Just Bought the iPhone 12? Here Are 7 Ways to Use Your Old One

1. Keep Your Media Libraries Secure

What’s an old iPhone if not a 64-, 128- or 256-GB hard drive? Malta-based site manager Adam Lumb keeps music backed up on a 32-GB phone as a way to safeguard songs from his youth—ones by local bands he bought on CDs, now largely unavailable on Spotify. “In most cases I have lost or broken the CDs, so it helps me guarantee that my library of old songs isn’t lost,” he said.

2. Combat a Source of Travel Anxiety

If you’ve ever been pickpocketed in Rome or left your bag on a U-Bahn in Berlin, you know how quickly a lost phone ruins a vacation. Annalisa Nash Fernandez, a tech strategist in Greenwich, Conn., always keeps an old phone in her suitcase. “Buy a SIM card from a newspaper stand in Madrid and your future is reinstated,” she said. “It restores lost access to your money, your reservations and your contacts.”

3. Disconnect, Sort Of

After enduring a bad bout of WFH Zoom fatigue, New York economist Will Stewart decided to try using an old iPhone 5S phone to dial into the majority of his calls camera-free. By retreating to the roof with a device that doesn’t constantly ping him with notifications, he’s found it’s been “surprisingly helpful in restoring energy during meeting-heavy days.”

4. Watch Out for Intruders

Instead of installing a pricey security system that beeps and blurts every time you leave your home, mount your out-of-use phone on a tripod near your front door to monitor activity. Webcam apps like Alfred Home Security Camera (premium for $30/year) can channel what they see to your new iPhone 12 and send motion alerts while you’re away without taking up storage space. The same apps can also function as higher-tech baby monitors than the static-y monstrosities of the past.

5. Become a Visual Artist

To shoot photos and videos like a pro, use an old iPhone as a separate viewing screen. Just attach the phone to a rotating gimbal and connect it via dongle to your digital camera. “The screen is tilted at an angle that makes for easier viewing [than cameras offer],” said Karl Robinson, an amateur photographer in East Sussex, U.K. The iPhone 11’s powerful 12-megapixel camera can also find its way into the grubby hands of a kid who wants to film a TikTok dance.

6. Hand It Down

Parents who want to keep track of their children but aren’t ready to invest in a kid-friendly Firefly phone can give their offspring an old device stocked with apps like TextNow that keep lines of communication open without a phone plan. And unlike WhatsApp, TextNow doesn’t require a Wi-Fi connection to work (ad-free version for $8/month).

7. Up Your Phone Game

Evolved beyond Tetris? Phone-gripping devices like the Razer Kishi ($100, razer.com) feature buttons and analog sticks to transform an old smartphone into a hand-held gaming machine akin to a Nintendo Switch. Prefer Xbox-level controllers? The Nimbus+ ($70, steelseries.com) has a familiar configuration that lets you enjoy retro-style games like “Crossy Road Castle” on Apple Arcade.

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