Ask Tecca: 3 secrets to using a touchscreen with long fingernails

We all love our smartphones and tablets. They're handy, incredibly powerful, and just plain useful. But they do have a basic requirement: You need to be able to manipulate the touchscreen. For a variety of reasons, that can be a challenge for some folks. Tecca reader and loyal boyfriend David wrote us with this question:

My girlfriend just got a new phone with a touchscreen. She's about to ditch it, though, because she can't click the screen with her long fingernails. Any suggestions on how to make it work and save the phone?

Long nails can definitely get in the way of using a touchscreen. Most touchscreens require your actual flesh to touch them to work correctly; fingernails just won't do the trick. Of course, this isn't exactly a new problem, and there are a few workarounds to the issue. (We'll skip the obvious "trim your nails" advice, since it's not actually helpful to someone who wants longer fingernails.)

1. Your friend, the pinky
This trick is probably the simplest, most universal way to use a touchscreen phone when you have long nails. By turning your pinky slightly to the side, you can use the outside edge of your finger to tap your screen. It's not quite as fast as tapping away with the tip of your index finger, but it gets the job done. Using the side of your pinky offers the added benefit of not obfuscating your view of the screen. After all, it's hard to see your perturbed avian fly through the air when your thumb is in the way.

2. Touchscreen gloves
A close cousin of the fingernails-won't-work touchscreen problem is the wearing-gloves problem. When it's cold outside, folks wear gloves — but the fabric blocks your fingers from actually touching the screen, so people in mittens suffer the same problem as users with long fingernails. There's a clever solution to this particular issue. Touchscreen-friendly gloves use a conductive material in the fingers so you can keep using your smartphone even in the winter chill.

While gloves aren't a perfect solution for someone with long fingernails, wearing them might be better than just ditching the phone. The downside is that you'd have to put the gloves on any time you want to do serious typing. Check out our review of some of these gloves; they double a a nice little surprise gift. Obviously, this solution won't work if your fingernails are too long to comfortably fit inside.

3. A stylus
Another alternative to consider is to use a stylus with your phone. A stylus is essentially a pen that you use to tap or draw on the screen. Like the touchscreen-friendly gloves, it has a conductive material in the tip that lets the touchscreen do its work.

A stylus is probably the sleekest option of the three, but it does have its own drawbacks and considerations. First, it's a separate device you'll need to carry around. It can get dropped, bent, mangled, or otherwise rendered inoperable. You'll probably find yourself buying a few of these over the lifetime of the phone. Second, make sure your phone works with the stylus. While most manufacturers are pretty good at making sure the stylus does its thing correctly with all capacitive touchscreens, it's still best to be positive. The Rocketfish stylus is a pretty good example of this kind of tool, and it works with most touchscreens we've encountered.

The best practical solution
The best solution to problems using a touchscreen with long fingernails is probably to employ a mix of all three techniques. Use the side of your pinky when you're just doing some light browsing, pop on the gloves for more serious typing, and use a stylus for anything else that doesn't fall in the first two categories. Long fingernails can be an inconvenience when you're using a touchscreen, but the problem isn't insurmountable.

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