iPhone Won't Delete Photos? Fix in 5 Tested Ways!

• User Case: Why is iPhone Not Letting Me Delete Photos?
• Why iPhone Won't Delete Photos?
• How to Fix iPhone Won’t Delete Photos Issue [5 Solutions]
• How to Permanently Delete Photos from iPhone
• Backup iCloud Photos Before Deleting via MultCloud
• Conclusion

User Case: Why is iPhone Not Letting Me Delete Photos?

Why iPhone Won't Delete Photos?

Before diving into the solutions for the iPhone won't delete photos issue, let's understand why you might encounter this problem. There are several reasons why your iPhone photos won't delete:

How to Fix iPhone Won’t Delete Photos Issue [5 Tested Solutions]

Now that we have a better understanding of the potential causes, let's explore the solutions to fix the issue "Why won't my photos delete on iPhone".

Solution 1. Restart Your iPhone

A simple restart can often resolve temporary software glitches and bring your iPhone back to normal functioning. To restart your iPhone, follow these steps to address your issue:

Step 1: Press and hold the power button until the "slide to power off" option appears.

Step 2: Slide the power icon to the right to turn off your iPhone.

Step 3: Press and hold the power button again until the Apple logo appears after a few seconds.

Solution 2. Check iCloud Photos Settings

If you have iCloud Photos enabled, it's essential to ensure that your settings are properly configured. Follow these steps to check your iCloud Photos settings:

Step 1: Go to the "Settings" app on your iPhone and tap on your Apple ID at the top of the screen.

Step 2: Select "iCloud" and then "Photos."

Step 3: Turn off the "Sync this iPhone" option to disable iCloud Photos syncing and wait for a few seconds.

Step 4: Turn on the "Sync this iPhone" button and check if your iPhone won't delete photos or not.

Solution 3. Disable Read-only Mode

If your photos are set to read-only mode, you cannot delete photos from iPhone. To disable read-only mode, follow these steps:

Step 1: Open the "Photos" app on your iPhone.

Step 2: Locate the photo you want to delete and open it.

Step 3: Click the 3-dot icon in the upper-right corner, choose "Duplicate" in the menu, and check if there is another photo in your album.

Step 4: Delete the duplicate photo and the original photo and you should now be able to remove it successfully.

Solution 4. Update iOS and Apps

Keeping your iPhone's operating system (iOS) and apps up to date is crucial for maintaining device performance and resolving various issues. Outdated software can sometimes lead to conflicts and glitches such as the iPhone won’t delete photos problem. To update your iPhone's software and apps, follow these steps:

Step 1: Go to the "Settings" app on your iPhone.

Step 2: Scroll down and tap on "General”.

Step 3: Select "Software Update" and check for any available updates.

Solution 5. Turn off iTunes Sync

If the photos you cannot delete are synced from iTunes, you have to turn off iTunes sync before deleting them from your iPhone.

Step 1: Connect your iPhone to the computer with a cable.

Step 2: Open iTunes and click on your device name in the upper-right corner.

Step 3: Select "Photos" in the left bar and uncheck the box beside "Sync Photos" or choose "Selected folders" instead of "All folders".

Step 4: Find the photos you want to remove from your iPhone and delete them.

How to Permanently Delete Photos from iPhone

After clicking the delete icon in the Library on your iPhone, the deleted photos will still occupy the device storage for 30 days before they are permanently deleted. If you want to free up your iPhone storage urgently, you can manually remove them from your iPhone.

Step 1: Go to the Photos app on your iPhone.

Step 2: Scroll down the page to find the "Recently Deleted" folder.

Step 3: Select the photos you want to permanently delete and click the "Delete" button.

Step 4: Tap "Delete From All Devices" to remove this photo from your iPhone and iCloud.

Backup iCloud Photos Before Deleting via MultCloud

If you find the reason why iPhone won't delete photos, before deleting the photos from your iPhone, it is a good idea to backup them to another place in case you want to restore them on another day or mistakenly delete some photos. In this regard, MultCloud Cloud Transfer is recommended to you.

MultCloud is used to manage your multiple cloud drives in one place instead of turning to different cloud websites. Cloud Transfer is one of MultCloud's main functions which can directly transfer files from one cloud to another without downloading. Besides, it can help you automatically delete the backed-up photos in iCloud Photos after the task is done.

Let’s see how easy to use MultCloud Cloud to transfer iCloud Photos to another cloud like Google Photos.

Step 1: Sign up for a free account on the MultCloud website.

Step 2: Add a cloud by tapping the "Add Cloud" button and cloud logo. Then you will log in to the cloud account and grant MultCloud access in the pop-up window.

Step 3: Click "Cloud Transfer" in the left sidebar and choose iCloud Photos as the source and Google Photos as the target. At last, tap "Transfer Now" to initiate the iCloud Photos to Google Photos transfer process.

Conclusion

Encountering the "iPhone won’t delete photos" issue can be frustrating. However, with the troubleshooting tips and solutions mentioned in this article, you can overcome the problem efficiently.

What's more, there are more great functions on MultCloud like Cloud Sync, Cloud Backup, Email Migration, and so on. You can solve many cloud problems in the best way with these functions. For example, if you want to move Gmail emails to Dropbox or another cloud as PDFs, using Email Migration is a pretty good try.