Jailbreak Your iOS 8 Device This Weekend

Add extra functionality and features to your iPhone or iPad by jailbreaking your device.Jailbreaking an iOS device is extremely easy and provides you with more options than you can imagine. You might want to jailbreak to enjoy additional customizations, or even to enable tethering. This weekend in the Weekend Series, you are going to jailbreak your iOS 8 device.

To jailbreak your iOS 8 device this weekend, complete the following tasks:

Backing Up Your Device

Before you begin jailbreaking your iOS device, you should back it up to iTunes and back up your SHSH blobs. For a tutorial, see our Back Up Your Device Before Upgrading iOS 8 article.

If you need to upgrade your phone to the version of iOS that you plan to jailbreak, do a simple upgrade through your device or through iTunes. Then back up your device and SHSH blobs again.

Jailbreaking Your Device

The best site that I found to get the latest jailbreaking software for your phone is using iClarified’s Jailbreak Wizard. The wizard will walk you through how to jailbreak different iterations of iPhones, iPods, Apple TV, and iPads for Windows and Mac, and for various iOS firmwares.

IMPORTANT:  You might not want to get the latest jailbreak. Just because the jailbreak is available doesn’t mean that the apps and the other software will work with the version. It takes a while for developers to catch up. Do your research. Jailbroken apps aren’t as stable as App Store apps, and can crash your device.

Follow the instructions on the iClarified website for your specific jailbreak setup.

Install Your Jailbreak Apps

To learn more about installing (and uninstalling) your jailbreak apps, see our How to Install Jailbreak Apps article.

The hardest part is deciding what Cydia applications to install. To get some ideas about what to install, view the list of the jailbreak apps that the author uses below:

Author’s Apps

The author uses the following apps:

  • BetterPowerDown – This app adds the ability to respring or reboot your device during power down.
  • BioLockDown – Specify apps, such as Facebook, that you want to lock down by requiring a fingerprint to open.
  • Browser Changer – Change the default browser for your device. Hellooooo, Chrome!
  • Disk Pie – View the disk allocation on your device to see what is using the most space.
  • DoubleCheck – This app adds the recipient’s name to the message field in iMessage so that you can see who you’re typing to before you type. This can prevent the dreaded “Oops, that message was for someone else.”
  • f.lux – This app dims your screen to a sepia tone (that you can set) at sunset, and back to daylight at sunrise. The dim screen is easier on the eyes at night.
  • iFile – Access your iOS file system to remove temporary files that are taking up space on your device.
  • MapsOpener – Change Google Maps to your default map for every app on your phone!
  • MyWi – This app makes it easy to tether your laptop or wifi devices. This is particularly useful when you’re trying to work in an airport and aren’t willing to pay the airport $5/hour wifi rates.
  • NCSingleTapClear – This app removes the pain-in-the-butt double-click necessary to delete a notification.
  • Nitrous – Unlock the Apple Nitro Javascript engine to speed up your phone and 3rd party browsers.
  • Photo Organizer 8 – If you’ve ever tried to clean out your photos on your iOS device, you know what a nightmare it is to delete hundreds of photos. This app provides the missing “Select All” functionality and so much more.
  • PKGBackup – This app backs up everything, even your jailbroken apps. It makes restoring a crashed phone a breeze.
    NOTE:  I have used PkgBackup in the past with no trouble, but have been unable to save a backup on iOS8. The app hangs and crashes and tries to save to my phone every time it opens. I have removed this package.
  • RecentFacebook – If you thought you were stuck using Facebook’s ridiculous “Top Stories” in the app, guess again. Now your Facebook app is back to showing most recent stories instead of what Facebook thinks (usually incorrectly) that you want to see.
  • TinyBar – Instead of seeing notifications drop down from the top and messing with what you’re doing, this app displays them over the status bar.

Now off you go to jailbreak your own iOS device.

Author: Steph

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