What Are iPhone Easter Eggs and Have There Been Any?

Easter Comes Early

An Easter Egg, besides the one that is sent by the mysteriously mutated rabbit in your yard, is something that has been placed within a piece of software or media that remains secret. The Easter Egg usually does not have a ton of quantitative value when found, but instead is a fun surprise for attentive users. Usually the Easter Egg was placed there purposely and it is the target of rumors and intrigue until players, or audience members, actually find it. Within this context, it is debatable what qualifies as an iPhone Easter Egg and if there are any legitimate iPhone Easter Eggs.

Past iPhone Easter Eggs

The truth is that there have been iPhone Easter Eggs in past incarnations, though we may want to open up the definition of what an Easter Egg is to include things that may not have been included by developers on purpose. An example of this is when the iPhone 3.0 software was in beta testing there were reports by testers that they had found evidence of a compass, video recorder, and a still digital camera with an auto focus feature. This had not been anticipated and was really just hinted at as a secret feature, and in essence an iPhone Easter Egg.

Strange Easter Eggs

The concept of the iPhone Easter Egg has allowed many people to begin to wonder what could be included. The likelihood that you are going to find an iPhone Easter Egg in the basic iPhone design is low, especially with an army of bloggers on a constant watch. Most things that could be considered an iPhone Easter Egg, such as unlikely iPhone ringtones or on board photos, are considered standard now. What could be an Easter Egg could be one developed by iPhone application developers, and some of them could be different than you would expect. Since serious adult content is banned through the iTunes App Store you may find that pornographic material may be included in some apps as an Easter Egg, though this has not been known of yet. One fear that has permeated the internet community, though it is likely unfounded, is that malware or viruses could be included as an Easter Egg in some iPhone apps. This is much more of a worry for jailbroken iPhones.

iPhone App Easter Eggs

There are still many iPhone app Easter Eggs as iPhone apps are made by thousands of different developers and they can do what they want with their software. Many of these iPhone app Easter Eggs are inside higher level games, just as in the world of console gaming. One well known iPhone app Easter Egg is in the Google Mobile app. If you go into the About screen and just keep heading upwards you will find the less than obvious “Bells and Whistles” menu. Like most Easter Eggs, this iPhone app Easter Egg will not give you anything incredibly useful, but it will add a little fun.