If you’re like most people, you probably rotate your Android phone’s screen when you’re reading. It’s a habit that probably started because the screen is always in the same orientation, and it makes it easier to see what’s on the screen. But there are ways to stop your phone from rotating the screen when you’re reading, and they can save you a lot of time and energy. Here are three tips:

  1. Use a case: If your phone is not protected by a case, it may rotate the screen when you’re reading. A good case will protect your phone from scratches and other damage, and it will also keep the screen in its original orientation.
  2. Use a power button: If your phone has a power button on one side, use that side to turn off the rotation of the screen. This will help avoid any accidental rotations that could happen while you’re reading.
  3. Use an app: Some apps can help stop your phone from rotating the screen when you’re reading. For example, Kindle Reading allows you to read books in their original orientation without having to rotate the device.

There’s actually a couple of ways to solve the problem, but we’ll show you two ways to solve the problem—one that makes sense, and the other that will only really work for people with a hardware keyboard.

Create a Shortcut to Toggle Auto-Rotate

This is by far the best option, since it will work regardless of the type of phone you have—just hit the AutoRotate Switch icon anytime you want the phone to stop rotating on you, and then hit the icon again when you want to enable the feature.

Head into the Market and search for “AutoRotate Switch”, install it, and then drag it from your applications folder onto the desktop somewhere. This application runs as a shortcut and not a widget in order to save memory.

Now whenever you hit the shortcut, it’ll show a little dialog that says “Switching OFF Auto-rotate”, and when you use the shortcut again, it’ll switch it back on. Awesome!

Note: as of the time of this writing, this little application is free. If at some point it should become non-free, you can always search for one of the other similar applications out there. I chose this one because it’s a shortcut and doesn’t waste memory running in the background as a widget.

The Built-in Way to Disable Auto-Rotate

If you’ve got a Droid, G1, or a Droid 2, you can make the phone stay in portrait mode all the time unless you’ve got the hardware keyboard extended. Before I found the shortcut method, this is what I used—it’s not as convenient, but it does work.

Head into Settings –> Display and uncheck Auto-rotate screen. That’s all there is to it.

So there you are—hit snooze on your alarm, and get comfortable in bed with your email, twitter, and whatever else.