How to Delete All Photos from an iPhone

This How.com.vn teaches you how to remove all the pictures from the Photos app on your iPhone. You can do this from the iPhone's Photos app itself, or you can use an iCloud Photo Library-connected Mac to quickly erase your iPhone's photos.

Method 1

Method 1 of 2:

On iPhone

Tap the Photos app icon, which resembles a white box with a multicolored flower icon.
2
Tap Albums. It's in the bottom-right corner of the screen.
- If Photos opens to a picture, tap the "Back" button in the top-left corner of the screen before tapping Albums.
3
Tap Camera Roll. This is in the upper-left side of the screen.
- If your iPhone uses iCloud Photo Library, this option will be entitled All Photos instead.
It's in the upper-right corner of the screen.
5
Select all of the photos in your library. Tap the bottom-right photo, then tap and drag from the bottom-right photo to the upper-left photo; you should see all of the photos in between gain checkmarks, and the screen will begin to scroll up while checking every photo in the process.
- You'll need to keep your finger in the top-left corner of the screen until all of the photos are selected.
- If you have an iPhone 6S or later, make sure you tap and drag lightly rather than pressing down on the screen to avoid opening the 3D Touch menu.
- You can also just tap each photo you want to select, but this will take a long time if you have more than 100 photos in your Camera Roll.
It's the trash can-shaped icon in the lower-right corner of the screen.
7
Tap Delete # Items when prompted. This moves all the photos in the album to the "Recently Deleted" folder.
- The "#" sign will be replaced with the number of photos you're deleting. For example, if you're deleting 100 photos, you would tap Delete 100 Items here.
8
Remove the photos from the "Recently Deleted" folder. Once you've deleted all of the photos in your iPhone's Camera Roll, you'll still have to remove them from your iPhone's "Recently Deleted" folder:
- Tap the < Albums back button in the top-left corner of the screen.
- Scroll down and tap Recently Deleted.
- Tap Select in the top-right corner.
- Tap Delete All in the bottom-left corner.
- Tap Delete # Items when prompted.
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Method 2

Method 2 of 2:

On Mac

1
Understand the limitations of this method. If your iPhone's photos are synchronized to iCloud Library, you can use your Mac's Photos app to quickly select and delete the photos; however, you can't use the iCloud website to mass-delete photos, meaning you won't be able to do this on a Windows computer.
- While the iCloud website will allow you to delete one photo at a time, you cannot select more than one photo at once.
2
Enable iCloud Photo Library if necessary. You'll need to have iCloud Photo Library enabled on both your iPhone and a Mac that uses the same Apple ID in order to delete your iPhone's photos from a Mac:
- iPhone — Open Settings, tap your name card at the top of the screen, tap iCloud, tap Photos, tap the white "iCloud Photo Library" switch, and select a storage option.
- Mac — Open Photos, click Photos in the top-left corner of the screen, click Preferences..., click iCloud, check "iCloud Photo Library", and click a storage option.
- It can take several hours for your photos to finish syncing across your iPhone and your Mac if you're just now enabling iCloud Photo Library.
3
Open your Mac's
Photos app. Click the Photos app icon, which resembles a multicolored pinwheel, in your Mac's Dock.
- Skip this step if you already opened Photos to enable the iCloud Photo Library on your Mac.
It's in the upper-left corner of the window.^{[1]XResearch source}
Click any photo on the page, then press ⌘ Command+A to select every photo in the "All Photos" album.
It's a trash can-shaped icon at the top of the Photos window.
7
Click Delete # Items when prompted. Doing so will move all of your selected photos into the "Recently Deleted" folder.
- As with an iPhone, the "#" refers to the number of photos you're deleting. For example, if you're deleting 3000 photos, you would click Delete 3000 Items here.
8
Remove the photos from the "Recently Deleted" album. Since deleting the photos from the "All Photos" album doesn't actually delete them from your iCloud Photo Library, you'll need to finish the job by clearing out the "Recently Deleted" folder:
- Click the Recently Deleted tab on the left side of the page.
- Click Delete All in the upper-right corner.
- Click Delete # Items when prompted.
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Community Q&A

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Question
How do I delete apps from my iPhone 7 screen?
Community Answer
Hold the app and it will shake and come up with an X. Click the X, and it will be deleted.
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Question
I have used all of the memory on my iPhone 5. How do I delete photos when I get booted out of the photo program?
Community Answer
Plug your device into your computer, either Windows or Mac. From iTunes (Mac) or File Explorer (Windows), delete pictures that are on your phone. If you want to save those pictures, simply move them to your computer hard drive by copying and pasting, or downloading from your iPhone.
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Question
How do I restore photos that were recently deleted?
Community Answer
To recover ALL recently deleted photos, open the "Recently Deleted" album. Press "Select" followed by "Recover All." On the menu that appears, select "Recover Photos." If you just want to recover selected photos, open the album, press "Select," and then tap the photos you want to recover to select them. Once you have chosen the photos you want, press "Recover" and "Recover Photos."
Thanks! We're glad this was helpful.
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