iOS 16 exploit lets you set system font to Comic Sans (and other things)
iOS 16 exploit lets you set system font to Comic Sans (and other things)
Expand / A standalone app can be used to change the font default on your iPhone if you haven't already installed the latest operating system update.
Zhuowei Zhang
If you love your iPhone but hate the San Francisco font, developer Zhuowei Zhang has released an interesting tool on Github: an app that can temporarily "overwrite" the iOS system font with another, giving your phone a new, non-Apple-approved look.
The app does not require any type of jailbreak, but needs "iOS 16.1.2 or lower" to work, as it relies on a kernel runtime bug (CVE-2022-46689) fixed in iOS 16.2 . If you have already installed iOS 16.2, which we advise you to do for security reasons, you will not be able to experience the hack. Any font changes will be undone by a device restart, and apps that don't use the default San Francisco font will not change.
The app includes a number of pre-installed fonts, many of which seem designed to irritate the eyes of Apple's UI designers. Comic Sans MS leads the charge in this regard, but Segoe UI (Windows and Microsoft's default font of choice) and Samsung's "Choco Cooky" (a distant cousin of Comic Sans) are also included. Custom fonts can be installed as long as they are compatible with iOS.
Apple used to support more extensive customization of its user interfaces back in the classic days of Mac OS, when everything from the system font to window borders could be customized using the Manager of appearance. These settings disappeared in the initial versions of Mac OS X, and changing the look and feel of any of Apple's operating systems has only become more difficult in recent years, as Apple has taken increasing steps to protect system files from modification and tampering (benign and otherwise).
Designing your interfaces around a single, predictable font makes it easier to test and makes it harder for users to break things using a weird monospaced font that causes rendering errors. But these screenshots kinda make me wish the OS makers would let me do as they once did.
Expand / A standalone app can be used to change the font default on your iPhone if you haven't already installed the latest operating system update.
Zhuowei Zhang
If you love your iPhone but hate the San Francisco font, developer Zhuowei Zhang has released an interesting tool on Github: an app that can temporarily "overwrite" the iOS system font with another, giving your phone a new, non-Apple-approved look.
The app does not require any type of jailbreak, but needs "iOS 16.1.2 or lower" to work, as it relies on a kernel runtime bug (CVE-2022-46689) fixed in iOS 16.2 . If you have already installed iOS 16.2, which we advise you to do for security reasons, you will not be able to experience the hack. Any font changes will be undone by a device restart, and apps that don't use the default San Francisco font will not change.
The app includes a number of pre-installed fonts, many of which seem designed to irritate the eyes of Apple's UI designers. Comic Sans MS leads the charge in this regard, but Segoe UI (Windows and Microsoft's default font of choice) and Samsung's "Choco Cooky" (a distant cousin of Comic Sans) are also included. Custom fonts can be installed as long as they are compatible with iOS.
Apple used to support more extensive customization of its user interfaces back in the classic days of Mac OS, when everything from the system font to window borders could be customized using the Manager of appearance. These settings disappeared in the initial versions of Mac OS X, and changing the look and feel of any of Apple's operating systems has only become more difficult in recent years, as Apple has taken increasing steps to protect system files from modification and tampering (benign and otherwise).
Designing your interfaces around a single, predictable font makes it easier to test and makes it harder for users to break things using a weird monospaced font that causes rendering errors. But these screenshots kinda make me wish the OS makers would let me do as they once did.
Expand / A standalone app can be used to change the font default on your iPhone if you haven't already installed the latest operating system update.
Zhuowei Zhang
