Although there isn’t a jailbreak for iOS 11 yet, that doesn’t mean you can’t have your cake and eat it too. Even if you’re using a jailbroken iOS 10 device right now, you can enjoy several of iOS 11’s new aesthetics and features by installing a few tweaks on it.
While a bevy of tweaks released over the last several months specifically port iOS 11-esque features to jailbroken iOS 10 devices, even some older tweaks provide functionality comparable to what Apple included in iOS 11 and are worthy of recognition. In this piece, we showcase all the tweaks that came make your iOS 10 jailbroken device look more like it’s running iOS 11.
LockscreenXI
LockscreenXI was created by iOS developer LaughingQuoll to port the iOS 11 Lock screen experience over to jailbroken iOS 10 devices.
Minus the new default wallpaper, which you could easily download and apply yourself, it’s difficult to distinguish any significant differences between the official iOS 11 Lock screen and the proxy experience that’s re-created with LockscreenXI.
LockscreenXI includes a redesigned music player that matches the aesthetic of iOS 11, which can be collapsed or expanded on demand, as well as a retouched passcode input screen.
Because the Lock screen is the first thing you see anytime you sign into your device, LockscreenXI is easily one of the most vital tweaks that we’ve included on this list. To learn more about it in detail, we recommend reading our full review of LockscreenXI.
Lysithea X
Lysithea X was an attempt by iOS developer ijapija00 to re-create the iOS 11 Lock screen experience for jailbroken iOS 10 devices.
Much like LockscreenXI, Lysithea X changes the way your Now Playing and passcode buttons look so that they’re more in line with the aesthetic of iOS 11. The Now Playing widget can be collapsed or expanded, depending on how much room you want to dedicate to music.
Unlike LockscreenXI, Lysithea provides more user customization, letting you tint the interface any color you desire and customize the overlay style, among other things.
More can be learned about Lysithea X in our full review about the tweak.
ControlCenterXI
The redesigned modular Control Center experience is another mentionable feature of iOS 11 that got ported to jailbroken iOS 10 devices with the help of ControlCenterXI, which also happens to be created by iOS developer LaughingQuoll.
Although it’s not a perfect carbon copy of the iOS 11 Control Center, it’s a well-rounded copy and lets you try the modular Control Center experience for yourself without upgrading and losing your jailbreak.
From the main Control Center view, you can launch individual modules with either a 3D Touch or tap-and-hold gesture. When you do, you’re presented with a full-screen widget for interfacing with that particular control. The tweak supports these gestures for toggles, Now Playing, and display brightness settings, among other things.
I would consider ControlCenterXI an essential add-on for anyone trying to get the iOS 11 experience on their jailbroken iOS 10 device, so to learn more about how it works, we recommend reading our entire review.
VideoPlayerXI
Another significant change that made it into iOS 11 was an entirely redesigned video player interface, and a jailbreak tweak called VideoPlayerXI by iOS developer LaughingQuoll ports it to jailbroken iOS 10 devices.
Despite how trivial this sounds, you’d be surprised at how many people got excited about the redesigned video player when Apple first announced it. With its modernized UI and darker look and feel, the new video player looks oodles better than the previous-generation video player.
For the most part, the controls are all still the same as in the old video player, but they’re arranged differently. VideoPlayerXI even goes a step further by adding customization options, such as choosing between a dark and light mode.
It’s a great tweak to try if you’re trying to get the iOS 11 aesthetic on your jailbroken iOS 10 device, so we recommend reading our full review about VideoPlayerXI to learn more about it.
NotificationCenterXI
NotificationCenterXI by iOS developer LaughingQuoll focuses on bringing an iOS 11-esque Notification Center experience to jailbroken iOS 10 devices.
In iOS 11, Apple made Notification Center look almost like the Lock screen, so NotificationCenterXI does the same. You’ll notice the wallpaper background instead of the Gaussian blur, and you also get a more prominent date and time indicator after the fact.
Notifications and widgets still look the same as they did before installing the tweak, and you even use the same ‘X’ button you’re familiar with from the iOS 10 interface to clear unwanted notifications.
NotificationCenterXI seems like an essential part of porting iOS 11 features to your jailbroken iOS 10 device, so if you’re interested in learning more about it, we recommend reading our full review.
ScreenshotXI
iOS 11 also re-thinks the screenshot-taking experience in Apple’s mobile device lineup, and a jailbreak tweak dubbed ScreenshotXI by iOS developer DGh0st mimics the look and feel quite well.
After taking a screenshot, a small preview thumbnail appears at the bottom-left of your screen. You can tap and hold on the thumbnail to invoke a share sheet that helps you direct your screenshot to the proper sharing platform.
iOS 11’s screenshot implementation is a bit more advanced than that of ScreenshotXI, but the tweak still mimics the preview experience quite well, and many of the share sheet options let you perform the same actions as you could in iOS 11.
