How to change the default home screen on the Samsung Galaxy S3

With the Samsung Galaxy S3 having 7 different home screens a nice hidden feature is that the the user can select which home screen can be used as the "default" home screen.

Firstly let me explain what a "default" home screen actually is. The default" home screen is the one the phone will revert to when you press the phone's "home" button, it's also the screen that new app shortcuts will be added to when you download them.

To change the default screen you will need to go on to any of the home screens and pinch the centre of the screen to change the screen to something like the image at the top. From this screen you will see your 7 home screens with 1 in particular having a little blue home icon in the top right corner (in the top picture it's in the top left screen, which we will call "screen 1").

To change the default screen you merely need to click in the little house icon on which ever screen you would like to become your new default screen. For the sake of this example I've selected the screen on the bottom right corner (or "screen 7"), though you can select any screen there.


Now when you press on the phones home button, from any app or screen you will then be taken to the screen you selected as the home screen (as you can see "screen 7" in the image on the side).

As mentioned above any apps you now install will install their app icon on to your new default home screen (see the icon for "New Gold Minder" on the top line of apps in this second screen shot).

Whilst this is just another way for a person to personalise their phone it's a nice feature and one that some really will make the most of, whilst others will just ignore another feature that they don't need, though it is nice to see that it is available.

How to move Icons on a Samsung Galaxy S3

One of the great things about modern day smart phones is the ability to customise your phone exactly how you want it. You're not limited by just changing the background or the ringtone but you can change literally everything about the phone. This guide hopes to show you have to move icons as further customise how your phone looks. Whilst this guide was done with screenshots from a Samsung Galaxy S3, the same method applies with pretty much every phone running Android.

Firstly you need to open up your home screens and find an icon you want to move. For this example I will be selecting the icon for "Ebuddy XMS", which is sat on the bottom left corner of the 3rd home screen (See top left). To select the icon you need to hold your finger on the icon for a few seconds and this will then allow you to drag the icon around the screen.

You can not only drag the icon around the same screen as it started on (see the picture on the right) but also place it on other screens by dragging the icon to edge of one of the screens. This allows you to drag the icon to any of the phone's home screens as you perhaps choose to put your most regularly used icons to the first screen whilst your lesser used icons can be put to the most distant homes screens.