Can live tiles be turned totally off in 8.1

[AdamInTx]

I'm still on 7.8 and looking to get an 830 but have a question about 8.1. Can live tiles be turned totally off? I know I'm a huge outlier with this, but I HATE live tiles. On my 900 I turned off all the live tiles I could but several of them could not be turned off. To get around that I went and made them the tiny tile as those aren't "live" like the larger ones. However, because of that I have to have my people, pictures, me, etc.. tiles tiny. On my new device I would like to have those tiles be larger but do NOT want them to be live. Has MS changed it so you can turn all live tiles off or will I again have to have some of my tiles be the tiny ones?

 

[slyronit]

No. You cannot. Its best you don't buy a Windows device if you don't like Live tiles

 

[ssapre]

I'm still on 7.8 and looking to get an 830 but have a question about 8.1. Can live tiles be turned totally off? I know I'm a huge outlier with this, but I HATE live tiles. On my 900 I turned off all the live tiles I could but several of them could not be turned off. To get around that I went and made them the tiny tile as those aren't "live" like the larger ones. However, because of that I have to have my people, pictures, me, etc.. tiles tiny. On my new device I would like to have those tiles be larger but do NOT want them to be live. Has MS changed it so you can turn all live tiles off or will I again have to have some of my tiles be the tiny ones?

I think that is one of the best and unique features we might not want to loose... and have no option to 'turn it off'. You can use some apps which provide fancy icons, with those you might see a tile which is not live.
As such no direct option..

 

[AdamInTx]

No. You cannot. Its best you don't buy a Windows device if you don't like Live tiles

Really? So live tiles are all you care about? I like WP because it's a more stable OS than any other smartphone I've used. It very very rarely crashes, it's easy to use, it looks nice, and the feature that makes it soooooo much better than any iphone I've ever used is that they are good as phones too. Iphones are pretty nice devices for playing with, but every one I've used has been a crappy phone.

Saying I shouldn't buy a WP because I don't like live tiles is kinda dumb. Really, what is so fantastic about them? Ooohh I can have it rotate through pictures of my friends, I can rotate through pictures in my albums, I can show updated sports scores, updated stock info, new tweets, etc...!!!! Wow, yea can totally see why I should avoid windows phone if I don't care for this one feature.

 

[slyronit]

Really? So live tiles are all you care about? I like WP because it's a more stable OS than any other smartphone I've used. It very very rarely crashes, it's easy to use, it looks nice, and the feature that makes it soooooo much better than any iphone I've ever used is that they are good as phones too. Iphones are pretty nice devices for playing with, but every one I've used has been a crappy phone.

Saying I shouldn't buy a WP because I don't like live tiles is kinda dumb. Really, what is so fantastic about them? Ooohh I can have it rotate through pictures of my friends, I can rotate through pictures in my albums, I can show updated sports scores, updated stock info, new tweets, etc...!!!! Wow, yea can totally see why I should avoid windows phone if I don't care for this one feature.

No need to get your panties in a bunch.

Instead of pinning the actual app tiles to the start screen, get a program which allows you to create custom shortcut tiles. I have never used then myself, but you can find them by some Bing.

 

[Michael Brooks5]

I use an app called start perfect to get transparent tiles, but you could also use it for none live tiles too. I don't understand why you would permanently want live tiles off though, it's one of the best features.

 

[AdamInTx]

No need to get your panties in a bunch.

Instead of pinning the actual app tiles to the start screen, get a program which allows you to create custom shortcut tiles. I have never used then myself, but you can find them by some Bing.

Not in a bunch, it's just strange that you would advise somebody to not buy a WP simply because they don't like one particular feature of the OS. As for your second bit, I did look online, however not on bing, cannot stand bing, and found quite a few apps for doing what you said. What this tells me is that I am not the only person who doesn't like the live tiles. Don't really see why this is something MS won't allow users to turn off. In what way does it harm the OS to allow me to not have it updating tiles all the time. It's not like these tiles are doing anything critical that the OS needs to run.

 

[colinkiama]

Try unpinning everything and see what happens

 

[AdamInTx]

I use an app called start perfect to get transparent tiles, but you could also use it for none live tiles too. I don't understand why you would permanently want live tiles off though, it's one of the best features.

I hear that alot when I tell people I hate them but nobody has ever gave me a genuine great reason for them. It's an opinion thing. I don't care to have pictures or any other bit of data rotating on my screen. If I want to look at my albums I open my album and look at the pictures full screen. If I want to see things about my friends, I just open my people tab or actually go to facebook, etc.. to look at the information there. Not so into sports, or facebook, or twitter, or stocks, etc.. that I need to immediately know when one of them are updated. Since you state it's one of the best features, what do you have live updating on your start screen? Just curious as to what you are showing on your tiles that make it such an important feature for you.

Also, for the record I didn't like them on Windows 8 on my laptop before I switched back to 7 either. They just aren't something I care for. Not in any way saying they should get rid of them as plenty of other users clearly love them. Just wish there was an option to turn them off for those who don't enjoy them quite as much.

 

[EasilyTheBest]

As someone said above, if you don't like live tiles just delete every one of them, solved.
Every app is then available as a list, simples.

 

[o0Nighthawk0o]

Let's see. What I find useful on my live tiles?

My calendar app's live tile shows me upcoming appointments at a glance
My weather app's tile shows me the current weather and the forecast for the next few days
Family room's tile shows me any changes my family has done since I last looked.
Individual contact tiles show me if they have called, sent texts, etc.
My email tiles show me how many unread messages I have
The photo hub is just cool
Astronomy Hub shows the APOD
My Star Wars Commander tile shows my game stats without having to open the app.

All of this at a glance.

I will agree that some are useless and those can be turned off depending on the app but I find that most that I use can be very useful/helpful.

 

[colinkiama]

On 8.1 you can turn live tiles completely off. There is an app called battery sense. Turn of the background task for. Each app and it will never update again.

 

[SammyD97]

I also didn't like live tiles before. I preferred them static but now I can't live without them. To answer your question, no you can't turn them off unless the dev specifically made that option available in the apps settings.

 

[gerzhwin]

You could enable Battery Saver permanently and set the apps to not run while BS is on. Haven't tested, but this might work for you. Only your contract group tiles might keep changing the pictures, and some apps might keep flipping their tiles ...