How to have a custom URL for an icon on the iOS home screen

Question

Is it possible to make a custom URL for an icon on the iOS home screen? Or at least have a way for the user to edit the URL themselves?

UPDATE: To be more specific, here's what the client said:

"Because of our use of authentication, the URL of the landing page that [website] takes you to changes to a long URL with a session ID. Right now, when I use the Add to Home Screen function, it associates the icon with the long URL which, because of the session ID, won't work after a couple of days. Is there any way to change the URL to [website] (our stable and persistent URL) after or before the Add to home screen function is invoked"

Also, the website isn't a web app, so I'm not sure if web app things would apply here.....?

Opsonin

Do you want to make a homescreenicon for a website? The you should find what you need here – Beheld

Answer 1

This answer is no longer valid.

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No, it's not possible to do this because of security constraints. You need to handle those expired session IDs on the web application side - it's usually done with a redirect to the authentication page, most web frameworks should do this out of the box for you.

Related: Can the url for the "Add to home screen" on iPhone Safari be customized?

Repurchase

See @bcampalo's answer below for how to save the base URL to a home screen icon. While you can't edit the existing URL, you can use airplane mode to prevent safari from loading and then trying to save the URL with the session ID and/or other URL redirection information to the shortcut. That really is the perfect solution for what kaeruranawa is asking. – Osmic

Answer 2

I just tried this on the iPhone 6.

1. Go to Settings and turn Airplane Mode to ON
2. Go to Safari and type in the address you want to have an icon for
3. Click Go. The page will fail to load, but the address will stay the same.
4. Click the AirDrop icon next to the URL entry bar (landscape mode) and click the + button.
5. Change the name of the site to whatever you want the icon caption to be
6. Go to Settings and turn Airplane Mode to OFF

Extrajudicial

Not sure why this was down-voted. It does work and doesn't require any third-party tools. – Extrajudicial

This is a good solution. I just used it and it saved me from having to try to use another tool, like Apple Configurator or our MDM product. – Osmic

great hint, though with mine the 'share' icon was in footer not near url entry bar – Cytoplast

Still working for me in 2021. Trying to put link to Google photos shared album on grandparents iPhones. Airplane mode needed to stop the link forwarding to sign up for Google Photos when creating the shortcut. Thanks. – Asocial

I don’t think this works with special app URL schemes like googlesheets://.... – Bouffard

Works with iOS 16.1 on iPhone 13 – Bumgardner

Answer 3

If you install the iPhone Configuration Utility, you can make custom icons on the home screen with custom URLs (including app URL schemes as long as you're OK with going through Safari first). It does not require jailbreaking or a connection to the Internet.

Impaste

Answer 4

bcampolo’s solution worked on my 8 plus ios 14.5. I had to tweak it a bit & didn’t use airdrop. I turned on airplane mode. Pasted the URL in safari - hit go - (didn’t load obviously) then hit the share icon (up arrow w/square) - add to Home Screen - (and now the URL is the correct one instead of defaulting to the websites main page) erased the title “cant load page” (said something to that affect) typed in title of the icon I wanted - at this point icon thumbnail is white - Turned airplane mode off - hit the Home Screen icon I just made…. And it works!!! It even changed the icon’s pic from white/blank to the website’s correct image/thumbnail.

Moonfish

This worked for me except the icon has not updated yet. The icon is a snapshot of the "Failed to load" text. – Peaked

Answer 5

Yes, you can create custom URL and icon with the help of .mobileconfig file.. there is a trick, First create mobileconfig file with the of "Apple Configurator 2" and link it with your html or web page such as a button.. If need any help then please let me know...

Nucleotidase