Let’s dust off another long-lost App Store gem, and figure out how to bring it to your iPhone. This time: FluxTunes, a music player you controlled with swipes.
What was FluxTunes?
Almost certainly the first in a long line of iPhone music players to ditch on-screen buttons in favor of gestures. This meant the entire display became a control surface, letting you skip tracks with a swipe, and trigger other actions with taps and multi-finger gestures. Once you’d committed the gestures to memory, you gained a surprising amount of control over your music, without ever having to look at the screen.
Why was FluxTunes great?
The original pitch, in 2009, was geared toward safer music control while driving. That wouldn’t fly today, but FluxTunes excelled elsewhere too. It was excellent while exercising, when fumbling for tiny playback buttons was a pain. It also worked wonderfully with a docked iPhone or iPod touch, where broad swipes at arm’s length were far more user-friendly than precise taps. Best of all, the app could be customized, letting you map favorite actions to specific gestures, including a four-finger lock to prevent accidental inputs.
Where is it now?
FluxTunes disappeared from the App Store years ago, although exactly when is unclear. According to the Wayback Machine, developer Quokka Studios still had a live website until 2017, but it appeared largely abandoned for years beforehand.
How can you bring back FluxTunes?
Modern iPhones offer hands-free playback controls via Siri and AirPod gestures. But neither option gives you the same tactile, screen-wide interaction that made FluxTunes so satisfying. And few players – including Apple’s own – have embraced gestures beyond swiping over tiny mini-player bars.
Fortunately, there are exceptions. Music Player ($1/£1) and Gesture Music car player ($1/£1) are basic players with swipe-based track skipping. And excellent all-rounder Marvis Pro ($10/£10) packs in extensive gesture support for its playback screen.
But the closest thing to FluxTunes today is TuTuneMe ($5/£5). This app originally appeared mere months after FluxTunes and yet still survives today. (It’s even been updated for iOS 26.) It’s also highly configurable, matching every FluxTunes feature (including the four-finger lock), and adding more, such as voice control.
Probably still don’t use it while driving, though. But TuTuneMe is just about perfect when your iPhone is docked, and a worthy modern-day successor to FluxTunes.