How to hide apps on Samsung

Samsung's One UI gives you more ways to hide an app than stock Android does, and they are not interchangeable. Which one you want depends entirely on why you are hiding it: to tidy a cluttered drawer, to keep something private, or to stop yourself opening it. The last one is the most common reason and the one the built-in settings handle worst.

Method 1: Hide apps (built into One UI)

1. Open Settings.
2. Tap Home screen.
3. Scroll to Hide apps on Home and Apps screens — on some versions it is simply Hide apps.
4. Select the apps you want hidden.
5. Tap Done.

The apps disappear from both the home screen and the app drawer. They remain installed, keep their data, and continue to receive notifications unless you silence those separately.

Wording and menu order shift between One UI versions. If you cannot find it, open Settings and search for "hide" — the setting exists on every recent Galaxy.

Good for: decluttering, removing preinstalled apps you cannot uninstall. Weak for: changing behaviour, because you know the path to undo it and it takes about fifteen seconds.

Method 2: Secure Folder

Samsung's Knox-backed private space. Apps placed inside get a separate, encrypted instance with its own login, and the folder itself can be hidden from the app drawer and Quick Panel.

1. Open Settings → Security and privacy → Secure Folder and set it up if you have not already.
2. Add the apps you want inside.
3. In Secure Folder's own settings, turn off the option that shows it on the Apps screen.

Good for: genuine privacy — a separate, authenticated copy of an app is meaningfully hidden. Weak for: focus, and there is a catch worth knowing: adding an app to Secure Folder does not remove the original from your phone. You can end up with two of them.

Method 3: Disable the app

Long-press the app, tap App info, then Disable where available. The app stops running, disappears from the drawer, and keeps its data.

Good for: preinstalled apps you never use. Weak for: anything you want back regularly — re-enabling is a trip into Settings, which sounds like useful friction until you do it twice a day and give up.

Method 4: Hide it for a set period, then get it back

This is the one that matters if your reason is usage rather than tidiness, and it is the gap in everything above: One UI's hiding is a permanent state you toggle, not a temporary one that expires.

That distinction does more work than it appears to. A permanent hide is a decision you have to keep re-making every time you want the app for a legitimate reason, and each time you unhide it, the odds of hiding it again drop. A timed hide inverts that — the app comes back on its own, so unhiding is never a decision you have to make under pressure.

Which method for which reason

A note on notifications

Hiding an icon does not silence the app. A hidden app that still pushes notifications will pull you straight back, and because the icon is gone you will often go looking for it — which is worse than not having hidden it.

Whichever method you use, silence the app's notifications at the same time. On Samsung: Settings → Notifications → App notifications, then switch off the ones you just hid.

Frequently asked questions