credentials will then pop up when you try logging in to a website or app on your iPhone. You might need to enable Password AutoFill for this to work. To do so, navigate to Settings > General > AutoFill & Passwords, and flick the toggle on.

You will find all saved passwords within the app, which is guarded by Face ID or Touch ID on launch. The app also lets you manage Apple Passkeys, which offer a more secure and faster form of authentication. The Passwords app alerts you to any security concerns as well. For instance, there’s an orange exclamation icon for reused passwords and a red one for those that have appeared in password breaches.

Modern iPhones ship with some of the fastest mobile processors. The A19 Pro found in the iPhone 17 Pro family features a six-core CPU, 12GB of RAM, and a GPU powerful enough to run console-quality games. The previous few generations of flagship iPhones have also been advertised with gaming in mind. Popular AAA titles available for the iPhone include “Red Dead Redemption” and “Alien: Isolation,” but modern games like “Genshin Impact” are also a great measure of how capable the iPhone has become. Consequently, you may have noticed an Apple Games app on your device, which now comes preinstalled with iOS 26.

This is not to be confused with Apple Arcade, which is a paid subscription service that unlocks a catalog of games in the App Store. Instead, the Apple Games app acts more like a game launcher and curator — much like Steam on Windows computers. The “Library” tab displays all currently and previously installed games on your iPhone, with a quick shortcut to launch them. Tapping on a game will expand its page with additional information like recent updates, achievements, or ongoing in-game events.

The “Friends” tab lets you invite friends to play multiplayer titles like “Call of Duty: Mobile” together. You can also challenge your friends in supported games. If you have an Apple Arcade subscription, you can navigate to it faster using the Apple Games app. The “Home” tab lets you jump into recently played titles more quickly and lets you discover new games.

The Notes app on your iPhone does a really good job of letting you quickly jot down thoughts, make lists, or even create well-formatted documents on the go. It has good integration with Apple Intelligence’s Writing Tools, and you can even lock sensitive notes using Face ID or a passcode. While you could totally use it for journaling, Apple actually added a purpose-built solution for that. The Journal app comes preinstalled and offers a better interface for keeping a log of your memories.

You can create as many entries as you want and complement them with images, videos, audio snippets, and location details to add more context to your memories. The Journal app uses on-device machine learning to suggest content when you create new entries. This usually includes photos of a recent outing, which your iPhone recognizes as a notable event worth remembering. It can even suggest people you’ve hung out with.

We’ve covered the Journal app for iPhone in slightly more detail before, but it has since received a fresh coat of paint with the Liquid Glass design in iOS 26. You can also create separate journals for different aspects of your life. Once you’ve populated enough entries, the search function makes it easy to dig up old memories. All data within the Journal app is encrypted when your device is locked, but you can also add another layer of authentication to prevent those around you from peeping at your entries.

Those who attend or throw a lot of parties know how the most chaotic part is planning and organizing the entire event. Sure, a curated text invitation containing details of the event and the location of the venue sent via iMessage often does the trick, but there’s got to be a more elegant way of doing it. That’s exactly what Apple Invites set out to solve. It’s a relatively new inclusion, and unlike other services on the list, it isn’t pre-installed on the iPhone — though you can grab it for free via the App Store.

Apple Invites lets you create, manage, or join invitations to events. You can invite people using their email address or share a joinable link. The app lets you create visually pleasing cards, with Apple Intelligence integration that lets you create images on the fly. You can add details about the venue, the day, and the time, and the app will lay out all the information neatly for all attendees to see. Though you can join invitations for free, you do need an iCloud+ subscription to create and send out invites.

Apple Invites works on Android and the web as well. The app features deep integration with Apple Music and allows you to create a shared playlist with other members. Participants can also chime in on the shared album and dump all photos from the day. This is a less messy version of spamming group chats with images.

Beyond apps for communication, gaming, and productivity, the iPhone comes preloaded with a few utilitarian services as well. Apps like Clock, Calendar, and Voice Memos are frequently used, but did you know you could also use your iPhone as a measuring instrument? The Measure app lets you use your iPhone’s camera and AR features to measure objects with surprisingly good accuracy.

The built-in Measure tool is as interesting as utility apps get. Any iPhone running iOS 12 or newer can be used as a measuring tool. Your iPhone can also automatically display measurements for rectangular objects when it detects them. For every other object, you can start a manual measurement by tapping the “+” button and panning your iPhone around.

There is better accuracy on iPhones with a LiDAR sensor. Guides appear on the edges of objects, making it easier for you to measure them more precisely. Once you’re done measuring, you can tap on the shutter button. This will save the image in your gallery with the measurements annotated. The app serves two functions — everything we’ve highlighted above falls under its measurement mode. If you switch to the “Level” tab, you can use your iPhone as a spirit level as well. This mode lets you check how horizontal a surface is.