Over the past decade, smartphones have gone from being a nice-to-have luxury item to an essential part of everyday life. We use our phones for work, play, family, and everything in between, so you may have emails, passwords, or photos on your phone that you don’t want someone to stumble upon. At the same time, you may want to lendyour awesome new phonewhen a friend, coworker, or partner is in need. Android has a built-in solution: Guest Profiles.
How to create a new user profile on your Android phone
Before you hand over your phone, create a user profile and give another person their own space on your phone. Here’s how:
Now that you have a new profile, you can back out of the menu tree or switch to the new profile. If you switch right away, be ready to set up the new profile like you would a new phone. If this profile is for someone else, verify they’re around to set it up.
How to create a guest profile on your Android phone
A guest is slightly different from a user on Android phones. A user profile can download apps and save data. A guest profile is temporary, and all data generated by the guest is deleted when switching out of that profile.
Guest mode is a bare-bones experience. The guest has access to your networks but not your apps. If they want to use an app that isn’t pre-installed on your phone, they must log in to the Play Store and download it.
How to switch between profiles on your Android phone
Now that you have these new accounts on your phone, you’ll need to access them. Here’s how to get it done:
If you turned on theAdd users from lock screentoggle, you may access these features from the lock screen by swiping down once.
You can change the color of the default profile icon, take a picture to create a new one, or select an image from your phone’s storage.
How to change the profile icons on user accounts
Now that your phone is set up for multiple users, add some personality to it with a custom profile icon.
How to delete a user profile on Android phones
All good things must come to an end, and you may need to get rid of an account on your phone. Deleting a user profile is faster than adding one.
Things to keep in mind
Managing user profiles on your Android device is intuitive, but you should be aware of some things. When you set up an account for someone on your phone, you don’t have access to that account. As the administrator, you can delete it, but your new user can set up a PIN and fingerprint for their account, which locks you out of their corner of the phone.
This setup is perfect for partners, coworkers, and a shared family tablet where everyone has their own apps and games without crowding someone else’s space. And if you want toshare your Netflix account, we have a solution for that.
