How to Delete Recently Deleted Photos on iPhone

To permanently delete photos from Recently Deleted on iPhone, open Photos, go to Utilities > Recently Deleted, unlock with Face ID or your passcode, tap Select, then choose Delete All (or select specific items and tap Delete), and confirm. Once deleted there, the photos are gone from the phone and, if iCloud Photos is on, from iCloud and your other devices. Copies in backups, Messages or Shared Albums are separate and need their own cleanup.

Steps on iOS 18

1. Open the Photos app.
2. Scroll down past your collections to Utilities.
3. Tap Recently Deleted and unlock with Face ID, Touch ID or your passcode.
4. Tap Select in the top-right corner.
5. To empty everything, tap Delete All (on some versions it's in the More menu, the three dots). To delete only some items, tap them, then tap Delete.
6. Confirm Delete from This iPhone (or Delete from All Devices with iCloud Photos on).

Steps on iOS 26

The Photos app in iOS 26 is organized into Library and Collections tabs.

1. Open Photos and tap Collections.
2. Scroll to Utilities and tap Recently Deleted.
3. Unlock with Face ID or your passcode.
4. Tap Select, then select items or use Delete All from the menu.
5. Confirm the deletion.

Menu labels move slightly between versions; if you can't find Utilities, search for "Recently Deleted" in the Photos search field.

Recovering instead of deleting

If you opened Recently Deleted by mistake and want something back, the same screen works in reverse: select the items and tap Recover. Recovered photos return to the library and, with iCloud Photos on, to your other devices. After about 30 days, or after you tap Delete, that option is gone for good, and only a backup can bring a photo back.

When Delete All doesn't seem to work

• Items reappear: with iCloud Photos on, another device that's offline may sync an old state later. Make sure every device is online and updated, then empty Recently Deleted again.
• Storage doesn't go down: iPhone storage figures update slowly. Restart the phone and check Settings > General > iPhone Storage after a while.
• You can't find the album: check that you're signed in and that the phone has a passcode; without a passcode, the lock options look different.

Make sure Recently Deleted stays locked

While photos sit in Recently Deleted, anyone who opens the album can recover them. Check that it's locked:

1. Go to Settings > Apps > Photos (on iOS 17 and earlier, Settings > Photos).
2. Turn on Use Face ID (or Use Touch ID / Use Passcode).

This locks both Hidden and Recently Deleted. It's only as strong as your phone passcode, though; anyone who knows it can open both. We explain why in is the iPhone Hidden album secure.

Where copies still live after you empty it

Deleting from Recently Deleted cleans up the Photos library. It doesn't touch copies made elsewhere. Go through this list for anything sensitive:

• iCloud Photos on other devices. With sync on, deletions propagate. If a Mac or iPad had sync off and imported the photo some other way, it keeps its own copy.
• Shared Albums. Photos you posted to a Shared Album are separate copies. Open the album and delete them there.
• Messages. Photos you sent or received stay in the conversation. Delete the attachment in the conversation's details, or the conversation itself. Remember the recipient has a copy too.
• Other apps. WhatsApp, Telegram, email, Google Photos, Dropbox and similar apps keep their own copies and often their own trash folders.
• Backups. An iCloud Backup or a Mac/PC backup made while the photo existed still contains it. It will come back if you restore from that backup. New backups overwrite old ones over time.
• Hidden album. Check it's not still there; hidden photos aren't shown in the main library. See how to find hidden photos on iPhone.

Can someone recover the photos afterward?

On a modern iPhone, every file is encrypted with its own key, and deleting a file discards that key. Recovering a permanently deleted photo directly from the phone's storage is not a realistic risk for most people. The realistic risks are the copies listed above, especially old backups and other people's phones.

That's also why apps that promise to "recover permanently deleted photos" usually just read your backups.

The cleaner approach: don't let sensitive photos into the library

The Photos library is designed to keep things, not forget them: 30-day trash, sync, backups, Memories, search. For photos you'd rather not have there at all, it's simpler to keep them somewhere else from the start.

sigil. keeps photos in an encrypted vault on your iPhone, separate from the Photos library. Its private camera saves photos directly into the vault, so there's nothing to delete from Recently Deleted later. When you import an existing photo, you then delete the original from Photos, and empty Recently Deleted once, using the steps above. The vault opens with its own sign, not your phone passcode.

To be clear about trade-offs: sigil. is local-first and has no cloud backup yet. Photos inside it exist only on that phone unless you back them up yourself.

Quick checklist

• Empty Recently Deleted after deleting anything sensitive.
• Keep Use Face ID on for Hidden and Recently Deleted.
• Delete copies in Shared Albums, Messages and third-party apps.
• Remember old backups still contain the photo.
• For the future, take sensitive photos without saving to the Camera Roll.