BlackBerry Z10: the best tips and tricks
The Z10 from the Canadian mobile phone manufacturer BlackBerry is the best-selling OS 10 smartphone ever. We show you the best tips for blackberries in this practical tip.
BlackBerry Z10 Tip 1: Take a screenshot
You take screenshots on the BlackBerry Z10 with a simple key combination.
- Press the volume and volume down buttons simultaneously to get a screenshot.
- You will then find the screenshots in your pictures app.
BlackBerry Z10 Tip 2: Restart the hub
All important messages and notifications come together in the Blackberry Hub. If it no longer works properly, you can restart it with a simple swipe gesture.
- Open your hub by swiping from the left to the right edge of the screen.
- Swipe five times from the top right corner towards the center of the screen.
- Your hub will now restart. Depending on how many accounts you have synced, this process may take a few minutes.
BlackBerry Z10 Tip 3: Minimize the keyboard
The keyboard is sometimes shown, especially with Android ports, although it is actually not used. Unfortunately, this often hides important buttons or input fields. There are several ways to minimize them:
- Option 1: Move the app to the background with a swipe gesture upwards. If you call it up again now, the keyboard has disappeared.
- Option 2: Simply pull your keyboard down with two fingers. You have already minimized your keyboard.
- Option 3: The easiest way; hold down the spacebar for a few seconds. Your keyboard already fades out on its own.
BlackBerry Z10 Tip 4: The reading mode in the browser
Various websites have no mobile version or are fully loaded with images and advertising. A reading mode is integrated in the OS 10 browser. This converts the website chaos into an easily readable text block.
- Navigate to your desired page in the OS 10 browser.
- Open the options menu using the three dots at the bottom right of the screen.
- With the »Read mode« menu item you start the eye-friendly reader function.
BlackBerry Z10 Tip 5: Preview image in camera mode
Within the camera app, you can switch to the picture gallery via the small picture at the bottom left. However, if you only want to briefly view the picture you just took, keep your finger on the photo and drag it upwards across the screen. To minimize it again, just let go of the picture.
BlackBerry Z10 Tip 6: Quickly navigate through long drop-down menus
Endless drop-down lists are the absolute horror scenario of a mobile internet user. Probably rather involuntary but still practical: BlackBerry 0S 10 smartphones have a very simple solution for this.
- Drag two fingers up from the bottom of the screen at the same time. Your keyboard will appear.
- Enter the first letter of the word you are looking for here. The drop-down menu jumps to the right place. You can then minimize your keyboard again (as described in Tip 3).
BlackBerry Z10 Tip 7: Install Android apps
As of OS version 10.2, you can install Android apps on your BlackBerry without first converting them to a .bar file. You can read how to do this in our CHIP article.
BlackBerry Z10 emergency tip: How to reset your Z10 to factory settings
If, contrary to expectations, your BlackBerry Z10 stops working properly, simply reset it to the factory settings. You can read here how it works:
- Navigate to the settings menu of your BlackBerry smartphone.
- Here you select the menu item »Security and data protection«.
- To reset the BlackBerry to the factory settings, tap "Security wipe".
- Here you have to enter "blackberry" again before you initiate the recovery process with the button »delete data«.
- Attention: When deleting security, all data is irrevocably deleted from the smartphone.
With BBM, BlackBerry has its own instant messenger. How BBM compares with WhatsApp can be read in another practical tip.