Handrail

AppCookery

About this app

Handrail replaces the home screen on an Android phone with something a person can use.

Instead of pages of small icons, the screen shows a few large tiles: round photographs of the people they call, and squares for the handful of apps they actually use. Tapping a face starts the call. Tapping a square opens the app. There is nothing else on the screen, and nothing to swipe away by accident.

WHO IT IS FOR

Someone who finds a modern phone hard to use — because the icons are too small to see, because the screen keeps changing under their hand, or because leaving an app means an invisible gesture nobody explained. Handrail is set up by somebody else: a son, a daughter, a carer, a friend. Setup takes about five minutes, and every part of it can be changed later.

WHAT IS ON THE SCREEN

Faces. Round photographs of the people they call, with the name underneath in large type. One tap starts the call.

Apps. Large square tiles for the apps they really use, chosen during setup. Everything else on the phone stays installed and stays out of the way.

A list of everyone else. One screen with every name in the phone and a box to search it. Pressing a name rings that person. Nothing on that screen can add, change or delete a contact — the family keeps doing that in the phone's own contacts app, and this list follows.

A camera with one button. Handrail's own camera has no modes, no zoom, no video and no settings — one large shutter that never moves, and a Finished button. Photographs are saved to the phone's normal gallery, where the family can find them, print them or send them.

A Home button that is always there. An optional round button that floats over every app, so getting back to the home screen is one tap instead of a gesture. Android asks for permission to draw it during setup, and it can be turned off again.

SIZE AND COLOUR

Everything is drawn large, and Handrail follows the phone's own text size — turning the system text up makes Handrail bigger with it. The background is chosen during setup, from off-white, cream, yellow, black, slate or navy, and the text colour follows automatically so the contrast is always right.

THE SETTINGS STAY OUT OF THE WAY

Settings are opened by holding a small grey line at the bottom of the home screen until a bar fills, about three seconds. That is deliberate. A stray tap cannot reach them, so the person using the phone cannot land in a settings screen they are unable to leave — and the person who set the phone up can always get back in.

WHAT HANDRAIL DOES NOT DO

No account, no sign-in, no ads, no subscription, no tracking.

Handrail has no internet permission at all. Names, numbers, photographs and settings stay on the phone, because there is no way for the app to send them anywhere.

PLEASE NOTE

Handrail is not a medical, care, safety or emergency product. It does not monitor anyone, it cannot guarantee that a call connects, and it does not contact emergency services. It is a home screen with large buttons on it.

Handrail has to be set as the phone's home app in order to replace the old home screen. Android asks for that during setup, and it can be undone at any time from the phone's own settings.

What’s new

First release of Handrail.

It replaces the home screen with a few large tiles: photographs of the people they call, a list of everyone else in
the phone, the apps they use, and a camera with one button. Everything is chosen during a five-minute setup and can be
changed afterwards.