ScreenshotXI even comes with a whole host of preferences that let you tailor the tweak to your needs. You can customize things like appearance, behavior, and window priority, and more.
You can learn more about ScreenshotXI from our full review if you’re interested in augmenting your iOS 10 screenshot experience so that it looks and feels more like it does on iOS 11.
SwitcherXI
If you’re looking for an App Switcher experience on iOS 10 that looks and feels just like iOS 11, then SwitcherXI by iOS developer ArtikusHG is about as good as it gets.
This tweak brings a few of the iOS 11 App Switcher aesthetics to the iOS 10 App Switcher, but one of the most notable would be the removal of the Home screen card.
While it’s not a perfect copy of the iOS 11 App Switcher because of minute differences in the way the wallpaper is expressed beneath the multitasking cards, it’s still a great addition to your device if you’re trying to iOS 11-ify your device.
Our full review of SwitcherXI provides the full details on the tweak.
CCRecord
iOS 11 lets you initiate screen recordings directly on your iPhone itself with a Control Center toggle, and a tweak called CCRecord by iOS developer Cole Cabral enables you to do this on your jailbroken device too.
The tweak adds a new toggle button to Control Center that causes iOS to start recording your screen movements and taps. When finished, you can tap on the toggle button again, and the video file gets saved to your Camera Roll so you can share it later.
As a bonus, CCRecord is fully-compatible with ControlCenterXI, which would be handy if you’re using that extension on your device already.
You can read our full review of CCRecord to learn more about whether the tweak is right for you.
CCLowPower
iOS 11 also gives you a Control Center toggle for Low Power Mode, which is useful when you’re running short on battery life and need to save juice. Fortunately, CCLowPower by iOS developer Cole Cabral brings this feature to jailbroken iOS 10 devices too.
After installation, you can open Control Center and find the new Low Power Mode toggle button in the interface. Tapping it enables Low Power Mode, and tapping it once more turns it off.
Unfortunately, CCLowPower doesn’t work with ControlCenterXI like CCRecord does, so you’ll have to pick and choose between the two if you fancy using either of using them.
You can read our full review of CCLowPower to learn whether the tweak is right for you or not.
GIFRoll
Another feature of iOS 11 that often slips under the radar is the support for animated GIF images in the Photos app. Notably, you can accomplish the same functionality on a jailbroken device with a free tweak called GIFRoll by iOS developer isklikas.
After installing the tweak, animated GIFs will move before your eyes from Apple’s native photo-viewer. There’s not much else to say about the tweak except for the part that it feels just like the OEM experience.
Be sure to check out our full review of GIFRoll to make sure that it will do everything you need it to do.
MultiIconMover
iOS 11 users with lots of installed apps are probably really enjoying the luxury of moving multiple apps at one time, but a jailbreak tweak called MultiIconMover by iOS developer Lance Fetters can let you do the same thing on jailbroken iOS 10 devices.
After installing MultiIconMover, you can select several apps on your Home screen at one time and move them in bulk rather than one-by-one. You could relocate them to other parts of the Home screen, or even into folders if you wanted to.
MultiIconMover has existed since the iOS 4 days. Believe it or not, the developer still maintains the tweak to this day.
Because MultiIconMover is such an old tweak, so is our original review of the tweak. Nevertheless, it’s a great way to mimic this iOS 11 feature on your jailbroken device.
Thumbtack
The Notes app in iOS 11 gains new note-pinning abilities to keep users more organized when jotting their thoughts down, and Thumbtack by iOS developer Evil Penguin brings this functionality to iOS 10.
While the pin doesn’t look as robust as it does in iOS 11, Thumbtack goes a step further by moving pinned items to the top of your notes list and makes it easier to discern essential notes from unimportant ones.
Our review post has the full scoop if you’re interested in learning more about Thumbtack.
Eclipse 4
The updated color inversion setting in iOS 11 is about as close to ‘dark mode’ for iOS as we’re going to get from Apple as of right now, but Eclipse 4 by iOS developer Guillermo Moran can offer a similar effect on jailbroken iOS 10 devices.
Once installed, you can apply a system-wide dark mode on your iPhone or iPad, but you can optionally exclude certain apps from the UI makeover if you experience any complications with color incompatibility.
The tweak also comes with a slew of configuration options intended to give you fine-grained control over how things look.
You can read our full review of Eclipse 4 to see for yourself just how similar iOS 11’s inverted colors feature is to the tweak.
Wrapping up
While the functionalities of many other unmentioned jailbreak tweaks also made it into iOS 11, we limited this list to tweaks marked as compatible with iOS 10 to reduce confusion and eliminate frustration. This robust arsenal of jailbreak tweaks will let you replicate a great deal of iOS 11 features on any of your jailbroken iOS 10 devices.
Did we miss anything? Be sure to let us know in the comments section below!
