2 Ways to Take Screenshots From Your iPhone
Ever wanted to know how to get great screenshots from your iPhone? It’s really easy. With the iPhone 2.0 software, you can simply hold down the Home button and press the top (on/off) button. The screen will flash and the screenshot will be saved to your iPhoto library. That’s quick and simple, for sure, but to actually use the screenshots on your computer you still have to transfer them.
You can also grab screenshots directly from your computer while plugged into your iPhone or iPod Touch. First, you have to download and install the iPhone SDK. Don’t worry, it’s free. You just have to have the desktop software tools that come with the SDK.
Open Xcode and open the Organizer window (from the Window menu). Plug in your iPhone or iPod Touch and in a few seconds, it should appear in the list of devices on the left. The first time you plug in your iPhone or iPod Touch you will be asked if you want to use that device for development.
Once you’ve got your device setup, just click the “Screenshot” tab in the Organizer window and you can capture screenshots from your device. You can capture literally any screenshot, including the lock screensaver, video as it’s playing, even as you’re holding a button down.
It can come in very handy when writing tutorials or taking screenshots of your application or mobile website for use on your marketing materials.
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#1 Matt Hoult says:“but to actually use the screenshots you still have to transfer them to your computer”. Talk about open ended, and outright untrue. What constitutes using in your view?
Having taken a screenshot on my iPhone using the 2.0 software I can manipulate the image and send it to just about any website, email it to a friend… I don’t see how this is not using it.
#2 Chris says:Thanks for that! I totally agree, it’s much easier to have them on the desktop ready for use than to have to sync them first. And you can’t grab any screen using the two iPhone buttons, it doesn’t work in any situation.
@ Matt: If you email it, it get’s scaled down.
#3 Matt Hoult says:@Chris I am still using the image, and email isn’t the only way to send. There are plenty of apps in the App Store to get your images elsewhere without scaling them. I have not yet found a situation this didn’t work perfectly well in. Certainly it’s better than launching XCode to achieve such a simple function.
Any which way, the “USE” statement is complete BS.
#4 Chris says:“Any which way, the “USE” statement is complete BS.”
Thanks for that, I’m sure you know…
#5 Brandon Eley says:Matt & Chris, Sorry for that. You’re correct that you can use it on the iPhone any number of ways. Apologies.
#6 Brandon Eley says:I moved the position of “computer” to make it more clear what I meant in the sentence. There is definitely a use for having screen shots on the iPhone, such as emailing support an error message, or noting something on a screenshot to send to a colleague.
#7 Brooke Kuhlmann says:Why require XCode? That is too much work. Instead, simply connect your iPhone to your computer via USB and launch the Image Capture application in your Applications folder. You can then download all pictures from your iPhone with one click of a button and then use the Preview app to edit them (unless you want to launch Photoshop).
#8 Brandon Eley says:Taking the screenshot from Xcode simply allows you to take screenshots that you could not take on the iPhone itself, such as a screenshot while you’re holding down a button in an application. If you already have Xcode installed, it’s really not all that much work to open one program and take screenshots. But that’s just my opinion, of course. That’s why it’s great that there are multiple ways to get the job done, I suppose.
#9 Michael Jones says:Well I’m not gong to be picky about your wording, this is a great article for those who don’t know what screenshot options are available to them.
I agree that each method has it’s place… the on-phone method of holding down the home + lock buttons is very handy for a quick screenshot of an error message, or to grab a shot of something displayed on the phone you want to retrieve later. (For example, I used it once to save a post I was writing when the website wouldn’t submit the form)
Then the XCode method is great for doing step by step screenshots as you mentioned. This is particularly handy if you need to have images to show someone how to use an application, or if it is to be used for telephone support agents to assist a customer over the phone so they can actually see the interface without having to have a full iPhone or simulator in front of them.
They both have their place, it just depends on the user’s needs.
#10 A.H.J. Haarmans says:I have installed the iPhone SDK (more than 1200 MB!) on my Mac G5 with Mac OS-X 10.5.4 installed. I can open Xcode and I can open the Organizer. But when I connect my iPhone with my Mac, the Organizer window remains empty. I think it will not work on a PowerMac PPC, only an Intel Mac.
#11 Nathan says:Hey this worked great thanks
#12 DM says:Is there any way to take a picture of the locked screen WITH the wallpaper picture and NOT the green battery (charging) image. I need a pic of the phone with my wallpaper and I cannot figure out how to do it.
Thanks!
#13 dm says:Is there any way to take picture of the locked startup screen, with the wallpaper pic? I tried following the instructions to take screen shots with the Xcode iPhone Developer Tools, but I could not get it to take a picture of the locked screen with my wallpaper pic. It only takes the locked screen pic with the green battery icon on it, since it needs to be plugged in (and therefore, charging) to work. Any ideas? Thanks.
#14 VT says:Ok How do you access the screen captures you took in the Organizer???
#15 Brandon Eley says:You can just drag them to your desktop or a folder and they save as PNG files.
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